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CNN Saturday Morning News
Hurricane Ike Keeps Hammering Texas
Aired September 13, 2008 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
T.J. HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everybody from the CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia. This is your hurricane headquarters. And this is CNN SATURDAY MORNING, where two-thirds of our Saturday morning team is out in Hurricane Ike right now, which has slammed into Texas. Specifically, it's pounded Houston down to Galveston. We've got you covered as the sun begins to come up now. We are starting to see those damages. Damage estimates come in and they are starting to climb as well again.
My co-anchor Betty Nguyen is in Houston right now. She's been reporting there for us all morning. Having some trouble with her signal right now. Given those weather conditions, a lot of wind blowing, you can see our Reynolds Wolf is there as well this morning. We also have other CNN correspondents out there for us. Our affiliates are out there for us, helping us bring you the pictures and the stories of what is happening this day.
Take a look at some of what has happened.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The generator has the lights on, probably?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Probably, you know, there is still electricity in that area of town.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I guess so. Maybe it's not on generators at this point. But in this part of downtown, there are traffic lights on the ground. There are street signs on the ground.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: And again, you are listening to some of our affiliates who have helped us tell the story. But downtown Houston is certainly a major concern. Lots of debris we have been seeing in the streets. Literally, we have seen traffic lights down, street signs down, shattered glass from a lot of those high-rises which is certainly a staple of that downtown area of Houston. It's just a place you do not want to be out and about and walking around right now.
Again, our Reynolds Wolf has been in Clute, Texas, this morning. We never know what we are going to get when we see his live shot. The conditions keep changing for minute to minute. So again keep us updated, Reynolds.
REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, T.J., one thing we've seen so far this morning, we have obviously, the wind, the rain, and certainly isn't good but one thing we have seen is a couple of police vehicles that actually roared by around 288, not too long ago. That maybe a sign of some of the first responders finally being able to get out to assist those in need.
One thing we have been seeing here this morning as the sun comes up, a lot of fallen meadow fronts, a lot of roof damage, a lot of tiles coming by. But other than that, this is just a giant question mark over parts of southeast Texas at this time. We are really not going to get a full idea of what the storm has done until possibly hours from now.
Now, one of those places where we have a bit of a question mark would be about 45 miles east of this location. That brings us over to Galveston. And in Galveston, my friend Rob Marciano, meteorologist Rob Marciano. We got Rob through phone. Rob, tell me if you can and tell our viewers across America, what conditions have you been experiencing? And how were things last night?
VOICE OF ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, things were horrible last night, Reynolds. And what's shocking is how bad it still is. The winds are still howling, well over tropical storm for us and gusting likely over hurricane-force at times obviously reversing direction once the eye pass. And now the damage and debris is flying in the other direction.
Now that the sun is up though, we are beginning to get a little bit of an assessment at least from our vantage point which still inside this hotel, which has been evacuated now to lower floors because of the instability at the upper floors and the windows in many of the floors being blown out. But what I can see now that daylight is upon us, a number of roof tiles and shingles blown off in various buildings. There is a building right next to us where the entire side wall collapse and I suspect that that's sort of echoes throughout the Galveston area.
As far as the storm surge is concerned, it did get up in and over the sea wall last night and poured across (INAUDIBLE) into the surrounding area. Downtown was flooded with waist to at times neck- deep high water. Some of that water has receded. And now looking at the Gulf of Mexico, with the southwest winds, the storm surge here has receded as well, but the winds continue to howl and we continue to see debris flying across at all elevations, Reynolds.
So for the folks who live in Houston though experiencing the hurricane at its brute force right now, I can tell them that they have a long day ahead of them. Because here on the backside of the storm, it continues to be pretty brutal, pretty brutal winds coming in, ripping in from the southwest -- Reynolds.
WOLF: Rob, great job. I believe we're losing Rob there. Rob, great job as always. Rob was finishing up and talking about the conditions that we're getting in Houston now. Houston still under the gun from this massive storm. And right now, that's where our Betty Nguyen happens to be. Betty, let's send it over to you and find out the latest of what's happening in downtown Houston. BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, right now in downtown Houston, we are taking a look at the debris because the sun is starting to come up and we are being able to see a little bit down the street, a little bit farther than we were a little bit earlier.
And as you can see, trees are blown down. You see debris in the streets. I'm starting to witness a lot more cars traveling through the downtown area as people are waking up and wanting to get a glimpse of the damage. This is one example of some of the debris that was flying around.
