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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
Hurricane Rita Impacts Coast
Aired September 23, 2005 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LARRY KING, HOST, "LARRY KING LIVE": Anderson Cooper in Galveston and Aaron Brown in New York will co-anchor a four-hour. I hope Anderson holds up through it. And Aaron Brown's ready for it. He's got the jacket off.
Mr. Brown, it's yours.
AARON BROWN, CO-HOST: Thank you. We'll talk to you tomorrow.
Good evening again, everyone. Anderson is in Beaumont, Texas, tonight, about 40 miles inland, and we -- we're working on communications there. We'll hear from him shortly.
For all intents and purposes now, we're at the beginning of the hurricane. The eye is still a few hours away from making land, but the winds have started to pick up in some parts of the gulf quite ferociously. So -- so for all intents and purposes, it is on.
And for all intents and purposes, the area has pretty much been evacuated. And that's the best news that we give you. This is not heading for major population centers tonight. Nothing like Katrina in that regard. But it is under way.
We heard a short time ago from a police officer in Port Arthur, Texas, right in the center of where this thing's going to go. "I've lived here all my life," he said. "And I don't expect it to be the same when I get back." Here is why.
The eye of Rita now a few dozen miles off shore. It is a strong Category 3 hurricane. Beaumont, Port Arthur, Lake Charles, Louisiana, all very much in the crosshairs. Cities largely empty, save for the usual hold-outs, as best we can tell.
More than 2.5 million Texans are away from home tonight, the largest migration in the history of that state. Rita claimed its first casualties today, early today, near Dallas, Texas. Two people died -- 24 people died when a bus carrying elderly patients caught fire and oxygen bottles on board exploded.
Oddly enough, the first significant storm damage came in New Orleans. Tonight, engineers watching the levees in St. Bernard Parish after high water became too for a pair of levees in the city's Ninth Ward. That part of town once again flooded, though largely empty. Mostly there, too, people have moved out, have not come back in.
Lake Pontchartrain, as Chad Myers put it a few moments ago, acting as a catcher's mitt for the heavy rains. Levels there have risen about six feet just today.
We begin first here with Max Mayfield at the National Hurricane Center in South Florida. We talked to him just a few moments ago.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: At this point, I assume the die is pretty much cast. So to the best -- the best you can, where does it hit? When does it hit?
CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, the eye will likely be on the coast very near the Texas-Louisiana border very early on Saturday morning here, but for all practical purposes, it's already hitting.
We've 90 miles per hour gusts at Cameron, Louisiana, and over near Marsh Island on the Louisiana coast. Gusts approaching hurricane force near Beaumont and Port Arthur.
The biggest concern is going to be the storm surge, and that's going to come in -- the highest amount will come in here the time of landfall near into the east where the center crosses the coast.
So here's the track of the hurricane right here. And, the red area that you see here is storm surge of 18 to 20 feet. We're very, very concerned about the areas here in Cameron, Louisiana. The surge pushing up over Cameron through Calcasieu Lake and up towards Lake Charles area. And then depending on the track here, if it's a little bit west of being here, the storm surge will push up into the Port Arthur area and Sabine Lake area, headed well up the Sabine River.
BROWN: And, how far into the day will we see that? Or into the night.
MAYFIELD: As long as that storm remains on the shore, you know, the flow remains on shore, it's going to keep piling water up. So it will still be pushing up, you know, well into Saturday morning.
BROWN: When you talk about it making landfall, we're talking about the eye of the storm making landfall.
MAYFIELD: That's right. But, you know, perhaps the more important thing here is that the core of the hurricane itself, you can see out here, that's going to be, you know, shortly after midnight.
But they are getting very strong winds along the Louisiana coast and will eventually be -- well, they'll be continuing to pick up along the extreme upper Texas coast.
BROWN: I assume that all these hurricanes have personalities of their own, characteristics of their own. Is -- this one reminds you of any in particular? Is it like Katrina? Unlike Katrina? Like something else that you can think of?
MAYFIELD: Well, I think it -- if there's any good news here, it's not as strong as Katrina. It's not as large as Katrina and it's certainly not hitting a populated area like Katrina did. The best analog is probably Hurricane Audrey back in 1957. It made landfall near the Texas-Louisiana border, and they actually had storm surge from Cameron, Louisiana, and all the way up into Lake Charles with that hurricane.
BROWN: Best guess you have, the next eight hours, 12 hours, 24 hours, how long is it going to be? Very difficult and very dangerous.
MAYFIELD: I'm afraid we're talking about days here, if we include the rainfall.
BROWN: OK.
MAYFIELD: The immediate concern, coastline tonight and, you know, tomorrow morning, but then after that, for the next four to five days, we need to be very careful about the imminent fresh water flooding.
BROWN: So we're not really at the end of anything. We're at the beginning of something.
MAYFIELD: That's correct.
BROWN: Max, good to see you. Thanks again for your time.
MAYFIELD: Thank you, sir.
BROWN: Max Mayfield at the National Hurricane Center in south Florida tonight.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Talked to him just before we went on the air.
Anderson is in Beaumont, Texas, and being lashed around pretty good there.
Anderson, good evening if you can hear me.
ANDERSON COOPER, CO-HOST: Yes, Aaron. I do hear you. Good evening.
It definitely does feel like just the beginning of something here. We have been here now for about two hours of so in this location. It has gotten demonstrably worst, really over the last 30 minutes or so, but it's nothing compared to what we think we are going to be seeing.
I mean, you don't want to say you get used to this sort of thing but it is certainly -- it feels like a bad rainstorm right now. I mean, yes, there are winds. There are gusts, which are now increasing. And, kind of blowing us around pretty good and nothing near the hurricane strength winds that we are anticipating seeing here over the next several hours, over the next four hours that you and I are definitely on the air together. The winds right now coming from the north. But as we know, with hurricanes, that -- there's so much schizophrenic in terms of winds, depending on where the storm is, we're also anticipating winds from the east and then later on from the south.
