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CNN Live Saturday

Hurrican Rita Aftermath; Galveston Officials Asking Citizens to Stay Away for Now

Aired September 25, 2005 - 12:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Houston specifically, Galveston, don't yet return to your homes. They want an orderly procedure to do so. They will get word, the governor says, later this afternoon, when that process can begin and how to begin it. Make sure they don't have the long lines, the jammed congestion and lack of gasoline that caused so many problems in the evacuation to begin with. We're going to keep these pictures of, our photographer, Mark Biello, is shooting these live pictures from Lake Charles, Louisiana, an area clearly hit very, very hard by Hurricane Rita. This is a river that we're seeing, and we see some riverboats. Mark, what else do we see in the video you're getting to is via videophone?
MARK BIELLO, CNN PHOTOGRAPHER: Again, the far side, the west bank is the actual riverboat from that casino, plus a lot of recreational small craft that are just tossing around and have actually pulled away from their dock. The actual -- this looks like a riverfront city park that's completely under water at this time, and the storm surge is pushing, and it is beginning now to come up over the road where we're at, so we probably won't stay too much.

We have Fish and Wildlife people now showing up with state troopers. Most likely I think they're going to ask us to leave, because the storm is actually intensifying instead of dying down at this time.

BLITZER: Be careful, Mark. Mark Biello and our crew on the scene for us at Lake Charles, Louisiana, bringing us they amazing images. I have to tip my hat to all our courageous journalists, Fred. They've been doing an excellent job.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Incredible images coming through. And we're going to continue to allow you to look at this picture. You see the kinds of winds pushing that water there in the river there in Lake Charles. It's doing a very similar thing in New Orleans, east of there in Lake Pontchartrain, pushing the water back into the troubled areas over the levees back into the troubled area that had experienced some 20 feet of water from Katrina.

We're going to talk to a member of the Army Corps of Engineers, as they try to make plans to move back into New Orleans to try to beefen up those levees that are compromised by the water that's overflowing. And we're also going to check in with Jacqui Jeras right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) WHITFIELD: Welcome back to our continuing coverage of Hurricane Rita. You're looking at live pictures right now via videophone of Lake Charles, Louisiana, which is getting some significant winds there. We're hearing sporadic reports of some potential damage. We know there's some riverboats, casino boats along the river there who are being battered quite a bit, but right now our crews are able to bring us these live pictures, but teams have not gotten out to assess any potential damage as of yet.

This same kind of wind spawned by Rita is a significant problem -- head east of there into New Orleans. It is pushing the water from Lake Pontchartrain over the repaired levees back into the lower Ninth Ward, an area that had experienced some 20 feet of water after Katrina. Well now an additional three feet of water is being pushed into the lower Ninth. That according to our correspondent there, Mary Snow. On the telephone with us now, Colonel Duane Gapinski -- he's the commander of unwatering task force with the Army Corps of Engineers.

Colonel, thanks so much. Mary Snow reported earlier your biggest concern is the Industrial Canal levee. Is that right?

COL. DUANE GAPINSKI, U.S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS: That's correct. We had some over-topping at four places yesterday, and it continues to over-top in one place today.

WHITFIELD: You stayed there throughout Rita, been there for the duration, almost three weeks now after Katrina. Why did you find it important to stay there? Was it your anticipation that something like this was going to happen.

GAPINSKI: Obviously the best place to be was on the ground, and since the storm was not nearly as intense as Katrina, we made the decision to stay put, that way we could respond as immediately as possible.

WHITFIELD: You had felt fairly comfortable and confident about the repairs done to those levees. What do you suppose went wrong here?

GAPINSKI: Actually, the repairs held, but the water just got too high. So it flowed over the top of those repairs.

WHITFIELD: So the sandbagging that's taking place as soon as the wind dies down, this is sandbagging on top of the previous sandbagging, or is it in a new location along the Industrial Canal?

GAPINSKI: No, these are at places that had previously been worked on or previously been breached, so yes.