This is a traffic light and it was pretty much hanging from this pole up here at the corner of Congress and Travis. And as the storm blew through overnight, it picked this up and turned it into a flying object. Good news is so far, we don't believe anyone was hurt because of it, but as you can imagine, if something like that would have hit you or your vehicle or went through a window, it would have caused some major damage.
As we move over here, through the middle of the street, you can see more tree limbs are just all over the place. A lot of people as they are trying to come throughout downtown Houston and get a glimpse at the damage, are having to really kind of wind around and make their way through the debris that is just literally all over the streets.
It is littered with things like corrugated steel, glass, street signs, tree limbs, we have heard a lot of crashing, especially with the storms blew through a little bit earlier. We got winds up to 115, 130 miles per hour.
And that was a major concern because really here in the Houston area, the downtown area especially, it wasn't as much the flood damage or the rain, it was more the wind that caused the most concern because as you can imagine, there are a lot of tall buildings here. And with these tall buildings come a lot of glass. Some of them have been boarded up.
But if you look over to my right and see that really tall building right there, that is the JP Morgan Chase building. It has 75 stories. It is the largest, tallest --
HOLMES: All right. That's our Betty Nguyen, we are trying to hang on to some of these signals. Again, this weather is just all over the place right now with the strong winds and getting gusts over 100 miles an hour in some cases and those are strong, strong. We got here back. I do believe. Betty, are you still with me there? We lost your signal for a second.
NGUYEN: Yes.
HOLMES: Continue with your thought if you can pick up for us.
NGUYEN: Yes, I was just talking about the JP Morgan Chase Building because it has 75 floors, the tallest building in Texas. And a lot of concern was about flying glass as windows start breaking. And we did send a crew over there earlier today and we saw a lot of windows that had been blown out.
I can tell you in the building where we were staying overnight, the hotel here. I was on the tenth floor. And as this hurricane came through, and you can see the debris that it put on the street, but on the tenth floor, I could feel the building rock back and forth. The lights started to flicker a little bit, but fortunately on this part of the street between Travis and Congress in downtown Houston, we still have electricity.
Now, that doesn't hold true for a lot of the rest of the surrounding area because as you well know, T.J., some four million people are without power. And to give you an idea of how damaging that can be, back in 1983 when Hurricane Alicia hit this area, only 750,000 people were without power. I say only. You compare that to 4 million this time around. But back then it took them two weeks to restore the power, so there's no telling how long it's going to take this time around -- T.J.
HOLMES: Yes. We got word, Betty, not long ago that crews are starting to come in and being called, power crews from as far away from California to possibly come in to help with that effort there. They are certainly going to need help. Betty, thank you once again. Our Betty Nguyen who is anchoring this show form out there in some really rough conditions in downtown Houston. Also to our Reynolds Wolf, thanks to him. We'll be talking back with both of them a whole lot more.
I want to tell you again. Again, there's our guy, Reynolds Wolf standing by as well. He's ready for us any time we need him. Here's what we do know right now. We do know that three deaths are being blamed on Ike, including a 10-year-old who was hit in the head by a tree branch. Again, as we have been talking about this power, it's going to be a situation for quite some time four million people without power. We are looking at weeks before all those lights come back on.
And as we have seen in some of those video, some of the new video continues to come into us, homes are certainly going to be under water. Let's turn now to our Jacqui Jeras. Jacqui, what is this storm doing? Is it still a strong category 2? Are we downgrading yet?
JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Down to a one.
HOLMES: Down to a one. All right.
JERAS: So, it's good to see it coming down a little bit but we're still looking at 90 mile per hour, maximum sustained wind. So, you know, that's a lot of force still and winds will continue to be an issue in the Houston area. You know, it'll probably be until at least early afternoon. If not, beyond that. We heard you talking about the power outages.
Let's check in the Web site from Center Point Energy which controls much of the Houston metro area as well as down towards the Gulf coast and those four plus million people that you're saying are without power. They say they should be prepared to go three weeks, potentially more. That's not everybody, but plenty of you are going to be dealing without power for a long period of time. When you don't have power, you don't have cell phone use, either. So communication is going to be extremely difficult here.
And also, be very careful with those generators. Make sure you know what you are doing if you're going to be operating them, if you have them. This storm is picking up a little bit of forward speed. Check this out. We put a little distance locator on there and showing you the eye of the storm started to fill in a little bit. But it is about 50 miles away from Houston. So, it's picking up forward speed and but it's weakening a little bit. And it is now pulling more northerly, so it is due north instead of north/northwest.