So, part of what we're trying to do is just get prepared to be in a location that, as the winds shift we will be OK. We're actually -- you can't see it because it's too dark. But the Natchez River is just right over there. It's an inland waterway, an inland river here in Beaumont.
The town of about 110,000, 115,000 people has largely evacuated. The mayor I talked to a short time ago said he estimates about 90 to 95 percent of the people are gone. Most of the people left earlier today and yesterday, part of that huge exodus on the roads here in Texas.
Actually, driving here today, from Galveston is very easy. Roads were completely empty heading this way. Because no one sensible would be heading in this direction, of course.
And it is certainly good news that the town has largely evacuated. They got the special needs people out. They got those who didn't have access to cars. They provided them with some transportation yesterday.
But all the police are on duty. There are about 240 or so officers here. They have all shown up for work. They are all sequestered in various locations in this town, ready to go out if and when they're need, as soon as the worst of this storm has passed, Aaron.
BROWN: Just, Andersen, if you can hear me, because I know people are going to wonder and worry, to what extent are you protected there from stuff flying around?
COOPER: Yes, you know, we're not taking any chances. And you know, we've all seen what happens in these things and anyone who's covered these things for an amount of time has a healthy respect for how horrific they can be.
We feel very good about this position we're in. We are surrounded on two sides by buildings: the city hall, government buildings, very solid buildings. There's not a lot of debris that can fly around from where we are.
I just have a wall over on that side of me. There's a wall on that side of me, as well.
And as these winds shift, we're going to be adjusting our position. We also always have a fall back position, which we have -- we actually have two or three fall back positions from here.
So we feel very good. The big question is the storm surge, will there be -- how much storm surge will there be? We're probably a good 25, 30 feet off the Natchez River, so we should be fine in terms of storm surge. So we feel pretty good, Aaron.
BROWN: OK. So do we then. We'll be right back to you.
Courtney Zavala is in Galveston, Texas, tonight. She's a reporter with KPRC in Houston, Texas, and she joins us now. What's it like there?
COURTNEY ZAVALA, KPRC CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, I can tell you that each minute that these new bands keep coming in, it's getting stronger and stronger.
Consistently, we've been dealing with about 45, 50 mile an hour winds. We're getting gusts now of up to 65 mile an hour winds.
We're actually in a parking lot, a strip mall parking lot. The gulf directly behind me, just feet from the sea wall. We're not seeing any flooding there on the sea wall boulevard.
What we're concerned about over here -- we'll show you this little street sign here. This thing is truly just taking a beating. I'm going to tell you in the next couple of hours, that sign probably is not going to last much longer.
If we can take -- shoot up and you can really just see the shot of the wind and the rain through the palm tree and through this light here, it's just consistently getting stronger and stronger.
We have witnessed and actually seen a transformer blow in this parking lot. We have reports of power outages all around Galveston, of course, and Harris County, as well.
There was a fire here on the island at about, I guess it was probably about 6 p.m. this evening. Emergency crews were able to respond to that. Nobody was in -- it was actually a convenience store. And that was the last emergency response that they were able to make.
They took all their vehicles, got them to higher ground and they said, you know, "If we get a 911 call like that, a fire, it's going to have to be, 'Oh, well'."
We've seen a lot of power trucks, Center Point Energy trucks, going up and down the sea wall. We were told that we weren't going to see any kind of that activity. Lots of police activity. But truly, no one, obviously, out on the streets except for us. Just feeling this wind and rain really taking a beating on us here in Galveston tonight, Aaron.
BROWN: As best you can tell, does the city still have power?
ZAVALA: Does the city still have...
BROWN: Power.
ZAVALA: Power, yes, absolutely. We're being told that about 30,000 people out -- without power here on the island. Also, a transformer at the airport. Obviously that's really not going to make a big difference tonight.
But you can see behind me, we've got lights here in this part. And also, the emergency operations center, which is actually just -- we're east of it. And that still has some power. Of course, they have generators and things like that, but we're still seeing all the street lights on at this point.
BROWN: Courtney, nice job. Thanks for your help tonight. Courtney Zavala with KPRC in Houston, Texas. She's in Galveston tonight.
Rob Marciano joins us now. Rob is in Beaumont. Besides being battered around for the last week or so, Rob is also a meteorologist. And so, Rob, as you feel this thing coming and it's sort of literally what's happening, can you literally feel it coming in?
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, this storm, as opposed to other storms, it's been very consistent, Aaron. The wind and the rain has been virtually nonstop since 3, 4 p.m. this afternoon.
And usually they come in bands, those feeder or outer bands come in, roll in. They give you a good gust, a good bunch punch of weather and then you get to relax for a little bit.
But this one has slowly and steadily come in, wind and rain. And every hour, it gets ratcheted up just a little bit. So, yes. You can taste this thing.
It's seems -- it -- I got -- at some point I guess we're going to bring Chad in. I'm just curious as to -- I need to know where exactly the eye is going to be relative to us, you know, in about six hours, because like Anderson was saying we have to monitor our position here. I'm not crazy about it to be truthful with you. And, you know, how these winds shift and they can shift quite rapidly, will be determined by, you know where we are in relative to that eye.
So, a number of things going on here, Aaron. One, the consistency of the wind increasing and the rain increasing. And two, the lay of the land here from Beaumont to Port Arthur to Orange over to Lake Charles, very low. Rivers feeding out into the Gulf of Mexico and that storm surge as it rolls in.
That's going to be -- it's going to be amazing to say the least. It could get as far north as I-10. So 10, 20, 30, maybe 40 miles inland. That's what I think is really unique with this storm.
A storm, really a hurricane -- they haven't seen a hurricane in these parts, major hurricane in like almost 50 years. So it's been a long time, and I suppose some people would say they're due.
BROWN: Well, they're seeing one tonight.
If this information is helpful to you, in terms of positioning yourself, our best understanding -- we're going to run it by Chad in a little bit -- is that the eye will hit somewhere around, around Lake Charles. So, a bit to the east of where you are. MARCIANO: OK, OK. Well then, what that tells me is our winds will likely never go southerly and we'll just -- we'll have to protect against the north and -- and northeast wind. And maybe at some point a northwest wind, but that does help at this point. Thank you, Aaron. Right on.