WHITFIELD: Now, we saw some pictures that there were sandbagging on some locations of the levee breaks, and then steel planks put into place in others. How did you go about making the decision of which areas would get sandbagging and which would get the steel planks?

GAPINSKI: There's only certain places you can use those sheet pilings, those steel -- you know, to create a steel wall. It can't be too, too deep, so we did that mainly along the mouths of the two canals on Lake Pontchartrain.

WHITFIELD: At what point do you feel like it will be safe enough to begin the dropping of those -- some 3,000 pound sandbags?

GAPINSKI: Well, we're coordinating with the Army helicopters right now. It is a little difficult for them to fly because of the wind conditions. We're hopeful we can start this afternoon. If not, we'll try it again tomorrow.

WHITFIELD: Good luck on that, Colonel Duane Gapinski from the Army Corps of Engineers, commander of the unwatering task force -- Wolf?

BLITZER: Your heart has to go out to all those people in New Orleans, once again suffering as they are. Let's head west from New Orleans to Galveston, Texas, a city of about 60,000 people, largely evacuated probably 95 percent of that barrier island. Capt. Phillip Morris of the Galveston Police Department is joining us on the phone.

Captain, how are you doing?

PHILLIP MORRIS, CAPT., GALVESTON POLICE: Fine, sir. How are you?

BLITZER: Tell us what's happened overnight as far as Galveston is concerned?

MORRIS: Of course, we did not receive a direct hit from the storm, so we had some localized street flooding, some wind gusts I believe into the mid, upper 80s, resulting in some power lines and traffic signals being knocked down, along with some signage.

BLITZER: What I hear you saying is it could have been worse? Is that right?

MORRIS: Yes. We're extremely fortunate we didn't receive a direct impact from the storm, and I think that's -- this causes some local problems as far as cleaning up and restoring power. Probably 50,000 people are still out of power this morning.

BLITZER: Any injuries or fatalities?

MORRIS: I have no reports of any injuries or fatalities. We had I believe four structure fires and one building had a failure on one of the walls, and other than that, it's been minimal damage.

BLITZER: What about looting? has that been an issue in Galveston?

MORRIS: I haven't had any reports of looting. We've had some reports of very minor residential burglaries on the west end, but I haven't heard any reports on that today.

BLITZER: We heard the governor, Tony (SIC) Perry, of Texas say, Stay put, it's not time to return to your homes in Houston or Galveston. When do you think residents of Galveston will be allowed to start coming home?

MORRIS: Absolutely I think the wisest to do is stay in place wherever you're at, give the city management time to get the services restored -- power, sewer, water, gas -- and to get the power lines that are down that create a safety hazard. I suspect the city management will be evaluating this -- it's kind of a pretty fluid evaluation. I think they'll be evaluating it today at about 1:00, and then tomorrow around noon.

BLITZER: Maybe within a few days, but today probably unlikely you'll give the work come on home?

MORRIS: Absolutely. I don't believe that there's going to be any word today that says to come home. I think today we're in a cleanup mode and trying to restore services and I think we'll advise everybody to stay where they're at today, and I think tomorrow at noon they'll reevaluate the situation and see whether or not we've established enough of those services and cleaned up those dangerous obstructions so that we can let the citizens return.

BLITZER: I assume you've been outside today, Captain. What's it like right now?

MORRIS: The winds are starting to lay down a little bit. It's still windy, there's a few gusts. It's currently not raining. We're even seeing a few patches of blue here and there.

BLITZER: Capt. Phillip Morris of the Galveston Police Department, thanks very much for joining us. Good luck to you.

MORRIS: Thank you, sir.

BLITZER: Fred?

WHITFIELD: At the top of the hour, Hurricane Rita was a Category 1. Let's see how things are going with it right now. Let's check in with Jacqui Jeras, who's in the Weather Center. Jacqui, is it still considered a hurricane?

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Technically, yeah, the 11:00 advisory. But we're not getting a lot of data in any longer. A lot of the stations aren't reporting anymore, but the storm has weakened pretty dramatically and I would suspect it's really a tropical storm at this time, with the winds that it's doing right now. We'll get another update in about an hour from the National Hurricane Center. I'm sure we'll see Tropical Storm Rita instead.

