September 20, 2005
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Rita Strengthens to Hurricane as Gulf Coast Watches and Waits
NOAA
The position of Hurricane Rita at 10:15 a.m. ET, according to the National Hurricane Center.
September 20, 2005
Rita Strengthens to Hurricane as Gulf Coast Watches and Waits
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS
and CORNELIA DEAN
BATON ROUGE, La., Sept. 20 – Hurricane Rita beat a path toward the west today with strong rain and winds that are expected to batter Florida’s southern coast and the Keys and potentially pose a new threat to the weary Gulf Coast.
The center of the hurricane, which strengthened from tropical storm status this morning, was about 75 miles southeast of Key West, Fla., and about 100 miles northeast of Havana, the National Hurricane Center said.
The approach of the storm has prompted evacuations in Key West and other coastal towns, and residents of Texas and Louisiana are warily tracking the storm’s progress.
The hurricane center said the storm had reached category 1 strength as it gathered force some 75 to 100 miles east-southeast of Key West. Maximum sustained winds were near 85 miles per hour, the center said, and the strongest winds associated with the eye wall of the hurricane are expected to impact portions of the Florida Keys directly.
Forecasters say that if the storm follows its predicted course, it will strike west of New Orleans – somewhere in southwest Louisiana or along the Texas coast – as early as Friday evening. But even if it does miss New Orleans, its accompanying rainstorms, even if they amount to only a few inches, could cause significant flooding in a city where some neighborhoods have never dried out and the levees have not been fully repaired, officials said.
Rainfall levels could reach 8 inches in some of the string of islands or even up to 12 inches in parts of Cuba and the Florida Keys. The Keys and parts of Miami-Dade County in Florida were under a voluntary evacuation order.
The storm is expected to strengthen once it crosses into the Gulf of Mexico. Hurricanes draw strength from warm surface water, so it is not unusual for a relatively weak Atlantic storm to roar to life as it crosses the warmer Gulf, where water temperatures have been unusually high all summer, said Abby Sallenger of the United States Geological Survey. This happened just over three weeks ago, when Hurricane Katrina, then a Category 1 storm, cut through southern Florida and strengthened to a Category 5 in the gulf.
The Army Corps of Engineers said it was preparing for a second round of severe weather as Tropical Storm Rita approached the Gulf of Mexico, ordering additional sandbags and re-distributing pumps and other equipment to prepare for a possible emergency response.
When Rita approached the Florida Keys on Monday with sustained winds of about 70 miles an hour, emergency officials ordered partial evacuations as far north as Broward County, even though the mainland was not expected to bear the storm’s brunt. About 40,000 residents of the lower Keys were ordered to evacuate, and the normally carefree spirit of Key West was strikingly subdued. “We went to bed Friday not worrying about this and woke up Sunday worrying about it,” said Raymond Archer, the port director in Key West, on Monday. “This is fresh and real in people’s minds.”
Mayor Jimmy Weekley spent Monday urging even stubborn long-timers to leave, and thousands of cars chugged north on Route 1.
“I still have people coming up to me and saying they are staying,” said Mr. Weekley. “I’m telling them to re-think their position.”
Texas, which provided major sanctuary to victims of Hurricane Katrina, went on heightened alert Monday.
The island city of Galveston, which was all but obliterated 105 years ago in a hurricane that claimed up to 12,000 lives, activated its emergency management plan. Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas said that if the storm continued on its projected course, she would order a voluntary evacuation to begin at 2 p.m. today.
Those without cars will be offered space on 88 school buses to four Red Cross shelters in Huntsville, Tex. Nearly 1,200 members of the Texas National Guard have been recalled from relief operations in Louisiana for return to their home bases.
In Louisiana, Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said coastal residents in the southwest should prepare to evacuate now.
“Even if it doesn’t strike the Louisiana coast directly, I want to remind our citizens that we are on the east side of the hurricane,” Governor Blanco said. “We are still in a very dangerous place.”
Mark Smith, spokesman for the Louisiana Office of Homeland Security and Emergency, said that if the hurricane shifted closer to New Orleans, devastating flooding could follow. “If there’s another event, we’re concerned the levees that are being repaired would fail,” Mr. Smith said.
Timothy Williams reported from Baton Rouge, La., for this article and Cornelia Dean from New York. Reporting was contributed by Christine Hauser in New York; Tim O’Hara in Key West, Fla.; Abby Goodnough in Miami; Ralph Blumenthal in Houston; and John Schwartz in Baton Rouge.
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