Check out the Houston metro area. Heavy downpours and gusty winds. We still could see hurricane-force wind gusts with these heavy squalls as the push on in. As the winds begin to diminish a little bit, our focus then is going to start to turn to flood threats. And check out the Doppler radar here. Here's Galveston, OK? Here's the coastline. And right up here is Houston and this whole purple area that you see here, this fuchsia kind of color, that's Doppler radar estimating a good eight inches of rainfall.
The wind gusts have been reported anywhere between 80 and 102 miles per hour. Those are the peak gusts that we have seen from this storm. So now, as we start to get out there and assess a little more of this damage, I think we are going to be surprised. We heard Rob, by the way, T.J., also talking about the storm surge, saying that it's gone down a little bit, but the levels are still high.
We were just checking the tidal gauges around Galveston Bay and out near the pier here, and we are still getting a surge between nine and 12 feet. So that is extremely significant. People still need to stay up on that higher ground until this water recedes. And it's going to be a while. It's going to be tomorrow really for a lot of these folks.
HOLMES: And this thing is moving. It's on its way, it's getting out of there. Right?
JERAS: It is getting out of there. We like to see that speed because you won't be under the winds quite as long as when it happens. But one other problem that we're going to be dealing with down the line, not just the flooding I was talking about in Houston but there is a cold front that's been producing just torrential rains across much of the midwest, Missouri, up into Illinois, into Kansas. This is going to hook up with that storm and we are going to be dealing with a big flood mess in the midwest down the line as well.
HOLMES: All right. Our Jacqui Jeras, keeping us updated on that storm. Thank you so much.
We want to head back down on the ground there. Like Jacqui said, it is moving away from Houston, but Houston is still getting a bit hit. Back out to our Betty Nguyen. You keep changing spots. You are trying to stay dry, I assume. NGUYEN: Well, we're trying to keep the shot alive because the winds keep whipping through and we are dealing with a lot of rain here along with the debris that I showed you a little bit earlier. I'm starting to see people come out of the buildings to allow their dogs to go outside for a minute and do their thing.
But for the most part, people are really heeding the warnings and staying inside. And that's a good thing. But the good news here is that daybreak has arrived in Houston. I know it has along the coastline as well and so the U.S. Coast Guard is going to be out and about. In fact, we want to speak with one of those members right now. We have Commander Ron Labrec with us.
And Commander, if you will tell me. Tell me what is really your first order of business today once you are able to get out and about?
VOICE OF CMDR. RON LABREC, U.S. COAST GUARD: Good morning. Well, our first order of business is to get out and about and make sure that we find people in need of assistance. We are going to have a jet flying in just a few hours along the coast looking for people who may have not heeded the evacuation warnings and need our help.
We have about 31 helicopters and the Coast Guard ready to go to search for those people and to lift them to safety in addition to hundreds of D.O.D. state and local assets. We have a multi-agency task force set up in Texas that is ready to respond and our first order is to get people out of harm's way.
NGUYEN: I know there was a lot of concern surrounding the Galveston area. That is where Hurricane Ike made landfall around 2:00 a.m. local time. What is the areas that you are really going to be focusing in on?
LABREC: We'll be flying along the entire coast. Obviously, Galveston is going to be an area we're going to hit very early. We pulled about 100 people off the beach and the Bolivar Peninsula area yesterday. D.O.D. was also involved in some rescues. We have heard reports as you have been reporting that there are still people in Galveston who may need assistance. We will be focusing on that area for sure.
NGUYEN: So you are getting reports of people indeed stranded in their homes or at least in areas where they can possibly reach some kind of safety if you come along?
LABREC: Well, at this point those are our only reports. Because of the storm, we have not been able to conduct any over flights. As soon as it is safe to do so, we will do that. We have aircraft in the area as well as boats moving in as soon as it is safe to go.
NGUYEN: Again, do you have an estimate as to exactly when that time will be?
LABREC: Well, it is really going to depend on the conditions both at the airport and in the area where they are going to fly. We would hope to have a set jet up within an hour and helicopters up in a couple of hours. That's really going to depend, so it is important for people to try to stay safe. You know, we have been pushing for several days, the federal government that this is a dangerous storm. It's unfortunate that we do have people in harm's way. But you know, we're going to do our best to go and get them now.
NGUYEN: All right. Well, stay safe as you do it. A lot of people really counting on you. We do appreciate your time, Commander Ron Labrec joining us with the U.S. Coast Guard. We are following Hurricane Ike here at CNN. We got all angles of the storm. You want to stay here with the latest news.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I asked Secretary Chertoff to go down as soon as weather conditions permit. I suspect he'll be able to get down to Texas this afternoon and we'll be in the Gulf Coast region hopefully within a reasonable period of time to help the state of Texas, officials as well as local officials begin the recovery effort.