The winds here very strong still around where the center -- that's just north of Jasper, Texas. That's probably about halfway up where Texas and Louisiana meet together right here. So we can expect to see certainly hurricane-force wind gusts, probably not quite sustained, but just below that. That's still enough to cause quite a bit of damage. You're going to see some trees down in addition to plenty of power outages. One of the other problems we've been dealing with -- the threat of the tornadoes, and there are a number of these squall lines, the outer feeder bands that have been pushing on through, getting near the Baton Rouge area right now that could produce tornadoes, and there's a plethora of tornado warnings in effect across parts of Mississippi for the second feeder band that goes up. And Vicksburg, Mississippi, right now is under a tornado warning, so you need to take cover now.

Still a very large storm -- we're still getting tropical-storm force sustained winds along the southern Louisiana coast. And you can see that flow coming in from the south and east. That's keeping our concerns up for the surge.

These are the main bullet points that you need to keep in mind here. Inland flooding can be expected as the storm begins to stall out near the Ark-La-Tx region. And we're expecting anywhere between 12 and 24 inches of rain, tornadoes expected in Louisiana and Mississippi. The storm surge is still going to be up across the Louisiana coast, including Lake Pontchartrain, about four to six feet above normal tide, but that should be slowly subsiding throughout the day for today.

Here you can see that watch in effect, starting to dwindle down across parts of Texas, but eastern Louisiana and Mississippi still under the gun. I want to show you the forecast track of where this will be going here. It will move still pretty rapidly up to the north about ten miles per hour or so, and then start to stall out right in this region. This is where we're most concerned about some of the flood potential. All the models don't have a great handle on how much it's going to be stalling, so still a little iffy. But the potential is there, anyways, for 12 to 24 inches of rain over the next three to five days. And remember that the inland flooding, this fresh water flooding, more people are generally killed in those conditions than anything else in a hurricane, because they just drive through that water, when they shouldn't -- Wolf?

WHITFIELD: Well, Jacqui, before I let you go, let me ask you real quick about Lake Charles. We've been showing the live pictures on the right-hand side of the screen. And we saw your graphic which showed Lake Charles seems like it's really out of the woods, but when you look at the pictures, it looks like conditions are still pretty bad.

JERAS: It's the surge they're dealing with more than anything else, and there's some rain there. The doppler radar out of Lake Charles is down, so we don't have really accurate information along with the weather observing sites, those are also down, but certainly among the hardest-hit areas. We think the worst is certainly over with for Lake Charles, but certainly not completely out of the woods. Look at that high surf, which is still up. That will be gradually going down throughout the day today.

BLITZER: We'll keep showing these pictures to our viewers. Jacqui Jeras, our meteorologist -- thanks, Jacqui, very much.

Joining us now is Congressman Bobby Jindal, Republican of Louisiana. You've got a one-two punch going on. Where are you right now, Congressman?

REP. BOBBY JINDAL, (R) LOUISIANA: We're literally at a bridge overlooking the 17th Street Canal, the infamous canal that broke that caused so much of New Orleans to be flooded. It was not breached during Rita. However in many parts of the city that were flooded before, they've been flooded again. Just -- as we're standing here, just east to us, we've seen streets that were flooded out. There's a heavy police presence to keep people out. If you go even further east, the Industrial Canal, obviously breaches again. Several feet of water have come back into New Orleans east, back into St. Bernard Parish -- back into New Orleans east and back into St. Bernard Parish. So, it wasn't the direct hit from Katrina, but tragically, some of the people that got hit hardest from Katrina also got hit again with Rita.

BLITZER: It looks still pretty windy where you are. Has the rain subsided?

