Hurricane Rita 4th Year Anniversary - 9/25/09

[StormClouds63]

Here's a couple of links:

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/TCR-AL182005_Rita.pdf
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/lch/rita/rita_main.php
http://kplcblogs.typepad.com/weatherblo ... -rita.html

Rode out Rita, and would not recommend every doing so again. Peak intensity (officially 897) over south-central GOM. I think lowest pressure estimated (unofficially) at 895. Pressure at landfall 937 mb. Though it weakened considerably, still packed quite a punch. 47-year interval between Audrey and Rita ended with a slam-dunk, only to have Ike 3 years later add to the misery.

This 2009 season puts in perspective how incredibly active 2005 really was:
http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/general/lib/li ... s/2005.pdf

[southerngale]

It actually hit on the 24th. I've talked about my experience and the devastation here so many times before, there's no point in repeating it. Rita came up several times yesterday and the memories flew back like it was yesterday... no pun intended.

Hurricane Rita pictures

[Derek Ortt]

Just curious, which of the two storms was worse for NE Texas and SW Louisiana? Rita or Ike?

[StormClouds63]

From a SW Louisiana perspective, wind and structural damage far more significant in Rita. Storm surge and flooding actually worse from Ike.

[southerngale]

Actually, it would be the same as what you said. While both caused very heavy wind damage, there's no doubt it was worse in Rita. Many more homes and buildings were destroyed, electricity was out for weeks and it was just generally worse in all areas, except storm surge and flooding. Don't get me wrong, the wind damage in Ike was awful, just not quite as bad as Rita, generally speaking. Of course some people had worse damage in Ike than Rita, I guess it depended on those pockets of higher winds. Areas like Bridge City though, the entire city (aside from a few lucky homes) was inundated with storm surge for Ike. Practically everything was destroyed. While some homes and businesses survived Rita, although damage was everywhere, not much in Bridge City survived Ike.

Also, the damage far inland to areas like Jasper and surrounding areas was much worse in Rita, although Ike was mean as well.

Eh, they were both devastating.


Entergy:

Hurricane Rita Damage Assessment

On September 24, 2005, Hurricane Rita hit the coast of Texas and Louisiana, almost a month after Hurricane Katrina caused widespread power outages and catastrophic damage to portions of Entergy’s service territory. Hurricane Rita affected 14 fossil-fueled units owned and/or operated by the Utility, and caused significant infrastructure damage to Entergy’s transmission system, severing east-west connections between Lafayette, La. and Conroe, Tex. At its peak, Hurricane Rita took out of service 82 percent of Entergy’s Texas transmission lines and 38 percent of the Entergy transmission lines in southwest Louisiana, including all the lines in Louisiana west of Lafayette. Virtually every transmission line between Lafayette and Conroe was knocked out of service. As of 3:00 p.m. yesterday, Entergy had restored 206 of the 344 affected transmission lines and 308 of the 436 substation outages. Five of the fossil-fueled units remain offline until storm damage repairs to those units are completed.

[Jagno]

Yesterday DH called me at work and asked if I remembered him sending me photos of what use to be our home around the same time 4 years ago. Yep, not an event that you forget easily. I wonder if people ever really "get over" so much loss and devastation. I learned early to move on but lots of folks still talk about getting back to normal. It will NEVER be what was and this is the new normal. Ike was not nearly as bad for wind damage as Rita was but did make up for it in flooding. Rita made landfall on Sept. 24th, not the 25th. I know this because it was my daughter in laws 21st birthday and I bought us each a nice drink.......after seeing the photos of course. LOL