There's going to be a need for federal, state and local coordination as this storm moves through east Texas. Obviously, there will be concerns about electricity. We got generators in place, generators moving into the area to help. They will be concerned about water and ice. They will be concerned about energy, and I'm concerned about energy. This administration is moving quickly. Last night we suspended EPA waivers on certain reformulated gasoline, which will make it easier for imports from abroad to make it into our market.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: That was President Bush a little, fairly under an hour ago talking about the response to this particular hurricane, Hurricane Ike. Also, our reporters have been all over the place, over that region covering the storm in the past couple of days. And our Rick Sanchez was one of them. Take a look at him getting tossed around.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: I'm underneath an area that's giving me some shelter, but I'm just going to walk out there real quick just to show you what it looks like when you walk into this thing. I'll see if I got enough wire. This is a big difference from what Gary says he is feeling now being in the eye of the storm.
We are still in the middle of this thing and there you see -- there you see what it is like when you get inside this thing. I mean, the rains are coming hard and there goes my cap. By golly, I'm getting out of this. There goes another transformer as well.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: Yes. We got closets full of those CNN hats, Rick. We will get you another one. But just to give you an idea there of what they are really up against out there in those elements. Also, take a look here, a live picture of the JP Morgan Chase Building. You have been hearing that name a lot this morning, but this is the tallest building in Texas. It's certainly a lot of people were worried about. It has so many windows that are being blown out, we are told. And so this building is certainly taking a hit from these powerful winds.
And downtown is where our Betty Nguyen, my regular co-anchor here on the weekends who is still co-anchoring this show, just out in the elements today. We see light now. I guess it's showing you a much different picture this morning.
NGUYEN: Oh, definitely. We are able to really get a better assessment of the damage that was caused by Hurricane Ike. You know, we saw a little bit earlier Rick losing his hat. Try losing one of these. This is a traffic light that just blew off one of the poles nearby, really right here behind me, that one there at the corner of Congress and Travis Street. This thing went airborne last night and, luckily, we don't believe it hit anything major. Essentially, just hit the sidewalk here and we were able to push it out of the way. But this is just one example of the debris that is littering downtown Houston.
Over here, you can see some tree limbs that have been knocked in the streets. There are tons of trees that are down in and around this area, but this is just one of them. You go down to my left over here, you can see them just really kind of lining the sidewalk and even in the middle of the street when people are trying to make their way through downtown Houston. They are having to go in a zigzag fashion in order to try to get down to areas where they want to see what kind of damage was caused by Hurricane Ike.
Some folks are even starting to come out of their buildings, kind of, sort of, at least peaking through their windows. We see a few of them waving to us right now. That building right there where you see the folks waving, we are told by one of the people who live there that their air-conditioning unit, listen to this, T.J. It blew off of the roof at some point during this storm. A couple of them went walking along the way here to try to see if they can find it. Good luck with that because stuff is scattered all over the place.
If you think the situation is bad here in downtown Houston, I know as you go farther to the south, folks are still feeling the effects of Hurricane Ike, especially in Beaumont, Texas. I want to take you now to CNN's Rusty Dornin. She joins us live with what is happening there.
Hi there, Rusty.
RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Betty, we are still feeling the effects and you can hear the winds howling through this eight-story building during the night, shaking the entire building. And you can see the ninth floor, apparently, actually, all of this is insulation. The winds tore off part of the ninth floor of the building I am in and it scattered all over the parking lot. It has also torn down the sign, the trees are down, the power lines are down, and they are just getting into some of these neighborhoods to find the damage. Of course, there's major power outages, but the big thing is they don't think that there is extensive flooding through Port Arthur and through Beaumont. That sea wall did hold at 14 feet. Apparently, the water only came up to 13 feet only. And of course, that was a big fear.
However, about 20 miles from here up the Sabine River, Orange, Texas, we are getting reports from the National Weather Service that there are people up on roofs. That there is flooding there, that need to be rescued. Also, we understand that in Port Neches, there was a fire last night. Six people had to be rescued. And also, in Bridge City, there is nine feet of water in the downtown area. And that apparently is from the Neches River. So this surge from the Gulf came up and is flooding many of these towns up the rivers, but the big fear about Port Arthur did not come true.
