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CNN Live Saturday
Hurricane Rita Coverage
Aired September 24, 2005 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Good work Dana and Miles. They saved that little dog.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Glad to see it.
BLITZER: They could bring that dog to Washington. They say you want a good friend, get a dog.
WHITFIELD: You've got to have your man's best friend.
BLITZER: All right. We're standing by for a news conference, the governor of Louisiana, Kathleen Blanco. We're going to go there live as soon as that happens. We'll also have a recap, all the latest developments. Hurricane Rita, now Tropical Storm Rita, but it's still a dangerous tropical storm. We'll tell you why, right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please do not try to come on to the island. Do not try to come on to the island. Citizens will be turned back.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Stay where you are. The great return must wait a while for the thousands who left Galveston for higher ground. Across Rita's impact area, assessments are going on right now. Just minutes ago, Rita was downgraded to tropical storm status with winds below 75 miles an hour.
WHITFIELD: CNN has reporters across the region in nine locations from New Orleans to Houston and in Louisiana's Lake Charles, one of the areas hardest hit by Rita.
BLITZER: Welcome to our continuing special coverage of the storm and its aftermath. I'm Wolf Blitzer at the CNN Center here in Atlanta.
WHITFIELD: And I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Thanks so much for joining us.
BLITZER: Let's get right to a check of the damage assessment board. As expected, flooding is proving to be a big problem in several areas, and not just coastal cities. Parts of New Orleans' Ninth Ward are once again under water, as much as eight feet. Flooding is also reported in Lake Charles, Louisiana and surrounding communities as well as in several Texas cities.
Rita knocked down trees and power lines across the impact region. More than one million customers are not getting power. And utility officials are now looking at how to fix that. Right now, authorities want most of the hundreds of thousands of evacuees to stay where they are. Officials want to make sure conditions are safe.
Police will keep residents from returning to several cities. The city of Lake Charles, Louisiana, took a fierce beating from Rita's eastern eye wall. Our correspondent, Rick Sanchez, is checking out the damage. He's aboard Hurricane One, our satellite equipped SUV. We'll hear from him in just a moment. First, let's get the latest forecast from the CNN Hurricane Center, Jacqui Jeras standing by with that -- Jacqui.
JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, Wolf, Rita is now a tropical storm. It's packing winds around 65 miles an hour, but it's a small area, where the strongest of the winds are right now. It's located between Lufkin, Texas, and Shreveport, Louisiana.
You can kind of pick out the center of circulation still here. It is right near that state line. The storm is pushing up to the north and additional weakening can be expected gradually throughout the day today.
But this storm can still produce a considerable amount of damage and snap off some trees, still produce some power outages potentially and cause travel problems also, because of the heavy rain and those gusty winds. There you can see some of those stronger storms.
They're going to be moving into the Shreveport area, likely within 15 to 30 minutes. And you'll notice the increase in the winds as the stronger thunderstorms hit the neighborhood. So now is the time to stay inside in Shreveport. Just enjoy your morning watching CNN and having a cup of coffee because it's going to be kind of a long duration event. It's going to take a good couple of hours for that to get out of there.
We also have a big concern this afternoon and evening, particularly later on this afternoon when the temperatures start to heat up. And that's going to help to fire up some of the outer bands a little bit stronger and increase that threat of tornadoes.
We have a number of bands that we're worried about. One right here, across southeastern Louisiana, heading on up into Mississippi. We've got another one developing near the Mobile area, and there you can see another one just off to the west of the Panama City. This storm is still very, very large.
In fact, the tropical storm force winds go out well over 200 miles. We're mostly seeing -- outside the near inner core of the storm we're mostly see gusts around the 50, 60 mile per hour range on occasion. So it's not as persistent as it was and we're not seeing any of those hurricane force winds any longer.
It's still moving at a good clip, 12 miles per an hour, so the faster we can get this to move, the better off we're going to be and keep those rainfall totals down a little bit. But unfortunately, the slowing is expected to be taking place late tonight. And then little movement expected.
There you can see the position by tomorrow morning into Monday morning, then into Tuesday morning. So we're especially concerned about the ArkLaTex region extending over to Mississippi for the potential of heavy rainfall, eight to 12 inches we think could be common, with isolated amounts pushing two feet believe it or not.
And this is a graphic from NOAA, what they're five-day precipitation forecast is. And there you can see, 24.5 inches. And sometimes this can be underestimated, and that's a large swathe right within this region -- Wolf.
BLITZER: A quick question, Jacqui. Planes flying overhead this tropical storm now, it's a pretty widespread area. Can they fly at 30,000 feet without any problem?
JERAS: I don't think they're going to be a lot of -- they probably could fly at 30,000 feet maybe but they're not going to be able to land anywhere in that at this time. I believe most planes need less than 40 miles per hour. That's their absolute minimum, I believe. So probably not going to be a lot of traffic going on there today.
BLITZER: So that's going to disrupt -- that's going to -- it's going to disrupt air traffic in those areas, I suspect.
JERAS: Absolutely.
BLITZER: All right, Jacqui, thanks very much -- Fred.