BROWN: Well, and we'll get you -- and we'll get you, for obvious reasons, and our viewers for informational reasons more precise information as we go along.
But Lake Charles is pretty much what we think right around Lake Charles is sort of the center of this thing now, and that's still some hours away. So it could still move around a little bit.
Are we going to Baton Rouge next? Is that where you want to go? Huh? Yes?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
BROWN: OK. The Brigadier General Robert Crear is with the Army Corps of Engineers. He joins us from Baton Rouge.
It's good to have you with us if you can hear us. Can you tell me the state of the levees in New Orleans?
BRIG. GEN. ROBERT CREAR, ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS: I can hear you loud and clear. Currently at the places on the -- industrial highway navigation canal, those two places that water was over the top, that continues tonight. However, we do have pumps that are pumping that water out.
BROWN: Can you pump it out faster than it can come back in?
CREAR: Right now, the good news is that the water level has dropped about a foot since this morning. So that's good news. So the surge is going back.
Once the surge goes back, we'll get up tomorrow morning, we'll be able to start putting rock, putting sandbags into those holes and making those repairs. And then we can start pumping out, again, you know, the area that we had already previously pumped dry.
BROWN: General, did anything that happened today in truth surprise you?
CREAR: We knew that we were vulnerable to surges, especially those surges that would be more than seven foot. The surges today were eight feet. So yes, that was certainly not surprising that -- that a surge would over top of New Orleans and just surprised that the surges over eight foot.
BROWN: And, and just to make sure I understand. I'm not the most engineering oriented person. Basically what you're able to do is sort of bail water at this point. It's like being in a boat with a hole in it. You're able to bail water out, but you're not able to fix anything. You can't solve the problem? CREAR: We can't solve it today. We have the wait until the water levels go down before we can. But we can get the equipment in there to make the repairs.
BROWN: Is there a danger -- I assume there's some danger -- that the continuing weather will exacerbate the problem, will further weaken the repairs in the levee and that the breach could become larger than it already is?
CREAR: That is always the case that any time you have an area that's already weakened, they have water, you know, going over it, that the longer that happens, that is the case. But again, we're hoping that the weather, as it presently is doing, you know, it is -- the surge is actually going down. And so if that continues then we'll be able to get in there and make those repairs.
BROWN: What are they telling you about what to expect from the weather over the next 12, 18, 24 hours?
CREAR: It looks as if as the hurricane moves westward, then it passes by us, and so that's good for us. And so we're expecting that the front, the winds to die down, the surge to fall, and then we can start work.
BROWN: Is it -- it's more the surge that you're concerned about rather than the continuing rain. Is that right?
CREAR: That's correct. The most critical factor for us has always been the surge. We figure that forecasted rains, that we can, in fact, turn the pumps on and be able to stay ahead of that.
BROWN: General, it's good to talk to you. Thanks for walking me through the situation with the levees in New Orleans so we have an understanding of that. They're pretty much bailing water there until they can get a handle on it in the morning.
Rita now making its first real move on the Texas coast. It's going to stay there for awhile. Certainly, the next four hours are going to be very nasty, perhaps, six, eight hours after that.
But just to underscore what Max Mayfield said at the beginning of the program, in some respects we may be talking about the next five days if that hurricane -- it won't be a hurricane once it comes over the land, parks itself over Louisiana, over Texas, parts of Arkansas, perhaps as much as two feet of rain, so this is not an one-day event or a one-night event or it's not going to be over by the weekend. This is going to move well into next week.
At about a quarter past the hour -- we're later than that, Erica Hill joins us from Atlanta with some other news of the day and we want to get on the record with that -- Ms. Hill.
ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: Absolutely. But we are actually going to start in Louisiana, Aaron, where the Coast Guard rescued a pregnant woman and her 4-year-old son from their home in Port Fourchon tonight. It was a second attempt the Coast Guard had made to persuade this family to leave their home. Two other family members, though, did opt to stay behind.
Senator Frist is being investigated by two government agencies because of the timing of his sales of stocks in Hospital Corporation of America. Now those sales occurred just days before the company, which is run by the senator's brother, released a disappointing earnings forecast.
Lester Crawford has resigned as head of the Food and Drug Administration. He did not say why but why he was leaving the FDA -- why he was leaving, but the FDA has been criticized for bowing to political and drug industry influence. President Bush has appointed cancer researcher Andrew von Eschenbach as acting commissioner.
And a 22-year-old Baltimore woman has given birth to quintuplets. The babies were born 10 weeks early. Altogether, they lay -- weigh less than 12 pounds, but the good news here, doctors say they are doing fine.
That's a lot of babies.
BROWN: Yes, it is. And terrific news that they're doing fine. Thank you.
HILL: Absolutely.
BROWN: If all goes well tonight or all goes as planned, and I'm not sure it well, we'll see you in about a half an hour, Erica. Thank you.
We'll have more on how the small town of Lufkin, Texas, became a nightmare for stranded drivers trying to escape the storm. And in fact, that could get worse there, because the storm really is pointed at Lufkin.
Our correspondents in New Orleans will talk more about the levees, how they're doing. We'll update what the Corps of Engineers just told us.
We have much more to go. We're with you 2 a.m. Eastern Time. This is NEWSNIGHT, as you look at Galveston, Texas, in a state of emergency.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: You're watching a special edition of NEWSNIGHT: HURRICANE RITA, with Aaron Brown and Anderson Cooper.
COOPER: And welcome back. We are live in Beaumont, Texas, where we are starting to get more and more gusts of winds. The winds coming now still from the north, occasionally shifting direction. But some pretty steady rain and these gusts just every few minutes just increasing in strength a little bit more, getting kind of an uncomfortable out here.
John Zarrella is not too far from where I am standing, elsewhere in Texas. John, what town are you in? JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm in Lumberston -- Lumberton, Anderson, about literally about 20 miles inland from you, due north to you.
I can tell you a lot of stories. We're with the police station here. Stories of heroism and despair already tonight.
