Freeport, Texas, Prepares for Landfall; Hurricane Ike Approaches

Freeport, Texas -- Located about 50 miles south of Houston, between Corpus Christi and Galveston on the Texas coast, the city of Freeport prepares to be ground zero for Hurricane Ike. A quiet coastal community of about 20,000, Freeport, Texas is proud of its 100-year-old fishing heritage and its nationally ranked birding areas. Inspired in 2000 by a visit from First Lady Laura Bush, the city of Freeport committed to a downtown revitalization program and set about to update and enhance the historic downtown area. It is now a Texas Main Street City with a growing tourist economy.

Freeport also is one of the busiest shipping ports in the country. According to PortFreeport.com, the port is ranked 14th in the country for foreign shipping and is continuously looking to expand in size and volume. Its location on the Gulf of Mexico provides easy access to oil platforms and the domestic and international shipping lanes. It's a city on the move.

After Saturday, September 13, all of that could change completely.

Hurricane Ike, the ninth named storm of the season, is currently situated some 500 miles off the coast of Texas. It is projected to make landfall in Freeport sometime late Friday or early Saturday morning as a Category 3 with winds in excess of 115 mph. The National Hurricane Center in Advisory #42 issued at 2:00 p.m. EDT, Thursday, indicates a wind field expanding approximately 115 miles from the eye of the storm. This puts several large population centers including Galveston and Houston, Texas directly in its maximum impact zone. Communities in Louisiana are also keeping a close eye on the developing situation. Hurricane Ike's path and circulation after landfall threatens to blanket Lake Charles, Shreveport, and New Iberia, Louisiana with tropical storm force winds and flooding rain.

Last weekend the storm decimated Cuba and the Turks and Caicos Islands, and added to the disastrous flood conditions in Haiti. The death toll from its time in the Caribbean stands at 80 and Texas officials are doing what they can to make sure that the final count does not include any citizens of their state. Mandatory evacuation orders are in place for thousands in the coastal communities and for sections of Galveston and Houston.

Tough lessons learned through a slow response to Hurricane Katrina led Texas Governor Rick Perry to declare the region most likely to be affected by Hurricane Ike, a disaster area. This allows state disaster agencies to activate and frees up funding set aside for emergency response. In a related move, President Bush has authorized federal emergency funds to be readied for the aftermath of Hurricane Ike.

The Texas coast is no stranger to major hurricanes. The storm considered as the deadliest on record for the United States hit Galveston on September 8, 1900. The unnamed storm, estimated to be a Category 4 hurricane, devastated the city and surrounding area, pushing an 8'-15' wall of water into the low-lying area. Although the actual number is not known, an estimated 6,000-12,000 people died in the storm. Over 100 years have passed since the Galveston Hurricane, but it stands as the deadliest weather disaster in the history of the United States.

Sources:
http://www.texasexplorer.com/Freeport.htm
http://www.portfreeport.com/about.htm
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jG1m4XT341oCKXPMIZlKffdhP9vwD934IN280
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/graphics_at4.shtml?5day#contents