Of course, it remains to be seen. Mega refineries are in this area. We have no idea what kind of damage was done. I did talk to one of the oil officials yesterday from Shell who said that they filled tankers with oil late last night in order to make sure they were ready to go. Once the power is back up, they will be ready to resupply gas stations in this area. So right now we are in a hotel where there are National Guard and troopers and they are just getting organized to try to get out and assess the situation -- Betty.
NGUYEN: All right. Rusty, thank you for that report. Back here live in Houston. You know, you talk about people getting out and about trying to assess the damage. We have seen a couple of sheriff's cars drive by through here, several police cars as well. Some of them really blocking many streets because debris is just littering many parts of downtown Houston. There is a lot more to come with Hurricane Ike. We are following it as it blows through Texas. The storm is going to last for several more hours. So you want to stay here with CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The power went out a few hours ago. It is naturally pitch dark out here and you are starting, you know, you know, the expression, you hear things that go bump in the night? You are starting to see it, but you can't -- uh- oh, hold on. Like this push, you don't know where that stuff is coming from.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: That was Susan Candiotti. She's in Clute, Texas, where the conditions have just been horrendous as we have seen in our live shots this morning from our Reynolds Wolf and also there. Good morning to you again, coming up on 9:30 here on the East Coast where that storm Ike has been pounding Texas for a number of hours now. Here's what we do know. There are three deaths being attributed to this storm. One of those, a 10-year-old child, who was hit in the head by a tree branch. The power situation as well, the electricity, we are told at least four million people are without it, and they could be without it for several weeks is the word we are told. And of course, we have been seeing flooding all over the place. Thousands of thousands of homes.
And now the light is coming out and we are starting to get a better idea of it. Bad of course in Galveston, bad in Houston, and all along the Texas-Louisiana coast. But, can you imagine living through this thing out at sea? Yes. That happened. Take a look at some of this here.
Twenty-two people, they just had to ride this thing out, ride out Ike on a freighter. This is some video here we got from the Coast Guard of it. The ship lost its steering power yesterday. The military tried to rescue the crew, but the winds were just too strong, too tough. The mission was called off. So this morning we are hearing that all 22 crew members, they actually made it through this thing. They are safe and now a tugboat will eventually be sent in to tug the ship ashore.
And of course, Ike right now, we are starting to see some of the damage again with daylight. And those assessments will be coming in. A lot of people want to help. Relief agencies are mobilizing. The ways you can help as well, you can find out how by going to our Web site cnn.com. We have an impact your world page. You'll find links to organizations who are offering assistance. Again, that's cnn.com/impact.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: Good morning, everybody, and welcome back. You are looking at some pictures we are just getting in, I believe this is Corpus Christi, a live picture here, one of several areas a being affected by the storm. Hurricane Ike, now downgraded to a Category 1 storm. The winds are still a bit much, right now -- over 75 miles-an- hour and gusting much higher.
The eye of the storm now, has moved. This thing is on the move and the eye is northwest of Houston. There are reports still that Houston got hit pretty good, lots of reports of broken glass and other things down, a lot of debris in downtown Houston.
We do know there will be an electricity situation, a power situation, at least four million people, we're told, without power. It could be weeks before getting it back. We also heard from President Bush this morning talking about the help that is on the way.
Expecting Secretary Chertoff, Homeland Security secretary, in Houston at some point, today. And emergency personnel will come as soon as they can. And Coast Guard has jet prepped to fly over an area ,as well, it's 31 helicopters. That search and rescue is going to be underway. Also from our Rusty Dornin, flooding not as extensive in Beaumont and Port Arthur where she has been, but other cities still reporting some pretty significant flooding.
Our correspondent are all over this region. We have blanketed this region. There you see them, they are all over the place, too many to name, but you know those faces. They're in Houston, San Antonio, Galveston, and several other areas including Clute. There were a lot of oil production areas along that area.
So, here is what we do know right now, as well, about this storm. I mean, the reports that at least three deaths are being attributed to this. We have been hearing more details about this one story about a 10-year-old child who actually was hit in the head by a tree branch. We'll keep an eye on that and hopefully, not many more injuries and deaths that we're going to be reporting about this thing.
We do want to head now to one-third of our CNN Saturday morning team. There he is, he's been reporting for us this morning, Reynolds Wolf in Clute, Texas.
Reynolds, take it away, continue to give us those updates. We see that jacket and those pants of yours blowing in the wind, there.
WOLF: Absolutely, T.J. The latest news we have out of Brazoria County, of course that's where Clute is located, is that law enforcement is now out and about, going around surveying the damage, trying to answer distress calls. I can tell you that there have been, again, this is early now, no reports of fatalities, yet. But still, there are many roads that have been blocked off by trees that have been knocked down by the strong winds last night. Many roadways inundated by the heavy waters.