We were told by the mayor of Port Arthur a little while ago that there was a man whose oxygen had run out, and he was down at Sabine Pass, down even further towards the gulf than you. And the mayor's people said, "We can't get to you."
Well, two SWAT members volunteered to go down to Sabine Pass to try and get that man out. He regretted that he didn't evacuate. We don't know the outcome of that. They're on their way down there about two hours ago to try and get him.
A story of despair, a little while ago. We were standing here and a family came up. They had left Beaumont, where you are. They got scared. They decided to leave. But they're running out of gas. They don't know where to go, have no idea what to do, whether to go back to Beaumont or to stay put. Here we are now and the power is all out here -- Anderson.
COOPER: What did you tell them to -- what was your suggestion to them?
ZARRELLA: Our suggestion to them to just try and maybe hunker down here at the police department. But they said they were going to probably just go back to Beaumont where you are.
Another story, real quick, Anderson, the Chances and the Gracedales (ph) live about two miles from here. All the family members have gathered together. They decided not to evacuate because of the 15- to 20-hour rides that it would be.
We stopped over at their house. They're fine. They think they'll be fine. A good, strong, brick house.
So there's all kinds of different stories emerging from this storm.
Like you, we're starting to get a lot of strong gusting winds and the rain's starting to blow in. You can see the trees behind us. Again, we've had flashes of the power going out, the transformers blowing here. So it's getting pretty nasty here, as well, Anderson.
COOPER: All right, John, we'll check in with you very shortly.
Advice just to anyone who is thinking who is thinking about leaving their homes: do not do it. Every mayor we have talked to has said, "Look, at this point, just stay where you are."
Try to, you know, if you're in your home, go into your bathroom. Go into your bathtub. Just stay there. Get to the safest room in your house if you can. Jason Carroll is in Lake Charles, where we believe this storm, the eye is heading straight for. Lake Charles, Louisiana. Jason, what's the situation there?
JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you can see what the situation is from where we're standing at this point. It's been like this for the past several hours. Pounding wind and rain. I know it's dark. We're doing our best to stay safe and throw some light on the situation, just so you can get a real sense of what type of pounding Lake Charles is taking at this point.
A short while ago, we did speak to the command center. That's in downtown Lake Charles. Spoke to a sergeant there. They have lost power at the command center. At this point, they are running on generator power.
They're also running on generator power here at St. Patrick's Hospital but everyone here doing just fine.
Want to talk you a little bit about the evacuation that was in place. For 48 hours, Lake Charles was under a mandatory evacuation, and yet still there were some people who decided to stay behind.
In fact, we spoke to one young woman earlier today. She got a flat tire. She couldn't get out, so she's stuck at home. What she's planning to do is use her attic as a shelter if things really get bad, and they are expecting several feet of flooding in some pockets of Lake Charles.
Also, the police at this point are warning us to get the word out for all those that people who did not get out and again, at this point they're saying that most people did heed the warning and leave Lake Charles, but for those people who did not get out, what they're advising is the following.
They say you should stay put, because t this point, it's too unsafe to be outside. That's first.
Second, they're saying if you are inside your home, what they're asking you to do is put a number with either spray paint, tape, some way, the number of residents that are inside your house. That way if they do have to make a rescue at some point, they know how many people inside the home they're looking for.
I also told you that what we're doing is we're standing at this point right next to St. Patrick Hospital. And I want to show you something. This is a blue band that they're giving all of us, all of those people who are visitors here at the hospital.
On this band, all of your information: your name, phone number. In the unlikely event that something should happen to you, they have a way of identifying you.
It's just another example of how they're taking things very seriously here in Lake Charles. Again, we're -- still a little ways away from the worst part of the storm. You can already see the wind and the rain that we're experiencing. At this point, they're expecting things to get, as one police chief told us, he said, "We're really getting ready to take a sock in the eye."
Lake Charles is going on the eastern side of this storm. So they're really expecting to take the brunt of it when Rita heads closer to where we are now.
Back to you.
COOPER: They are certainly expecting to take the brunt of it. Jason, we'll check in with you. Let's get back to Aaron in New York -- Aaron.
BROWN: Thank you.
Just to help orient viewers little bit, Beaumont, where Anderson is, is a town of about 115,000 people.
Lake Charles, Louisiana, where Jason was, Jason Carroll, is a town of 70,000 people. So these are good, medium-sized cities.
Galveston, which we've talked a lot about, is almost 60,000 people. Mostly it is evacuated.
And, when we get up into Houston, where we'll get some nasty weather but it's not going to be the kind of nasty that we've been looking at for the last 20 minutes or so, talking about a city of fie million people and some of it in very low lying areas.
So just gives you a sense of the numbers of people we were talking about. We talked about Katrina, you were talking about in just the New Orleans, greater New Orleans, about a million and a half people were hit right smack dab in the center of that thing.
As we approach the half hour, a quick overview for those of you who may be joining us. The eye of Hurricane Rita is now just a few hours from landfall, but the outer rings of it are very much lashing the Gulf Coast.
Rita remains a strong Category 3 storm, a very dangerous storm. The eye now about 85 miles southeast of Sabine Pass -- excuse me -- along the Texas-Louisiana state line.
Rita is headed toward the oil refining towns of Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas; Lake Charles, Louisiana, where we just were, all bracing for a very dangerous storm surge of 20 feet or so.
In Houston, largely quiet tonight, save for this. A convoy of trucks loaded with relief supplies rolling into town. They're using the Reliant Center, the basketball arena in the Astrodome complex, as a staging area there. That was home to so many Katrina evacuees.
New Orleans took an early hit from Rita at about 10 a.m. this morning. An 8-foot storm surge from the approaching storm proved too much for the city's weakened levees or at least two of them. Water pouring in again to the Ninth Ward, parts of St. Bernard Parish, as well.
That is a quick overview.
Sean Callebs is in Galveston, Texas, tonight, part of the team of CNN correspondents and producers on the Gulf -- Shawn.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Aaron, here, at this point, it is certainly something where people are looking at the storm as perhaps the big one that may just skirt the area. A lot of anxiety in the days leading up to the outer bands of Rita making landfall here. We're getting some rain, at times coming down in a horizontal fashion. Every now and then we see what appears to be insulation from some construction nearby blowing down through the area.