JINDAL: There was heavy rain earlier. The last couple hours, we haven't had heavy rain. Unfortunately, with that heavy wind there is a concern that get some of the lakewater. And with that heavy wind there's a real concern -- I know that we literally saw truckloads -- 18-wheelers filled with sandbags -- headed towards the Industrial Canal

I know they're flying overhead, trying to survey the situation to see if think can drop those sandbags into the breaches, try to repair those breaches. There's a concern that not necessarily just rainwater, but the tidal surge. There's a real concern. You heard about Lake Pontchartrain -- it wouldn't take a very large tidal surge to continue overtopping some of those weakened levees.

BLITZER: Is it fair so say, Congressman, that the areas that have now been re-flooded were largely empty of residents, empty of people?

JINDAL: Absolutely. When you talk about the Ninth Ward, you talk about New Orleans East, you talk about St. Bernard Parish, you had first-responders there, but you did not have people living there. You had people that may have come back temporarily to look at their property. That process was stopped. You did have dry land, though, however much of that area had been pumped dry, now you've got as much as three to six feet of water back in homes that had been dry at one time.

On the north shore, in southern Mandeville (ph), you did have some areas where people were living, in Slidell, people who were living on cots, maybe without power, without water. They had to evacuate a second time, not because of the rain, because of some back- flooding from their canals. But for the most part, the property that was flooded was largely already evacuated. This was not the parts of Jefferson Parish or even the parts of New Orleans that had been repopulated.

BLITZER: Congressman, I know you're in very close touch with local officials, state officials, federal officials. The hurricane season officially ends November 30th, a couple more months to go. Is it a good idea to start bringing people back inside New Orleans, given the potential risk out there?

JINDAL: I know Rita reminded people how vulnerable we are. What they've done is phased in Jefferson Parish and the West Bank of New Orleans, which were largely -- not completely, but largely -- untouched by Katrina and now Rita. They had a lot of wind damage, but not a lot of flooding damage in many of those areas. I know on the north shore, in St. Tamany Parish, where there was more wind than flooding damage, they really focused on getting people back into those areas where they could get power and drinkable water back up. But they're saying that Rita will delay by at least three weeks the process of draining out and getting people back to even survey the damage in St. Bernard Parish, New Orleans East.

I don't think there's any talk of trying to repopulate those areas that were flooded or hit the hardest. It's not physically practical, especially with the damage that Rita has brought down on to this region again.

BLITZER: We know the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers -- they've worked tirelessly to try to shore up those levees, those flood walls, but it's sort of a stopgap measure. When do you anticipate serious real work to protect New Orleans down the road will get started?

JINDAL: They're talking about not until June of next year will they get the levees back to pre-Katrina levels. Obviously those levels weren't sufficient. We see they didn't protect the city from Katrina. But they're not talking until June before it'll be pre- Katrina.

Here on the 17th Street levee, what they did in addition to the sandbags, right behind us, they put metal scaffolding -- they literally put in metal pilings. That's good and bad. That's good because temporarily they can close the canal, stop the water from coming in, protect the levees. That's bad because it prevents you from pumping water out.

So the 17th Street Canal as opposed to the Industrial Canal, they had a fail-back. In case the levee was breached, they could put the pilings back in place, it shuts off the pumps, but it protects the levees. Obviously we need more permanent solutions. We're talking June to pre-Katrina -- pre-Katrina levels aren't enough. We obviously have to look at strengthening the levees, strengthening the pumps so that, god forbid, if there's another level three, level four hurricane, the city will be protected.

BLITZER: And we know you're -- I'm sure you're already looking ahead to next year and the hurricane season next year. Congressman Bobby Jindal, good luck to you, good luck to everyone in Louisiana. A double-double dose of trouble for your state and for Texas now as well. Fred?

WHITFIELD: Wolf, the nation's fourth largest city, Houston, breathing a sigh of relief. However, emergency officials are warning against an all-clear as of yet. An explanation when we come right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Live now to Galveston, Texas. That's the mayor, Lyda Ann Thomas.

LYDA ANN THOMAS, MAYOR, GALVESTON, TX: ...causeway open to our citizens just as soon as we possibly can. We're doing our best, and hopefully in the next couple days, and as each day goes by, we'll find a way, we'll get this island cleaned up and you'll all get home just as quick as we can get you here.