So, there's a lot of mystery out there, but as each minute, each hour passes, we have a better idea of assessing the damage. I have to tell you with, again, just over roughly a quarter of a million people that call this home with 70 percent evacuating and roughly 30 percent of the people staying here, it will be a miracle if this area is able to escape any fatalities from this storm.
But, right now, the news is good. That may change, so we need steal our resolve. We need to be ready for some bad news. That is certainly going to be a possibility. Let's hope for the best, but be ready for everything.
I can tell you, yesterday afternoon, we took a drive right through Freeport, which is right down 288. Went down there, went past over some levees, went up closer to the coast, and I can tell you that the water along the Intercoastal Waterway was really beginning to stack up. Everything -- instead of pulling out to the sea along the Brazos River, everything was coming in reverse, that water really, really beginning to pile up.
In some locations, the water was coming up up to three feet along some of those home. Along the coast, the beach, forget about it. The water was coming up there completely covering the sand and going up along the roadways, in fact, meeting the base of the bridge right along the Intercoastal Waterway. We were actually doing some shots out towards there, yesterday afternoon.
Those areas, I can only imagine how they must be at this point. Yesterday when we were out there and everything was flooded, it was roughly 10 to 12 hours before landfall. I can imagine now with the storm moving north of Houston at this point, still you have those waters that are extremely high. And I imagine that the effects will be devastating and we are very curious to see what we are going to find later today. Let's send it back to you, T.J.
HOLMES: Yeah, we're going to find out a whole lot more later, today. And again, as I mentioned to the viewers, stand there for me, Reynolds. There we are, that's the CNN SATURDAY MORNING team, as you can see. Two members of my team have left. Actually I would have been there, but my CNN jacket is on backorder. But, as soon as we get one, I'll be out there with you guys.
But we want to hand it over to Betty Nguyen, my co-anchor, there, who has been in downtown Houston keeping an eye on things. And like you were saying, place is just littered with debris downtown.
NGUYEN: Yeah, we need to get you a red jacket and quick because we could use your help out here. There is a lot of debris in downtown Houston. We've got traffic lights that have blown off of their poles, we have tons of tree limbs in the street. And I'm not kidding you, I walked around the block just a minute ago, you see trees that have not only fallen over, I saw one that was uprooted. So, that gives you an indication of the power of this storm as it came through.
You are seeing, just a second ago, some of the people that are coming out of their high-rise buildings. We know that the one that faces to my left, they lost their air-conditioning unit. Somehow during this storm, it blew off of the roof. Two guys went looking for it. We have not seen them yet, so that tells you they probably have not found that air-conditioning unit. Who knows where that's going to be because debris is scattered all over the place here, T.J.
As I told you earlier, when this storm blew through around 3:00 a.m. Local Time, I could feel the hotel move back and forth. I was on the tenth floor and you could feel it swaying. Power was going in and out. In fact, we are getting some more information as people are able to asses the damage and really how many people were affected by this.
Get this, overnight, some 1,200 calls went in for medical emergency requests. So, that is way up from some of the previous hurricanes that we've seen here to hit the Houston area -- T.J.
HOLMES: Right. And just as you toss it back here, I can hear the wind kind of picking up on your microphone, there, a little more, but it continues to happen there in downtown Houston. Betty, thank you so much.
We do want to take a look now at actually a piece that Betty filed for us, I do believe, here. Talking about babies in the storm. You know, you can't just shut down a hospital, you can't just actually move everybody out sometimes. A lot of the local hospitals had to be prepped to care for babies who are intensive care.
Take a look at this report that file Betty filed.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN (voice over): Babies at Houston Memorial Medical Center were on the move. Their neonatal intensive care unit was surrounded by windows, which could have put them in the path of flying debris. Getting these newborns to a more fortified part of the hospital was a careful process. It took a team of nurses to pack up the equipment and prepare the babies for their trek to the other end of the building.
DR. SHERRI LEVIN, OB/GYN: My leaving them early, we're behind the eight ball, you know, trying to get them moved. Supposedly our worst time will be midnight to 6:00 a.m.
NGUYEN: They rode out the storm in a room usually reserved for day surgery. It had all the necessary equipment to handle major medical emergencies during the storm. That put parents like Joshua Price at ease. His twins were born Thursday night.