The highest gusts of wind that's been recorded so far here, about 70 miles-an-hour. So certainly not nearly as punishing as this slender barrier island had feared. Of course people still talk about what happened in 1900 here, so any time a hurricane begins churning in the Gulf, it's viewed with a great deal of respect here in Galveston.
It's protected right now by a sea wall that's ten miles long and about 17 feet high, but this island's about 31 miles long. Now where the sea wall doesn't run -- we've talked to the mayor, and we know there's somewhat significant flooding in the west end and in the east end, but now there are reports that the water is coming over parts of the sea wall and causing some low lying flooding. And a big concern, the bay. As this rain continues to come down, the tide moves in, they expect that bay is going to move over and swamp the region.
There have been power outages all throughout this island. The good news, Aaron, so many people still with those vivid images of what happened in the New Orleans area, when Katrina blew through. People simply fearful when they saw that hurricane off the coast here. So a lion's share of the people evacuated. The mayor estimates it's about 95 percent of the 60,000 or so residents here. We talked to a police officer and he said he's convinced it's closer to 98 or 99 percent.
The last couple of days we have talked to a number of people who are choosing to ride this storm out. Everything from new, large condos that face the ocean where pylons are driven deep into the ground, so basically little shacks that don't look like they could hold up from any sustained winds whatsoever. We're not expecting hurricane winds here for perhaps a couple of hours. They do expect it's going to get 110 miles-an-hour for a sustained period, so certainly this is nothing to be taken lightly. However, it appears the main sock, the main thrust of this hurricane is going to skirt this area, and that's just fine for the residents who live here -- Aaron.
BROWN: Just hour to hour, can you feel the difference?
CALLEBS: Yes, you can. You know what you can really feel? When those bands come over. Because right now it doesn't appear it's rained that hard, but awhile ago, I had to wipe my eyes constantly just to see the lens, and when the wind really picks up -- as it moves in and that counter clockwise motion, we're getting the wind from the north, obviously, but there's a -- we're in front of a large hotel that's has become the emergency operating center. There are legions of police officer, military, medical officials, everybody here. They are hunkered down here, and basically this giant structure that appears to be 13 or 14 stories, blocks a good deal of the wind.
If you can look behind me down on what's called Sea Wall Avenue, you can see the palm trees being blown around pretty good down there. And again more insulation continues to fly.
This is also an island that's had a great deal of development recently. And a lot of that development seems to be pretty pricey. It looks like high end stuff. And it is down in the area that simply isn't protected by a sea wall. We know virtually all of those people are out, and I can presume, if the forecasters are right, they're going to get at least a seven to ten foot storm surge. So the damage could be pretty significant down in that area.
BROWN: Sean, watch that flying debris. That's the stuff that'll get you in these things.
CALLEBS: Indeed.
BROWN: Take care of yourself. We'll get back to you. Sean Callebs is in Galveston, Texas tonight.
Last night, our severe weather expert, Chad Myers, sent me a note saying, essentially, forget the wiggles and the lines, pay attention to the cone. The cone gets narrower with each passing minute, literally, now.
CHAD MYERS, CNN SEVERE WEATHER EXPERT: Sure, literally, right. Exactly. Yesterday we had that little wobble to the left and a wobble to the right, and that's why you can't focus on the line anymore. And by the time the line gets closer and closer to the cone, eventually there is no more cone left, and it really is just a line as it gets closer to shore.
There's the center of the storm right there. To the south of Sulfur, to the south of Cameron, Louisiana, still moving to the northwest at about 11 miles per hour.
Let me get you in a little bit closer now. In four hours and 49 minutes, the northern part of -- the worst part of this storm will be right over Port Arthur, headed to Beaumont, Texas. Our reporters here in Beaumont, I know Rob wanted to know what's going to happen. The eye, Rob, moves to the east of you right along the Sabine River. Your winds will always be from the north or from the east here. You're never going to get the bad side of the eyewall. The bad side of the eye is actually going to drive itself up right across Cameron, right across Holly Beach, and right through and across the Sabine River.
There are many other things to talk about with this storm, too. Sure the radar is bad. Sure, the storms are bad. But this is going to be a rain maker. Proportions we haven't talked about in a long time, because this storm is going to be a lot like Agnes. Any of you who lived through Agnes like I did back in 1972 -- this thing stopped over New York and Pennsylvania and dumped rain for days, and this storm is going to do the same thing. Here is the storm. There's the eye. Getting a better looking eye now as we move on shore. The left side of the eye will hit the Sabine Pass. The right side of the eye will actually be right over Louisiana. The eye itself will drive itself right over Port Arthur, right over Beaumont. In fact, you may even get a little clearing in Port Arthur. It will be that close. You will be that close to the eyewall itself.
If you are to the right of the eyewall, to the right of Port Arthur, you're waves and your winds are always on shore ten to 14 feet. Galveston a little less surge for you, but we just talked to Sean Callebs there, the winds are out of the north. Well guess what? All the waves are out of the north too, from the bay pushing that water over Galveston and into Galveston from the backside where there is not a sea wall. From the bay side. We call that bay side flooding, when the winds are coming this direction here pushing the water into Galveston from the wrong way.
Then the wind coming in here, coming in from the east in New Orleans, only 2 to 4 foot, maybe 5 foot surge here across a lot of southeastern Louisiana. But the yellows in there, four to eight feet in New Orleans. Because this is acting like a catcher's mitt. This is catching all the water that's trying to come in here, and the water is piling up and piling up. Right in the middle of the causeway in New Orleans, the water now is up six feet from where it was this morning.
This is a difficult map to understand, but I want you to take a look at it. This is a raw, brand new map from NOAA. Fifteen feet -- 15 inches of rain way up here, 15 inches, in the blue. And Aaron, look at this. From Texarkana all the way down to the Gulf of Mexico, that number, that little X is 24 inches of rain. Twenty-four inches of rain forecast from NOAA in the next five days, because the storm stops, it absolutely comes to a stand still. Well there's New Orleans right there. That's red. Red, four, five inches right there in New Orleans, as well. This is a dangerous part of the storm, because it is not going to move after it comes on shore.