Now, what I'm going to ask you all to do, because it's a little bit hard to hear, we're very tired, is if you would just raise your hands and be recognized, we will try to answer as many questions as we can, but I'm going to ask you all to make your questions short. We have an awful lot to do, and we're doing it, as I just said, to get our folks back home. Let me start here, and we're just going to go right around and we'll try not to miss anybody.

QUESTION: Two quick questions: first, what about the people who are already lined up to get onto the island? Secondly, can you tell us a bit about the damage you did see and your perspective of it?

THOMAS: I'm going to let Mr. Leblanc answer the question.

LEBLANC: As far as the people that are lined up to get in, if they don't have a business being here, they're being turned around. What was your second question?

QUESTION: And so residents can get on?

LEBLANC: No, that's not what I said. I said if they're essential personnel, they are being allowed on. If they're not being essential personnel, they're being turned away by DPS.

QUESTION: Second, your perspective of the damage that you all viewed this morning?

LEBLANC: I think we got off very well as far as damage is concerned. There's very little flooding. They have a number of downed trees and such at that, but not that much. Our biggest issue is power.

QUESTION: Any idea how many power lines are down throughout --

LEBLANC: I said 75 percent of the city is without power.

Yes, ma'am?

QUESTION: Can we get more details on the fire and how many buildings it was that were damaged or destroyed on the strand?

LEBLANC: Joe can answer that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sure. The corner of 19th and Post Office is sort of the mid line between the east end historic district and the Strand central downtown area. At 1902 Post Office, the Eagles Hall suffered total devastation. That's currently being used as an art studio -- no longer. 1907 Post Office is a private residence, possibly a duplex. That did not suffer extensive damage, but embers crossed the street, as you all saw last night in the height of the storm. That sustained burn damage. A bail bonds office facing onto 19th street between Post Office and the alley between Market and Post Office suffered total devastation. The Galveston Historic Foundation, which is right next to this, did not suffer fire damage. However, I did note that a window on the northeast corner of the building was blown out, and that's the only damage I could notice. So there are three different buildings that burned and only one person as you know, who sustained that grievous injury.

QUESTION: Any idea on a cause yet, even if it was storm-related or not?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, sir.

QUESTION: Was there much historical significance to the buildings that were burned or the building where the facade fell off?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, absolutely. The facade that fell off of the Yagas (ph) Building is right at the heart of our Strand Historic District. It's at the 23rd and Strand intersection at Sangerfest Park. It's an old building made of brick, certainly dating back to the last century, beginning of the last century, 1900s. The Eagles Hall was an older building, but it was a fraternal organization for decades. The bail bonds building was not an old building comparatively, and 1907 Post Office that had the minor damage was a wooden structure from about the 1915 era.

QUESTION: Can you give us more details on (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The question is about the woman who was burned in the house.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right. From what I understand, the woman was in an apartment on top of the bail bonds part of the structure that faced onto 19th Street between Post Office and the alley. She was by herself, was on a mattress, and there may have been something to do with either a smoking-type situation. There was also some suggestion there was some gasoline in the structure, but that's not confirmed.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).

QUESTION: You know, the island has withstood a Category 1 hurricane before, the island has seen these same kinds of power lines down before when people did not evacuate. There are a lot of folks who want to come home, they just want to come home, they're tired. I know that there's a safety issue, but what can you -- I know no time frame, nothing for these folks?

THOMAS: Come back at 5:30, just as we did before the storm, just as we did during the evacuation. We have to go, at this point, hour by hour as we assess the damage, just as we assessed the strength of the storm as it was coming in. As soon as we can let our folks in, I guarantee you, but I'm not going to say today what that day is, because I don't know yet. Remember, the storm just passed by here a few hours ago, so we're out all over the place trying to assess the damage.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me add this: what the mayor has also hinted out and said, one of our partners here in the city is Centerpoint Energy. They're the franchise that provides electricity and manages the lines. We are expecting a recommendation from them. That is something that only they can give us.

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