JOSHUA PRICE, FATHER OF TWINS IN HOSPITAL: They are taking every precaution necessary regardless of where they think this storm might go. That's awesome.
NGUYEN: Beds were set up for parents in the next room so they could stay with their babies throughout the storm. Courtney Lewis says she couldn't imagine being anywhere else.
COURTNEY LEWIS, MOTHER OF INFANT IN HOSPITAL: I just had a cold vision of him just in this little plastic crib by himself. And no matter how great the nurses are, they have all the other babies to take care of and that way I can just sit here and bond with him, too, because he was, yesterday he was a week old. Wednesday was the first time I ever got to hold him. So, this will give us some extra bonding time.
NGUYEN: Her only concern was how the rest of her family would fare as they hunkered down at home.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: And you know, Betty, we're listening to your piece there, it sounds so interesting to hear her say that. You know what, you got to look at the bright side, she said, hey, she gives us some extra bonding time.
NGUYEN: Absolutely. Her baby was born not to long ago and because of his condition, she really wasn't able to hold him and she was looking at this to a positive. But although, I will tell you, she was kind of torn because she has two other kids who were staying at home with their father and so, she was worried OK, which kid so I go and stay with during a storm like this, but of course, she couldn't leave her baby in that plastic bin all by himself as Hurricane Ike rolled through.
And you know, I spoke with a lot of people yesterday, especially down in Kemo (ph), which is near the Galveston Bay, and some of them weren't ready to leave, which was really kind of surprising because that was an evacuation area, T.J. But, one of the women she said, you know, it's my pets, I don't want to leave my little Chihuahuas. Who's going to save them when the floodwaters come?
Well Betty, this might sound cold to me, but I would have told my cats "bye" in that situation.
NGUYEN: You know what? I told her, I said here's the number to the Red Cross. Please call them.
HOLMES: All right, our Betty Nguyen for us, down there. Hopefully everybody made it all right and everything is OK. We're going to be checking in with you here in just a second to talk about some more on that debris going on in downtown Houston where Betty Nguyen is reporting this morning.
Also, people in Memphis, Atlanta, other places like that, you're not in that impact zone, if you will, for Hurricane Ike, but still you are being affected and you're feeling the impact. You know where? The gas pump.
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HOLMES: As we have been mentioning, as you have been seeing, a lot of our correspondents are out in the field this morning. We're also getting a lot of help from our affiliates to tell these stories. We're going a head now to one of our affiliate reporters. This is Cameron Corley in Corpus Christi, say that 12 times fast if you want to. Let's check in with him and see what's happening here. Let's take a listen.
Cameron, are you with us?
CAMERON CORLEY, CNN AFFILIATE: Yes, sir, how you doing?
HOLMES: Hey, I'm all right, Cameron Corley in Corpus Christi. You tell me what you got going on down there.
CORLEY: Man, we got a lot of water. How's that for you?
HOLMES: How much water you got? Give me an idea. We're looking at a live picture here, but it doesn't really tell the whole story. So, you tell us.
CORLEY: Man, we didn't even come close to getting hit by Hurricane Ike, but man, the tides have really, really come up. And what you are looking at is the bridge from Corpus Christi to (INAUDIBLE) Portland and normally, this area is what we call North Beach. And normally, this is just a real big parking lot/beach area, just a lot of sand and picnic tables and people will come and park their RVs and boats. And I'm going to zoom out here for you and give you an idea of what you are looking at behind the bridge as to what we call the back bay, and a lot of people like to go wade fishing underneath the bridge and a lot of people like to go fishing or in boats behind the bridge. But, in front of the bridge, you should see nothing but land.
HOLMES: Oh, really? So, what's that structure I am seeing here in this foreground, as well, of the bridge?
CORLEY: In front of the bridge, that structure right there, is either a condominium or a -- believe it's a condominium is what I believe that is.
HOLMES: OK, but normally, what we are seeing here on that side and all around that condominium, we think it is, would normally be land, and that's all water right not I'm looking at, right?
CORLEY: Yes, yes, exactly. And I'm going to zoom out a little bit for you and pan across North Beach. And all of this is pretty much covered in water. And these are all condominiums and North Beach is pretty much all covered in water and you can even see behind -- you know, there's some housing developments in the back there, the water has come up to them. You can even see how the water, you know, overnight, right now we're at low tide. So, even at low tide right now, you know, the water is still high, but at high tide overnight, you can see how in the center of the picture how the water came up to the center.