WHITFIELD: All right, well, Tropical Storm Rita still a problem, still a threat, particularly for Louisiana as you heard Jacqui explain that other parts of Louisiana could expect to experience quite a bit of flooding.
And that is why the Louisiana governor, Kathleen Blanco, is momentarily going to be having yet another briefing, this one coming out of Baton Rouge. They're setting up that location, getting ready for her press conference. And when that takes place, we'll be bringing that to you live.
Meantime, head west now, Galveston, Texas. Fire turned out to be as much a problem as wind and water. CNN's Sean Callebs is there -- Sean.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, a really frightening situation here. We were up live when it happened last night, basically right at the teeth of the storm when winds were gusting perhaps as high as 70 miles per hour, rain coming down almost in a horizontal fashion.
We were in front of a building that housed the emergency operation center. They got a call of a very serious fire. Well, they had parked the fire trucks two blocks away in the Convention Center to protect them from any possible damage from a storm surge or debris flying around.
Firefighters had to run out, get in those vehicles, race about ten minutes from here. They found two buildings, three buildings completely engulfed in flames, two of those buildings destroyed, another one significant damage.
They looked at a possibility that maybe some arching (ph) from a power line may have sparked the fire, but they also are checking into the report that a woman who lives in the top of one of those buildings could have been smoking. So that's another concern that authorities have. That woman did suffer burns over 20 percent of her body.
Here in Galveston right now, we're just getting some light, breezy winds. It's been extremely hot here for the past several days. It's actually quite comfortable right now, but the residents who live here full time aren't going to be experiencing this, not today, perhaps not tomorrow or the next day. Authorities are not letting anybody back on the island who evacuated and some 60,000 residents live here.
The mayor says at least 95 percent of the people fled the island. One reason they are not letting people back, power lines are down, debris is down. Officials need to get this island up and running again.
But another concern coming in from the Department of Homeland Security. They're concerned that everybody who fled Rita will start coming back down south and once again clog the interstates and major highways. And that would keep those all-important gas tankers from getting to gasoline stations that are simply bone dry at this point.
So it's basically a double whammy for the residents who left the island. So the mayor says they hope to have the county government, city government running up by Tuesday. But that still may be somewhat ambitious. They were extremely worried about any kind of storm surge as well as flooding from this.
But this was the threat that may have just skirted this area, a small, narrow barrier island that's protected by 17-foot sea wall, about ten miles of the 31-mile long island but also the bay in the back. We saw some low-lying flooding but nothing terribly serious.
Right now, officials are out, trying to get their best estimate. They know power lines are down in a number of places, some debris scattered all over the roads. A lot of buildings had windows simply blown in, but nothing terribly serious. And at this point, the one casualty we know about, the woman who suffered burns, and she was actually flown off this island into Lubbock, Texas, I think was the information we got last -- Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: All right. Sean Callebs in Galveston, Texas, thanks so much -- Wolf.
BLITZER: And this reminder, Fred, to our viewers. We are standing by to here the governor of Louisiana, Kathleen Blanco. There's a picture. They're getting ready for the governor to show up and to brief everyone on what's going on in her state.
First Hurricane Katrina did an enormous amount of destruction. Now Hurricane Rita and other parts of the state, especially the Lake Charles area, doing a great deal of destruction as well. We'll hear from the governor. That's coming up.
Rita dumped torrential rain and caused storm surges that overtopped a levee breached by Hurricane Katrina. Part of the Ninth Ward in New Orleans is under eight feet of water again. CNN's Mary Snow is on the scene for us. She's joining us with the latest information. She joining us by phone. Where exactly are you, Mary?
MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, we're trying to make our way to that Industrial Canal levee where water overtopped that breach and poured into the Ninth Ward. And water has been steadily going into that area. The Army Corps of Engineers, trying to patch that area that had been overtopped.
And one factor that has been hindering their efforts today is the wind. They're trying to put military choppers in the air. This, in order to drop those huge sandbags to try and help them shore up and reinforce that damaged area. Also by ground we saw a number of trucks leaving with sandbags, but in that ninth ward area, it's really almost impossible to get to that area by land.
There were two sections of that levee that had been damaged. This is being closely monitored at this point. The Army Corps of Engineers is calling this a setback of up two to three weeks because they're going to have to pump out all that water.
Also, Wolf, we ran into Congressman Bobby Jindal. He was taking an inspection of the area, calling this really a huge setback, saying it was just devastating to see this water pouring into areas that had already been flooded by Katrina. He is saying that, you know, so many people had already been gone for weeks because the areas are so devastated. He worries about the psychological impact, though, because he said, you know, people were watching this on television.
They haven't been allowed near that area where their homes are. This area had just been really dried out earlier this week. And then to see it reflooded again, it's very disheartening -- Wolf.
BLITZER: Mary, is there any sense that the weather in New Orleans right now is improving, that the winds are dying down, the rain is going away so that at least they can begin what amounts to a second round of cleanup?
SNOW: One positive sign, Wolf, is that it really hasn't been raining very much at all today. The wind has been pretty steady throughout the day. Another encouraging sign that engineers pointed out -- you know, we were over near Lake Pontchartrain where it had been about five feet above sea level.
