Was Ike not near as bad as anticipated???

[hurricanetrack]

Mike Watkins and I ran in to a couple on the west end of Galveston, in Bermuda Beach, on Friday morning who said they were not leaving. They lived on the Bay. We told them that there would likely be 10 feet or more of water over the island in the best case and 20+ in the worst case and that trying to out-guess where the center would cross was playing with their lives. They told us "The worst thing that could happen is that we would die". That really happened. They really said this.

And, these folks were riding around in the early overwash on their golf cart. Makes you wonder- it really does.

[jinftl]

for them, it was 'as bad as anticipated' then...not better, not worse...and closer to the 10' surge estimate than the 20' estimate in their location (which shouldn't have made a difference unless they were over 10' tall)

Mike Watkins and I ran in to a couple on the west end of Galveston, in Bermuda Beach, on Friday morning who said they were not leaving. They lived on the Bay. We told them that there would likely be 10 feet or more of water over the island in the best case and 20+ in the worst case and that trying to out-guess where the center would cross was playing with their lives. They told us "The worst thing that could happen is that we would die". That really happened. They really said this.

And, these folks were riding around in the early overwash on their golf cart. Makes you wonder- it really does.

[stu]

I was on Galveston Island last Friday night when Ike made landfall. Prior to this I was on Surf Side Beach (south of Freeport) which was already flooded out by mid-day Friday – The local police told me that there was only one stubborn old man left in surf side who refused to evac. I did see a picture of him after the event so I know that he was OK.

During Ike, The Galveston PD that they estimated that 20,000 people still remained on Galveston – I saw many of them on the Saturday morning – the look of shock on there faces tells me that Ike was way worse then they expected. I was unable to reach the West side of the island on Saturday as the road was blocked with debris. I got off the island early Saturday evening (had to go to Austin to find a room)

As an aside the highest wind gust I recorded was 104 mph (RM Young anemometer)