BROWN: It is a huge difference between four inches of rain which, even in its current state, New Orleans probably handles fairly comfortably. Not perfectly. And 20 plus inches of rain --
MYERS: Can you imagine?
BROWN: What are the forces that are going to cause the storm to stop?
MYERS: We talked about that high pressure, that actually stopped it from turning to the right and becoming a Katrina. Well, that high pressure is going to be sitting right here. It was forecast to kind of eject off to the east, but it's just elongated itself and become a little bit longer and just stopping this storm from doing anything. Some of the models actually have this thing turning left and making rain over Dallas. Many of them have it stopping over Arkansas. And when you get models, 14 of them, that are so confused, left, right, stop, up, down -- one of the models, Aaron, has it coming up to Texarkana, stopping and then going back down into the Gulf of Mexico. That's how slow the winds are going to be aloft. There's just going to be nothing to push it anywhere.
BROWN: Chad, you'll be pleased to know, I took your e-mail to pay attention to the cone and not the line and pinned it on my bulletin board today, so I wouldn't forget it. Thank you. We'll talk as the night and the morning goes on.
Still to come on the program tonight, stranded and desperate in Lufkin, Texas, very much in the path of the storm, bracing for a long night, trying to figure out what to do with all the people who have evacuated there.
We'll check back with Anderson who is in Beaumont, Texas, and as Chad Myers just said, right in the heart of it. We'll take a break first. This is a Special Edition of NEWSNIGHT State of Emergency.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: And welcome back. I'm in Beaumont, Texas where the winds are picking up gradually as these gusts of winds, these outer bands of the storm just continue to wipe across this entire area.
A couple of days ago, if you had asked people where the storm was headed, most of them were saying it was Galveston, Texas. I was there earlier this morning, arrived here in Beaumont just a short time ago to see what the situation is here.
Sean Callebs is still in Galveston. Sean, how's the situation there?
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the wind and the rain is probably about what you would expect on this, the weak side of the storm. But Anderson, we have some developing news we need to tell you about. You spent a good deal of time on this island in the last couple of days.
On 19th and 20th streets, not terribly far to the east end of the island, we are told that there are a couple of significant fires at this hour. Trying to find out more. We don't know exactly how those fires were caused, but we know that emergency officials have been mobilized. They're going into that area. At this point, the winds are not hurricane strength. So it's not something to keep the large emergency vehicles off the ground. But this is certainly what the emergency operation center here is going to be one of their worst nightmares, is basically as these bands begin to move ashore, it's pitch black in many areas here. Power's gone out through much of the island at this point. But we know that there are a couple of fires on buildings on 19th and 20th street. We're trying to determine just how significant that is.
The people here in Galveston, you know, have done extraordinary work trying to get the word out the 60,000 or so resident to call this home to get off this barrier island, to find solace further inland. Well, A lot of them paid the price sitting on the interstates and highways last 24 hours.
But, you know, those people had experienced some discomfort. They are certainly going to live through this and the people who did stay here, it's an agonizing night. And, we expect the winds are going to pick up somewhat significantly.
We spent time talking to a number of people, including one 79- year-old living who is living in basically a shack. We, in essence, pleaded with this lady to try and consider going to a shelter that was only a few blocks away. She absolutely refused. She's staying in that small home with her two nieces. We'll certainly check on her first thing in the morning.
There is only one shelter open here on the island, in the heart -- the middle of the afternoon had two residents inside. We just checked a minute ago, there are 61 people. Some of those people have come within just the last hour or so as power begins to go off on the island which is -- you've been saying it all evening, if you choose to ride out the storm, you don't leave in the middle of the storm. That's apparently what some people are doing. Go ahead.
COOPER: Sean, let me ask you, you talked about these fires over by 20 -- 21st street, are those near the shore, or are they further -- you know, a little bit north of the shoreline? Do you know?
CALLEBS: Can you hang on second, I'll ask our producer, just came out. Mike, are those fires near the shore? Are they away? At this point, we simply know. But we do have one crew. We're going to try and get out there.
COOPER: Let me ask you...
CALLEBS: If it's not too dangerous, we'll get back to you. Go ahead.
COOPER: Let me ask you. I know most of the fire -- search and rescue personnel are staying at the hotel that you are in front of, the San Luis Hotel. It's one of the strongest buildings on the island. The entire seat of government has moved there. The mayor is there. Are they actually sending out fire trucks from that hotel?
CALLEBS: No. We have not seen any emergency vehicles move from this hotel. We don't see any parked here. I do know that some are parked in a high garage that was protected from the wind, and protected from any kind of debris. So, maybe some of the fire trucks moved out from that area. I can't -- I haven't heard sirens in the distance. But you know what, the wind is blowing so bad here and also with the IFB in my ear, it'd be hard to hear anything at this point. But that is certainly something to break away and find out about. We hope this isn't terribly serious at this hour. But certainly, a huge cause for concern on this island.
COOPER: And of course, because in all these situations, the mayors, law enforcement personnel, you know, let people know, look, if you stay, you're taking your chances. We can't go out in the middle of the storm and endanger our own personnel. But Sean saying that perhaps they are trying to respond to these fires. So, we're going to try to find out a little bit more information on that.
This -- the area, 20th, 21st street that Sean's talking about -- I don't know, Sean, if you got a chance to eat there, there's a place, Luke's Deli, which is on 23rd street over there in Galveston, one of the last places you could still get a good, hot meal -- amazing sloppy Joe's -- they were going to try to stay open as long as they had electricity. That area, as far as you know, is out of electricity though?
CALLEBS: We don't know if that area is out of electricity. I can tell you, though, we apparently got barbecue today. So, Luke true to his word, did stay open at least throughout much of today.
If we look up and down the strand here, I can see lights on many of these buildings here in this area. It's 31 miles long. And the information from the mayor and other people at the EOC is that power is spotty.