But that was at high tide. So when I asked an engineer, do you expect the surge to continue and waters to rise, at that point, they were hopeful that they wouldn't see much elevation. They saw that as a positive sign.
BLITZER: Mary Snow in New Orleans for us. Mary, thank you very much -- Fred.
WHITFIELD: All right. Well, although Houston didn't take a direct hit fro Hurricane Rita, there remain concerns about getting to people who are in need of help. Our Jeanne Meserve is traveling with search and rescue teams. Jeanne, what are you seeing?
JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Fredricka, the teams here, the federal teams, are still waiting for the deployment. The winds have not died down enough for helicopters to go up and do reconnaissance and give them a real read on what's happening on the ground. Then the states will have to request assistance. If they do, then these federal teams will be deployed.
They did get a briefing this morning about what was known about the situation at this point. They were told there had been no incidents with oil refineries reported at this point in time, that there had been clearly heavy damage in the Beaumont and Port Arthur areas and that heavy rains are falling near Jasper and that there were expectations there could be as much as 24 inches of rain there.
They were told to prepare for several possibilities. One was that they might have to be deployed by helicopter, another they might have to be deployed by boat, and a third that they'd go by ground.
However, officials here caution that did not necessarily reflect anything about what their mission would eventually turn out to be. They are simply sitting here. They are waiting, they are chomping at the bit. They want to get out there and do this search and rescue that is their job. Back to you, Fred.
WHITFIELD: And what might be the scenarios, even though you mention that there have not been reports as of yet that they're needing to respond to, what might be some of the scenarios that these particular teams specialize in?
MESERVE: Well, there are two types of team here. There's a type three team which is relatively small, in the area of about 30 people. They can go out and sort of do a very rapid fire assessment of a situation. Do the most obvious life saving and there are heavier teams, type one teams, they go in with heavier gear. They do much more structural work and extensive searching for possible survivors and for victims.
It's the lighter teams that might be deployed by helicopter and by boat, because they're much more mobile. But as I say, as yet, no clear marching orders for any of these teams. They wait.
WHITFIELD: All right, Jeanne Meserve, thanks so much out of Houston.
BLITZER: I want to immediately, Fred, go to David Reddick. He's joining us on the phone from Lake Charles, Louisiana, a heavy hit area. David is with the American Red Cross. Where in Lake Charles, David, are you?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm at the St. Patrick Hospital right here downtown.
BLITZER: What's it like there?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, inside the hospital, they evacuated the patients on Thursday. They've got a skeleton crew here in the emergency room and an admin group here. We weathered the storm here last night with them, just a wonderful group of people, very tight- knit folks and ready to help any people that were injured in the storm should they arrive here.
Outside, things are a little different, as you might suggest. We went out this morning and saw that the waters there on Lake Charles here were continuing to rise and push a bunch of debris up on to the roads. Some of the roads were impassable. A lot of the high tension power lines were down, foam poles, trees. It's kind of hard to get around down here.
BLITZER: So what is -- what can we -- what -- at this stage, it's only hours after landfall, what can the American Red Cross do in the Lake Charles area?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, over the last 24 hours we set up 153 shelters and had about 63,000, 64,000 people in there. Now that was for Louisiana and Texas. And the southwest Louisiana chapter has been working with authorities here to interface with them, to discuss the possibility of opening shelters in the area.
Now we're not going to do that until it's safe to do so and we can put the shelters in the safe areas that are not going to be affected by possible flooding waters, additional high winds and the like. So we're cautiously looking into some options here. And as those needs arise, we're going to be sure that we do everything we can to meet them.
BLITZER: Lake Charles is a city of approximately 70,000 people. Is it your anticipation that those individuals -- and most of them probably almost all of them, did evacuate -- are not going to be able to get back into their homes for some time, along the lines of what happened in New Orleans?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, hopefully it's not going to be that bad because, you know, the entire infrastructure is different than New Orleans. The don't the have the same levee type of situation here or the -- I guess the word I'm looking for is beneath the sea level situation they have out there in New Orleans. So hopefully these people will be able to return a lot faster than those that were in New Orleans.
BLITZER: Is there any indication when the mayor and other local authorities will start letting them come back or encouraging them to come back to their homes? Will it be days, weeks? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's a good question and it's not one I have an answer for. All I can say is that the Red Cross will be there when they come back and we're there for them now that they're evacuating.
BLITZER: David Reddick is with the American Red Cross in Lake Charles, Louisiana. David, thank you very much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.
BLITZER: This important note to our viewers, we're standing by to hear from the governor of Louisiana, Kathleen Blanco. She's going to have a news conference. Those are live pictures coming in from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the state capital. We'll go there as soon as she comes to the microphones. Much more of our special coverage, right after this.
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WHITFIELD: Well, this just in out of Louisiana, out of the Vermilion Parish. Apparently some emergency workers are beginning to launch a rescue effort to try and get to a group of people who did not heed the mandatory evacuation order for that parish.
Apparently they are trapped in their homes and these emergency workers are just now beginning to get their first helicopters up and running to launch this rescue operation. We don't know exactly how many people are involved, only that a group of people in their home are now at the center of a rescue effort soon to be under way in Vermilion Parish.
