posted by admin on Jun 26
During the first week of September, 2008 Hurricane Ike tore through the islands of Turks & Caicos and Great Inagua as a category four, with sustained winds of 135mph, before making landfall on the north coast of Cuba as a strong category three, with 120mph winds.
Ike crossed the eastern and central provinces of the Cuban mainland and moved offshore, paralleling the south coast of the island, making another landfall over the western portion of Cuba and emerging into the Gulf of Mexico.
The hurricane continued across the Gulf and made a final landfall near Galveston, Texas as a borderline category two/three, with 110mph winds, during the early morning hours of September 13th.
The hurricane caused extensive wind and storm surge damage in the affected areas, virtually obliterating several coastal communities on the Bolivar peninsula of the upper Texas coast.
With monetary losses over $31 billion (USD), Ike is now ranked as the third costliest hurricane in United States history.
From the afternoon of September 7th through the evening of September 9th, storm chasers Michael Laca, Jim Leonard, Jose Garcia and Max Hagen intercepted numerous outer rainbands, from Hurricane Ike, in the middle and lower Florida Keys, as the storm passed well to the south.
At the time of Ike’s closest point of approach to the Keys, the hurricane was a category one with sustained winds of 80mph and a central pressure of 965mb (28.50in).
Although the center of Ike remained a significant distance (150 miles) to the south, the hurricane had a very large windfield and produced sustained tropical storm conditions (39-73mph), with gusts of near hurricane-force, across most of the Florida Keys, which resulted in some minor wind damage.
These strong winds produced a 2-3ft storm surge in exposed locations on the Atlantic side of the lower Keys. During high-tide, many low-lying areas experienced significant flooding.
Numerous tornadic thunderstorms were also embedded within the outer rain bands of Hurricane Ike and several confirmed reports of tornadoes and tornadic waterspouts have been received from locations throughout the Keys.
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Maritime Safety and Security Team Boston esses the Houston Ship Channel for obstructions and damage following Hurricane Ike. Coast Guard personnel and ets from around the country were deployed to the Houston-Galveston area to ist with search and rescue, aids to navigation repair and pollution essment.
Crews from Aids to Navigation Teams Galveston and Port O’Connor load temporary buoys onto a 55-foot Coast Guard boat at Sector Field Office Galveston before getting underway. More than ninety percent of the aids to navigation were either damaged, destroyed or moved out of position in the Gulf of Mexico and the Houston Ship Channel during Hurricane IKE. The Coast Guard is repairing and repositioning buoys to reopen the ports and Ship Channel as quickly as possible. (Coast Guard video by PA3 Rob Simpson)
In this video by the U.S. Coast Guard, an Air Station Houston HH-65C rescue helicopter crew conducted a pre-Hurricane Ike overflight of the Freeport/Galveston coastline. Numerous ships including shrimp boats and barges can be seen taking the necessary cover for the impending storm, Sept. 11, 2008. Heavy surf arrived early, erasing the beaches and threatening houses being prepared to weather Ike.
Our Texas History project about the Galveston Flood of 1900.
Click HERE galveston-come-back.blogspot.com … hurricane storm tropical emergency disaster fima government president rescue nature history loot insurance flood