We also know that in some cases, we have seen power trucks go up and down this road, so certainly they're trying to check the power, or at least see if there's anything to do with the power at this point. Because right the gusts are only -- and I say only, about 70 miles per hour. They know that in the next two hours or so to top more than 100 miles an hour, probably peaking at 110. And we heard Chad talk about this, it's just a punishing storm that's going to continue to hit this area for some times.
So, it's going to get worst before it's better. And it's probably going to be worst for a significant period of time. So, if any emergency crews are there, they're going to hopefully tackle this quickly because it's going to get nasty before the night is over.
CAOOPER: Sean, stay with us. I want to bring Aaron in.
Aaron, Galveston, really, the mayor there learned the lessons of Katrina. They made a big effort to get people...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: So, they are -- seems like they may be responding, Aaron.
BROWN: Yeah -- well, Sean says he can hear some sirens. And that's -- I guess -- and perhaps you can hear them...
CALLEBS: Definitely. It sounds like there's a -- there's a great deal of activity now.
BROWN: So, you've got a couple of fires...
CALLEBS: A lot of people actually heard what we were talking about. And now, a lot of people are mobilizing down in that area.
Yeah, we just saw trucks go out on seawall, turn and begin to head north.
A great deal of activity. I'm sure you can hear all the sirens now.
They are, indeed, now pouring out of the belly of this building, Anderson, just like you though. The ESE, hunkered down here, firetrucks. Haven't seen any ambulances, but at least two firetrucks went down that street. We have a crew going down that area as well, so hopefully we'll get, certainly information, and get back as quickly as possible. But let's hope...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Try to stay with us. I don't know if you can hear Aaron. Aaron, I was just saying that this is a town where the mayor. They got buses. They got bus drivers. And in fact, they came up with this plan -- you know, in New Orleans, there was such a problem of getting bus drivers to drive the buses. Well, they got the bus drivers, they told the bus drivers, look, you can take your families, your possessions on the first bus out. It was an incentive to get people driving those buses. And it certainly worked, they were able to get a lot of people on the buses, Aaron.
BROWN: Hopefully, yes. I mean, you can plan for a lot of things. You can't necessarily plan for a fire.
Sean, do you have any idea what these buildings are? Big buildings? Small buildings? Are there people in them? Do we know about the buildings burning?
CALLEBS: The Simple answer is no. We know nothing except there are two buildings on fire. We did drive up and down that area today and virtually every building was boarded up that we saw, or had those shutters that are some kind of, either aluminum or steal over their windows and doors.
But at this point, we don't know if anybody is in there. Obviously, that is the largest concern at this hour. All we could do is try to get that information to you as soon as possible.
But one other thing. We heard Anderson talk about getting those bus drivers. One added incentive, they also let people take their pets. And police didn't like that idea. They thought they just wanted to get the people out, they didn't want to have to worry about that. But the mayor of this town, you talked to her, she's a neat lady, and she insisted that people are going to be able to take their pets out if they evacuate.
BROWN: Just, Sean, before I go to Rob, again, are the buildings -- right next to each other, is there space between buildings? Is there a risk that if building A gets -- is on fire, that a whole block could go?
CALLEBS: Really don't know, Aaron. Honestly. The only thing --
BROWN: OK. That's fine. CALLEBS: We had our producer come out and just tell me two buildings and then they took off.
BROWN: Got it. We'll wait to hear back from the crew that we presume is safely making their way there. We, in all honesty, we worry a lot about our colleagues in moments like this. A lot of unpredictable things can happen. We take all the precautions against the predictable ones. It's the ones you can't imagine that gets you, and we are not interested in that happening. Rob Marciano is in Beaumont, Texas, tonight, not far from where Anderson is. Rob, I'm not sure you were able to hear Chad. Were you able to hear him earlier, he gave you some --
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: No.
BROWN: OK. He talked pretty much about Lake Charles being the -- the worst of it, but that the eye would come right over the Sabine River and, essentially, right over you.
MARCIANO: Right. Yes, you know, that's kind of what we've been thinking for the past couple of days. So it sounds like the track hasn't changed. The Sabine River splits Louisiana and Texas, and, as Chad's probably been saying all night, this storm continues to move northwesterly, so even though it'll cross at the Sabine Pass, that means it will head right towards us. So we very well could be in the center of the eye in -- we're just going to have to watch the winds. They can be unpredictable when the center of the storm is coming on top of you, that's for sure.
I can tell you right now, I'm facing due north. Our winds are coming -- they're trying to come due north, but right now there's a building behind the camera. So, the wind's fighting to go on either side. But it's been very gusty down this street.
Just look at these live oak trees that they have got down here in Texas and Louisiana. These amazingly old, huge hardwood trees. Different from oak trees that maybe New Englanders are used to. They don't have the big, broad leaves that turn beautiful colors. They don't really fall off the trees really until, well, December or even January. But amazingly huge trunks, and we saw those trees last time again in Biloxi where the trunks were fine, but the foliage and the branches on top completely ripped apart. Completely -- it almost looked like a fire had gone through that area, and I suspect by this time tomorrow night, these big beautiful live oaks will have experienced the same thing, because we do expect to see winds in excess of 100 miles-an-hour down this area.
Lights still on. That's pretty impressive to me, because we have easily had winds -- at least wind gusts close to hurricane strength. And that's usually enough to topple down -- take down some power lines. You know, this area hasn't seen a storm in many, many years. So a lot of times what will happen is the trees, they haven't really been thinned out. They have got a lot of weak branches hanging around, so, typically, you will see power go out little bit quicker -- (AUDIO GAP) -- the power is still hanging tough. Of course, 95 of the people in -- who live in Beaumont -- (AUDIO GAP) -- That's obviously a pretty good thing, Aaron.
BROWN: Rob, thank you. Rob Marciano, they don't make weather like that in Portland, do they, Rob? Marciano is in Beaumont, Texas, tonight.
Anderson, I'll tell you the truth that every time we try and make this toss back to you, I wonder if you're going to be able to catch it, and I wonder if I'm going to see you again. This thing is building up, and building up. And at some point we're going to lose you.