Now, on to Houston. After an anxious and chaotic week, the city dodged the worst of Hurricane Rita's wind and water. National correspondent Bob Franken is there. Bob, how are things going?
BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: While this was -- while this was a relative breeze for the city of Houston its surrounding area, not that there weren't problems. There are about 4,100,000 residents of this metropolitan area, the fourth largest population center in the country.
About 500,000 homes and businesses are without power. They're quickly trying to restore it. There are the variety of concerns about such things as late flooding. Houston is one of the areas that has low-lying neighborhoods where the water sometimes takes 12 to 24 hours to do its damage. So they say they're not out of the water here yet.
Officials are most concerned that all those people who evacuated and caused such chaos on the way out are now going to want to come back. And they're joining a list of people who are saying, don't do it yet. There are too many problems. Among the people saying that, the governor of Texas.
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GOV. RICK PERRY, TEXAS: I can't say in strong enough terms to those who evacuated the coastal regions that they should not begin to return for the time being. We are not through assessing the damage. We cannot assure you at this time that your community is safe to return to. We also need time to restock fuel supplies along the return routes and to restock goods in stores. We also want to avoid any traffic gridlock.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FRANKEN: So the skies are turning blue every once in a while here in Houston, but that does not mean, Fredricka, that they're in the clear yet -- Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: All right. Bob Franken in Houston -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right. Let's immediately go to Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, a Republican of Texas. She's speaking.
SEN. KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON (R), TEXAS: ... area have been so taxes. I have met with and talked with the mayor and the country judge in Harris County and Houston. And they've been working with Katrina victims and trying to get their area stabilized.
And then to have this come so suddenly was an extra burden. But I think, given the circumstances, it was not as bad as we thought it could be, though there will still be a great amount of damage and a great amount of inconvenience.
QUESTION: Are there areas you would like to see improved with regard to the evacuation?
HUTCHISON: Well, I think clearly we learned so much from Katrina about evacuating early and I think the early evacuation was the right thing to do. There will be postmortems and there will be improvements that we learn from this. And that is when two million people are trying to leave a pretty narrow area, we probably ought to be looking at changing the highways over more quickly so that they're all going out.
And I think certainly the gasoline shortage is something that we would address next time. Having said that, I think the state planners have been terrific. I think the mayors and the county judges implemented their plans and got their people out.
Having grown up in Galveston County, I can tell you, we have never had 95 percent evacuation for a hurricane. Not ever. And that was the right thing. And it did save lives and so you have to factor that in along with the frustrations that I know people feel about being stuck on the road without gasoline.
QUESTION: The president has taken what appears to be a proactive approach to this storm, this kind of accountability (ph). How did you gauge the federal response so far?
HUTCHISON: I think the federal response has been terrific. I have been working with the local officials and when I have called the head of FEMA or anyone in the Coast Guard to say we need airplanes, we need to go into Jefferson County to evacuate or I called on behalf of Mayor White to try to help people get out of Ellington and get more medical team there -- the response was instant. It was absolutely there.
I think the federal response this time has been very focused. And I think the president has done a wonderful job of monitoring it, hands-on, making sure that any requests that got through the system was answered. So I think -- and let me say, that in Texas, the state and local and federal authorities work very well together.
They all have communicated throughout this week, all the plans that were put in place have, I think, in large part, mitigated many of the potential deaths that we could have had. Yes, we will have property damage but we are going to have very few deaths. And probably one of the sad areas was the bus blowing up in Dallas which really, I think, was just an awful situation. But other than that, I think that the deaths have been avoided.
QUESTION: Texas is such an important state for oil and gas production for the rest of the country. Is that federal response in part because we don't want the rest of the country to suffer because of here (ph)?
HUTCHISON: Well, I certainly think that with 25 percent of the refining capacity for all of America sitting in one area that was the target of this hurricane, that all of us were concerned that it would have a mammoth impact on the whole country if the bulk of those refineries were really damaged and out of pocket and out of commission for a long time.
As it happened, they did shut down because of the evacuations, but I think they will be up and going very soon and this is good for America, because 25 percent of the refining capacity means that gasoline prices would have gone up and stayed up.
If there are spikes because of supply, I think they will be very short, just as they were in Katrina. And I have to say, that it was the president who opened the strategic oil reserve, imported gasoline and crude oil from foreign countries and made the spikes in gasoline prices very, very short after Katrina. And I think that that will be the case after Rita as well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's it guys. We've got to wrap up, seems (ph) it's coming up. Thanks a lot.
HUTCHISON: Thank you.
BLITZER: All right. The senator from Texas, Kay Bailey Hutchison briefing reporters, suggesting that the situation pretty much under control. Federal government, state government, local government doing a good job, she says, in dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Rita.
These are the new pictures, new video that we're getting in along the border, the coast area, the Gulf coastal area between Texas and Louisiana, some of the hard-hit areas, although many of the homes have survived as you've been seeing.
Here, this new video coming in, the damage elsewhere in the state considerable in Louisiana and in Texas. But at least these areas along the coast, these homes, many of them high up, they seem to have emerged in relatively good shape in the aftermath of Hurricane Rita. We continue to bring you these pictures. We also want to let you know, we're standing by for a news conference.
The acting director of FEMA in Washington, David Paulison, will be briefing reporters on what the federal government is doing to deal with the aftermath of Hurricane Rita. We've now been told the Governor of Louisiana, Kathleen Blanco, she'll be talking to reporters at the top of the hour, 3:00 p.m. Eastern. We're going to go and listen to her when she starts speaking there as well.
In the meantime, Steve McCraw is joining us on the phone. Well, actually, he's speaking live right now. The head of Texas Homeland Security in Austin.
STEVE MCCRAW, TEXAS HOMELAND SECURITY: Including residents of Tomball, the woodlands, Waller, Hockley, Katy, Brookshire and the surrounding communities will be welcome to return on Sunday. That would be tomorrow.
If you live west of State Highway 35 and South of I-10, including residents of Richmond, Stafford, Rosenberg, Sugar Land, Pearland and surrounding communities, and if you live inside loop I-610, then the best day to return is Monday.
The rest who leave east of I-45 and north of I-10, up to Liberty and Chamber County the Chamber County lines, can return on Tuesday.
Let me reiterate. This does not apply to those who live east of the area of Houston area and were impacted by the zone. As we've talked earlier, we're moving troopers in, we're moving mass care shelter teams in, we're moving a lot of resources in. (INAUDIBLE) an overwhelming response to take care of those people there, clear the roads and get back to normal and make in fact, getting on those roads at that time, we would consider it a public safety risk.
We're also strongly encouraging school districts from Houston to the Louisiana border to close on Monday. Obviously those hit hardest my want to close for much longer or at least some longer. We don't want people to feel like they should get rushed back to school, to return students to school.
If you return today, we cannot guarantee enough fuel, we cannot guarantee safety along the roads because of debris and downed power lines and we cannot ensure a fast return. And as I mentioned earlier, is that we have to use our public safety resources to quickly deploy to those affected areas so we can take care of the people that were in harm's way.
Thank you.
BLITZER: Steve McCraw's in charge of homeland security in the state of Texas, briefing reporters. Giving specifics on which individuals, which residents, can start returning to their homes as early as tomorrow. But most of the people are being told, don't yet get back on the roads even though the damage to Houston and Galveston, elsewhere in Texas, not necessarily as bad as feared. This is not a good time to start clogging those arteries, those highways to make sure that rescue workers and other emergency personnel can get to those areas as need.
The acting FEMA director, David Paulison, getting ready to brief reporters in Washington. We're going to go there live. We'll take a quick break.
We've been showing you this new video along the coast as it's been coming in to us. We'll continue to do so. Much more of our special coverage right after this.
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FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: As promised, we want to take you straight to Washington, D.C. there. And there's the FEMA acting director, David Paulison.
DAVID PAULISON, ACTING DIRECTOR OF FEMA: So having said all of that, the damage is not as severe as we had expected it would be. And also, I'm here to tell you that the evacuations worked. Every mayor that we talked to is crediting the evacuations for the fact that we have no reported deaths at this time for many of the states.
I know that the evacuations were difficult. I know there were some rough edges around them. But we got quite a few people out of harm's way and I think that is the reason for the fact that we had so few injuries and so few deaths.
We are, at this time, currently moving our assets into the affected areas. Urban search and rescue teams are already on the ground searching homes and looking for people to rescue because that's our primary mission right now is search and rescue. We have the 17 urban search and rescue teams in Texas with over 900 people. And we have five urban search and rescue teams in Louisiana with 400 people.
They are working with our medical teams. They're working in conjunction with each other to go from site to site. We have a 30 excuse me, 438 people in Texas, medical people, and 500 in Louisiana. In fact, they are already trading people in Houston. So the disaster medical teams are already on the ground and are already working.
We are also sending in high water vehicles into those areas that are flooded. And those high water vehicles are carrying food, water, doing basic first aid, basic medical supplies. And they're also doing some damage assessment for us so we can get a good handle on exactly where the damage is and how significant it is.
Very shortly, we'll be putting our Coast Guard helicopters in the air, if they're not in the air already. So we're just waiting for the winds to die down to really get a good handle on where the damage is and where the rescues need to take place. We are moving as quickly as possible. People need to understand that the roads are difficult to pass. The first responders on the ground are going to have a difficult time getting around. But they're out in the streets trying to get by. I've already seen pictures of firefighters in turnout gear wading in water going from house to house and searching.
I need to caution people that the storm is still very dangerous. Even though the winds have died down, please stay in your homes. If you've evacuated your area, do not go back to your city until the local officials tell you it's safe to do so.
The water has power lines down in it. There's a lot of debris. The power lines could still be charged even though there's not electricity in a lot of places. It is a very, very dangerous place to be. We're strongly encouraging people just to stay where you are, just to be patient and wait for the local officials to tell you it's safe to go back in.
We are moving as quickly as we can. We're going to move food and water to the places they need to be as fast as we can. And that was really kind of what I wanted to brief you on today and I'd just like to answer a few questions and keep this short.
QUESTION: Sir, where do you think the danger is from here on out going ahead? You mentioned the power lines. But what about if the storm hovers and we get a lot more rain and those flooded areas. Do you consider that a major danger? And also, when do you anticipate that people who have been evacuated will be able to go back to their homes.