COOPER: Well, you know, I think we feel pretty good about where we are. And I said it before -- look, especially after Katrina, no one's taking any chances and we're not going to endanger -- you know, I might be an idiot, but I'm not going to endanger the people around me. So, you know, again we're watching this thing minute by minute, and if it gets real bad, if it gets where we are, unsafe, we're going to call it a day and, you know, we'll see you in the morning.
But we feel pretty good. We have buildings, really, on both sides, and even if this wind shifts, we feel we'll be pretty protected. So that said, I want to go to Randi Kaye who is in Baytown, Texas. Find out what the situation is there. We've got reporters all over this region. Randi, how is it where you are?
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Anderson, we're doing the same thing here. We're sticking real close to our hotel, which is here in downtown Baytown. It is really the only hotel that is still open here. Again, trying to protect ourselves, stay close to something. But this whole town is shut down, and the winds are certainly kicking up. We're not seeing the consistent hurricane winds yet, but we are certainly seeing the gusts that kind of sweep you off your feet and push you forward a couple feet.
I want to show you back in the distance there, you can probably see those palm trees. They're blowing pretty good back there and they're right next to a pool area. And there's sort of an ominous sound that keeps coming from that area. We're told that they've put away all the pool furniture, so we're hoping that that is the case. We certainly don't want to see any kind of flying debris coming out of that area.
But again, just driving around town here and talking to the city manager here at Baytown. He said that most of the people did heed the warnings to evacuate. He said a very high percentage of folks did evacuate the Baytown area. In fact, the emergency personnel and the fire marshal and the emergency operations coordinator, they are hunkered down in the old federal building in downtown Baytown trying to stay safe and monitor everything that's happening. A lot of other people in the old hospital just trying to find buildings here that they think can withstand the winds that are certainly heading this way.
Another concern, as you know, Anderson, is that the -- Baytown sits on the Houston ship channel, and there's about 200 chemical plants and refineries there. Folks are very concerned about what kind of damage those plants and refineries could suffer from Hurricane Rita. We visited a Shell plant in Deer Park just a little ways from here yesterday and they tell us that they have shut down, and, in fact, all the plants have shut down. And if any of those plants do suffer any severe damage, it could be a week, it could be months before they could open up, which would certainly affect all of us.
But right now we are certainly beginning to see the outer bands of Rita coming here -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right. We'll check back in shortly with you. Let's go to John Zarrella who is in Lumberton. John, I have determined that I am not going to use the word hunkered in this entire broadcast. It's -- I don't know why. The word -- it's the most ubiquitous word only during hurricane coverage. Anyway, that's my vow tonight. How about you?
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and I already did it once. So I'm going to take your word and not do it.
COOPER: I did it once already too, but I'm just --
ZARRELLA: That's it.
We're really starting to get the winds and rain now. It's really constant, really steady. Squall lines moving through here. We're continuing to see and hear in the distance the transformers exploding. We talked to the Texas department of safety here, and they were telling us that the emergency management folks in Texas, that their big concern, of course, one of them is inland flooding. They're really very worried about that. They are going to have to get heavy machinery, they think, in there. They believe a lot of the inland flooding, up to 15, 25 inches of rain is going to take place in areas that are going to very hard to reach, very wooded areas. And with this storm, you can see how it's really starting to pick up here, so I know how you must be feeling where you are. But that's one concern they have.
We're hearing still reports of people that are trapped out on the highways between here, up towards Lufkin about 70, 80 miles from here. So there are some very dangerous things going on out there with a lot of people running out of gas, run out of gas. One story about a bus that left from Port Arthur to go to a shelter, and when they got to that shelter, a school, the school was locked. The mayor of Port Arthur got the phone call. He said to the driver, break the lock. We can't have our people sitting outside. So there's lots of things going on as people are trying to get to safety -- still trying to get to safety. Many of them getting trapped out as the conditions are continuing to worsen -- Anderson.
COOPER: Well, John, to hear about people still out on the highway at this point without gas, just on the side of the road, that's a dire situation to be in. I mean, I guess we don't know any of the details of it, but, I mean, -- are there even rescue personnel out there on the highways trying to look for these people? Probably not at this point. ZARRELLA: No. At this point, police are pretty much staying put. And they can't get to a lot of these folks and that's the problem. And won't be able to get to them until after the storm goes through. And so many of these people are inland where they're stuck in parking lots, we're hearing, on the side of the road, that what's going to is, when the storm stalls out and that water comes up and we get that flooding, who knows what kind of situation they're going to be in then? If they're still stuck in those cars. Hopefully, they're finding safe haven in peoples' homes and just leaving their cars and going to somebody's house to seek some refuge. Hopefully, that's what those folks are doing -- Anderson.
COOPER: And from -- John, from where you are, I mean, do you get a sense of the power of this storm out there? You know, I felt it out there a little while ago, but it sort of feels like maybe we're in between bands or something right now. It seems to have kind of let up a little bit. Are you still getting a sustained winds? Or are you just getting kind of these gusts?
ZARRELLA: No. Just gusts. We're just getting the gusty winds. We had one come through here with a lot of driving rain, that sideways rain and that gusty wind. And now it's let up again. So no. Like you we're just getting a lot of gusts, but nothing really sustained yet.
COOPER: And in terms of the number of people who have evacuated out of Lumberton, any sense of like what percentage of the population, I mean, I imagine most of them, yes?
ZARRELLA: Yes. There's about 11, 12,000 people here, and we've been told by the police they believe a good 90 percent of the folks have gone inland. We talked to one police officer. His family went to Waco, Texas. And again, took them about 14, 15 hours to get to Waco. So yes. The numbers are quite significant. And we've been told by the mayor in Port Arthur and by the officials here that the numbers of people that have evacuated, Anderson, are directly related to what happened in Katrina. They don't believe they would have ever had the response that they had, if it hadn't been for the tragic events of Katrina. People saw what happened and they got out.
COOPER: Yes. That's the same thing that the mayor of Galveston told me.
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