PAULISON: You've got at least a couple question there.
The first one is, what I've seen historically and as time after time in hurricanes is, most of the fatalities, most of the injuries are after the hurricane is over. People are tired. They want to get their homes back in shape. You know, we end up with people falling off of roofs. We have people hurt themselves with chainsaws. We have generator accidents. All of those things happen after the storm is over. So that's one of my big concerns.
The other is, the high water in still on the streets. You don't know what's under there. There's debris there. There's holes in the road. There's live electric lines down. So that's why we just would like people just to stay where they are as long as they have food and water and take care of themselves and just be patient. It'll take a couple days. Be just patient and then, you know, we'll get you back in your homes.
The timetable, I can't tell you that. That's up to the local officials. It depends on how quickly the waters recede and how quickly we can get services back up. You don't want to go back into your home if there's no water, there's no electricity, there's no sewage. So just be patient and when the local officials are ready, they'll tell people when it's time to move back into their homes.
Yes.
QUESTION: President Bush, in one of his speeches since Katrina, thwarted (ph) DHS (ph) to do a review of the (INAUDIBLE) plans at every major city, saying we have to have plans to evacuate large numbers of people in an emergency. Has FEMA begun that yet? How are you going to begin that? And what do you think realistically you can do to help cities do a better job? Because I know you said that the evacuation worked, but I think a lot of those people involved in miles and miles and miles of traffic jams, running out of gas, sitting on the side of the road might disagree.
PAULISON: It wasn't a lot of fun. There's no question about it. Houston area is a huge city. We probably evacuated 2.5 million people. Maybe more. We don't know yet. So the roads were not capable of handling that. And I'm sure that Houston and Texas will go back and look at that very carefully.
But I firmly believe that every city in this country should have an evacuation plan of some kind for whatever, natural disaster, terrorism, it doesn't matter. Just have those plans in place. And we're going to have to start working with that. I can't deal with it right now. I'm worried about Rita. That will be something down the road that we'll have to work with the cities to make sure that we can help them put those plans together.
Yes, sir.
QUESTION: What do you attribute the sort of apparent better (ph) success with Rita than with (INAUDIBLE) on, you know, keeping people alive and avoiding huge death tolls?
PAULISON: Well, I you know, I'm not going to go back and look at Katrina yet. We'll have time for that later. So I don't want to make any comparisons.
I can just tell you that we approached this particular storm in a very cooperative manner. We had a lot of partners. We had a video conference this morning with the Department of Defense and the president and other people. And my comment was how well we did the communications in this particular piece with the states and the locals, with the military, with the coast guard, with FEMA. We were in constant communication.
We understood very clearly what the states needed. We understood very clearly what the locals need. And they understood what our capabilities were. I think that's the key to making any type of disaster work. That's why it worked in the past. You know, I've done this a long time and that's the way we're working in this storm.
So one of these days we'll get back to looking at Katrina and critique that and decide what worked and what didn't work. But right now, I'm just focusing on Rita.
Yes.
QUESTION: Does this storm (INAUDIBLE) the progress that you were making (INAUDIBLE) recovery in the Katrina area? And to what extent are the (INAUDIBLE)?
PAULISON: Well, yes, of course it had an impact on it. I mean the fact that the levees were breached in New Orleans, that set us back. I mean we're going to have to go back and repair those levees and start pump the water out again. Some of the people on the ground told me that we probably set ourselves back three or four days in what we tried to do.
So, yes, it had an impact. We had to take people out of the area that we were they were working and now we have to move them back again. So it does set you back a bit.
Yes, sir.
QUESTION: What about bringing people back to Houston? Are you working with the cities in order to try to get to bring people back so that none of the same kind of problems we had during (INAUDIBLE).
PAULISON: Yes, that will be a decision by the state and by the city of Houston and the other cities. We will assist them in the type of resources they need. But that's their decision on how they do that. And, yes, we will consult with them to help them make sure that's an orderly fashion to get back into the city.
QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).
PAULISON: Well, that's again, that's they're not ready for that yet. The Houston mayor was just on the television just a few hours ago saying, don't come back into the city yet. When that time is ready, we will assist them with that, yes.
Yes.
QUESTION: How is moral building up here at FEMA? I talked to folks who have been working 12-hour plus shifts every day since Katrina hit. And the same time, they're very cognizant of the fact that along the Gulf Coast, to say that FEMA's not (INAUDIBLE) regard right now (INAUDIBLE) people in Houston.
PAULISON: Well, I have to tell you, I am extremely proud of the employees of FEMA. And a 12-hour day is a short day. And they are working, some of them 18 hours a day. They are very cognizant of some of the issues out there. But I have to tell you, I've never been so more proud to be part of an organization like this.
When this extra storm came along, when Rita came along, you would expect people to just kind of drop their shoulders. That didn't happen here. These people re-energized and back together again and ready to take on this next storm. So, you know, I don't see some of those other issues. These people are focused on Rita and focused on getting the people from Katrina back in business again.
Yes, sir.
QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE) the weather (INAUDIBLE) assessment device (ph). Do you have any early word on the (INAUDIBLE) oil facilities (INAUDIBLE) storm is moving north (INAUDIBLE).
PAULISON: The first question is, I don't have a good assessment yet on the damage to any of the oil facilities. We're in the process of doing that. The Coast Guard will be responsible for doing that assessment for us. And I'm not sure if the winds have died down enough for them to do that.
And your second question was?
QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).
PAULISON: Right. And we're monitoring that very carefully. We know that this storm is although the winds have died down quite a bit, is still a tremendous amount of rain ahead of this particular storm. And so we're working with the states and the locals to monitor that, to see if maybe we have to do further evacuations or not. But we're going to be there could be flooding all the way up into Arkansas and that's something we have to watch very carefully, no question about it.
QUESTION: You said the communications were vital this time. You had a better idea of what the cities needed the cities that were aware of what you could provide. Did that have to do with the fact that in this case you pre-positioned FEMA workers at the cities and kept them there (INAUDIBLE) in the case of Katrina where I spoke directly with the mayor (INAUDIBLE) FEMA people pulled out right before the storm (INAUDIBLE) and left New Orleans.
PAULISON: I'm not sure I understood your question. The (INAUDIBLE) . . .
QUESTION: How important I mean did your FEMA people who you put in place at the cities stay there and ride out the storm with the cities and therefore be able to quickly transmit back to what they need versus, again, in Katrina, where FEMA people pulled out and (INAUDIBLE).
PAULISON: We moved a lot of people out of harm's way. Some people stayed to stay with the city officials, yes. And we had already put a communication in place already for Louisiana to make sure that we could understand what those issues were. And we just duplicated that in Texas. Putting people with the cities, putting people in the governor's office, and the emergency operations center, to make sure that we were talking together on a not only a daily basis, but an hourly basis.
QUESTION: Has the president declared a disaster (INAUDIBLE)?
PAULISON: The disaster has been applied for by both states. And we're working on those right now.
QUESTION: Did you say that there were (INAUDIBLE) that have been done so far or (INAUDIBLE)?
PAULISON: I know we're treating people in Houston with our the disaster medical assistance teams. And I understand there have been a few rescues already taking place. I don't have the details on those right now.
QUESTION: You don't know how many?
PAULISON: I do not know how many at this point. We're still getting reports in as we come. And people are still getting out into the field.
Folks, I thank you very much. I appreciate it. And, you know, keep up the good work. You're getting our message out and I appreciate that very much. That's important to us.
WHITFIELD: Out of Washington, D.C., there the acting director of FEMA, David Paulison, talking about, based on their initial assessments, good news, damage was not as severe as anticipated. Evacuations have worked, even though they were very difficult and, in his words, there were a few rough edges. However, there have been no reported deaths.
Wolf.
BLITZER: Let's bring in Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, a Republican of Texas. She's, obviously, watching this very, very closely.
I take it, Senator, based on what we heard, you say you're pleased with the response by federal, state and local authorities in Texas.
SEN. KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, TEXAS: Yes. I think they coordinated very well, Wolf. Obviously there were some glitches. People stand on the roadway and not enough excess gasoline. But in the main, they were communicating and I think that they had a plan which they implemented and there were a few things that weren't anticipated, like 2 million people trying to get out at the same time. But I think we've learned from that, just as we've learned from Katrina.
BLITZER: But now 2 million people are going to be going back home. How are you going to implement that so that you don't re-create the kind of traffic jams, the nightmare scenarios that we saw leaving Houston, the greater metropolitan area. This is an area, as you know, 4.5 million people. And the gasoline shortages that occur.
HUTCHISON: Well, of course, you have to take it in stages. And they are going to try to do that and say, if you live in this area, you can go back on Sunday. If you live in a different area, please wait until Monday. But if people do not adhere to that, it is going to cause problems. Clearly, they would like to be able to build up the gasoline supply and the food supply because the food markets are also very dry right now and water is scarce. So they want to be able to restock the shelves before people move back in. But if people don't heed the advice, then, of course, it will be a glut (ph) going back in.
And frankly, Wolf, I just came into Austin and it was bumper to bumper traffic going from Austin to Houston. So that could happen. BLITZER: So people are not necessarily heeding the advice, at least based on the anecdotal experience that you just had, that they're getting ready to go back to their homes in Houston. You can't blame them, everybody wants to do that and see the damage and make sure that everything is OK.
One of the glitches that we did see in the buildup to Hurricane Rita was at George Bush International Airport, a lot of those TSA screeners failed to show up for work. There were horrendous lines, back ups. There were a lot of nervous people at the airport. Couldn't the federal government have done a better job bringing in screeners from outside of the area to deal with this emergency?
HUTCHISON: Yes. I think that is something that should be looked at. Definitely. Because that backup, of course, caused delays, which made it even more.
BLITZER: So there are going to be some lessons that all of us are going to be studying. It looks like the federal government did a much better job in dealing with Rita than it did with Katrina. Do you want to draw any early lessons based on your experience?
HUTCHISON: Well, I think that the Rita evacuation early was the right thing to do. That was what we learned from Katrina. But I think, when you reverse the lanes and allow all the outbound traffic to go on both sides of the freeway, is an issue that should be looked at, as well as the added gasoline supplies in case of emergencies such as we have seen. I think having bringing in people from outside for TSA screeners certainly is another area and that could, perhaps, be the case for police and fire.
Now, again, anecdotally, Wolf, I was just coming in and I saw ambulances from Frankfurt, Kentucky, from Lexington, from all over Texas. They had brought in a lot of assets for emergency medical care that are in wait right now. So that's the good news. I think the medical side of this has been very well handled.
BLITZER: Correct me if I'm wrong, Senator, are you originally from Galveston?
HUTCHISON: I was born in Galveston and grew up in Galveston County. And I lived through Carla, which is the worst hurricane that we've had in the Gulf Coast really ever since the 1900's storm. I wasn't there for 1900. But I have lived through the hurricanes. And I will say this from my experience, I've never seen a 95 percent evacuation of Galveston County ever and that is what we had this time. So people took the Katrina lesson. And I think we can now build on that with Rita. And we will get this down as we see these big, mammoth hurricanes actually coming more frequently to our shores.
BLITZER: Air Force One, by the way, is landing in Austin, where you are right now, bringing the president from Colorado Springs. He was briefed this morning, spent the night at the U.S. military's northern command, which is in charge of homeland security. I'm sure you'll be seeing him once he comes. And he's now about to land in Texas. I'm sure you'll be seeing him shortly. There will be those critics, and I don't know if they're already suggesting this, but I'm sure there will be some second guessers in Galveston, in Houston, saying everyone overreacted this time, that evacuation was not necessarily all that important. Have you been getting any of that yet?
HUTCHISON: Well, of course that is going to be the natural response. And that's why you haven't seen this kind of evacuation in the past because people have seen so many times where there's been a big buildup and then it has been less. But you have to look at Katrina and see what happens if you do wait and think that this is going to be like all the rest. We have to error on the side of caution. We have to error on the side of safety. We do not have very many lost lives in the Rita hurricane and that is due to the great evacuation process that was put in place.
BLITZER: Are you getting any preliminary cost estimates of the damage in Texas from Rita?
HUTCHISON: I have heard an estimate of $8 billion. Some of that, of course, will be private. The refineries. But there is also going to be a lot of damage to streets and signs and many of the roofs that have been blown off buildings in the Beaumont/Port Arthur area. There's going to be property damage. But the loss of life will be very small.
BLITZER: That's the good news on that.
A political question while I have you, Senator. Who should pay for all of this, the federal government? Obviously got a big price tag for Hurricane Katrina. Now Rita. Where should this money come from?
HUTCHISON: Well, we are certainly looking at that and hope to have some offsets and some delays to try to keep us from building this deficit to such a great extent. It's going to be difficult, I will tell you, but there is a very strong sentiment in Congress that we should cut back on other areas so that we try to keep the deficit down. And I don't know where those areas will be but we're looking.
BLITZER: In our most recent CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup Poll, 55 percent or so said the government should help pay for all of these disasters by reducing expenditures in Iraq. Would you support that?
HUTCHISON: We must keep our commitment to the war on terror. That war is for the freedom of future generations. And as long as we are fighting to stabilize Iraq, we are try to keep terrorists on their turf and not come to our turf. It would be absolutely the worst thing we could do, to walk away from our commitments in Iraq and the commitment of the United States of America and our word so that in the future, neither our enemies nor our friends would ever trust that we would stay the course. That would be a disaster for sure. So I do not think that's the place to go.
BLITZER: All right. What about delaying the prescription drug benefit under Medicare that's about to be implemented? HUTCHISON: I would prefer to see us look for other means, Wolf. I don't want to delay the prescription drug benefit that so many seniors have been looking for. I think we ought to be looking at infrastructure. I think we ought to be looking at transportation, things that could be maybe put off. Maybe busses. Maybe certain bridges or roads. I don't know exactly which ones could be put off for a year or two. But I would rather see us put off capital expenditures rather than programs for our people.
BLITZER: All right. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas, thanks very much for spending a few moments with us. She's back in her home state of Texas in Austin. The president of the United States, Air Force One has just landed there as well. We'll be watching his visit to the area. There it is, Air Force One.
We're just getting this word in from a spokesman for the vice president of the United States, Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney had surgery today on both of his knees, not just one of his knees, to repair aneurysms on the back of both of his knees. His counselor, Steve Schmidt (ph), telling reporters that the vice president's surgery was a success. He will remain in the hospital for up to 48 hours to monitor his recovery. He's expected to resume a regular schedule when he's released to go home. This according to Steve Schmidt.
Originally he was only supposed to have that aneurysm surgery on his right knee but his doctors decided to do both at the same time, this according to Steve Schmidt. Aneurysm is a ballooning weak spot in an artery that as blood pounds through eventually can burst if left untreated. His condition was discovered during Cheney's, the vice president's, annual physical back in July. He's had four heart attacks, as you know.
Much more of our coverage coming up. We're awaiting not only the president's arrival in Austin, Texas there's Air Force One but Governor Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana about to speak to the press. We'll go there when she does.
We'll be right back.
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