HOLMES: Well, Cameron Corley in Corpus, Christi, one of our affiliate reporters, there. We are so glad we had you and so glad you actually have control of the camera to actually navigate that shot for us. We appreciate you. We might be checking in with you again this morning. But we thank you so much, again. talking about Corpus Christi, not really taking some kind of a direct hit, you know, from the storm, but still the effects all that flooding, that water, the storm surge we talk about, still flooding those areas as we see in his live picture, here.
We want to head now to some business news, which is always a part of these mayor disasters. Our Ali Velshi is on the line for us from Baytown, Texas.
It is this time, Ali, we have been talking this morning about gas prices and how that stuff has been shooting up. What can we expect now and in the coming days as far as gas prices and oil prices?
ALI VELSHI, CNN SR. BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Well, let me tell you, we are waiting for evaluations on that right now. We won't probably see a great deal to do with oil, hopefully, T.J., because the oil from the Caymans to the Gulf of Mexico have been shut down. But we need to see what has happened to these refineries.
And actually in a few minutes, I'm heading out to the Baytown refinery, right here, the biggest one on the continent, to just get an evaluation of the outside of what's going on. A more detailed evaluation is going to come after the storm subsides here in Baytown. It's still raging. It looks like we are at the end of it, but it's still going.
After that, they will send in teams from Department of Energy, Department of the Interior and the oil companies and they'll get a good sense of it. Now, here's what is going to happen, likely the power will be out at many of them and they might be flooded. If it's just power and flooding, they can dry it out and they can get the power back up and run these things in the next few days.
If it's more than that and there's damage, you are going to see continued price spikes across the country. And that six-cent increase overnight that's pretty substantial. We had several weeks of drops in gas prices, T.J. now we have seen four days in a row of increases and a six-cent jump is significant.
HOLMES: And Ali, let me ask you this quickly, we spoke not long ago when you were there covering Gustav, when it was on the way and we talked about how many -- so many of those oil rigs had to be evacuated, had to be shut down for a few days. Well, did those get back up and running in the interim and all those damage assessments done? I guess, since this storm is coming through the Gulf as well, I mean, how big of a break was it? Go ahead.
VELSHI: They did, a few of them got back up and running, a very few small percentage did and then they went and evacuated them all again. So, one again, the Gulf of Mexico is shut down from the oil production perspective. There was limited damage, very little damage, very little spillages that came out of Gustav. Again, this one wasn't -- this Ike was not expected to do a lot of offshore damage, those rigs are stronger than the refineries, but the refineries, you've seen them, T.J., they're sprawling and they can be damaged.
HOLMES: All right, our Ali Velshi doing that reporting for us on the gas and the oil refineries and that situation, that business situation. Ali, we appreciate you. We'll be checking in with you again.
Our Josh Levs, as well, keeping an eye on that big screen, there. Folks that don't know, that is actually his computer screen he's standing in front of, right now. What do you got for us this morning? Are we doing i-Reports? We talking gas still?
JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're talking about gas and we're following up on Ali, there. And I got to tell you, this is astounding, we know that we need to find out what's going to happen in that region, but what we already know is that people around the country, including here in our area, Atlanta, are literally seeing massive spikes in gas prices. And by seeing, I mean, they're actually in their cars waiting in line when someone comes out and jumps the price incredible high.
Let's take a look at this board behind me, quickly. These are just some of the i-Reports that we're getting. Someone here claiming extortion. And these are all different places in the country. We also have a piece of sound here from a driver in Memphis.
OK, we don't have that, but I'll tell you the basic idea. He was doing literally what I just said. He was in his car at the time when someone came out and jumped the price about 60 cents while he was there. We're hearing similar things around the country.
I want to bring in now, Kevin Kerr, who's with Global Commodities Alert, the editor of that.
Kevin, are you with us?
KEVIN KERR, GLOBAL COMMODITIES ALERT: I sure am.
LEVS: All right, Kevin, break to this for me really simply. What is going on with these gas prices?
KERR: Well, what you are seeing is you're seeing the retail gasoline guys, and it's really not fair to blame them. What they're doing is they're reacting to the wholesale prices and they're fearful that they're going to have to get. They're running out of gas, they've got to refill these tanks and they're worried they're not going to get more supply and if they do, it's going to be awful expensive, so they got to pass that cost on to the rest of us.
LEVS: So, you're talking about -- is it a panic? What's the basic thing that's happening here? Because, we've known for more than a week that Ike was coming, it was going to be big. Were they not prepared? Was there not enough gasoline in advance? I don't see why this kind of jump, today.
KERR: Yeah, it is very dramatic. And I think there is a lot of fear here involved. We don't really know the damage is, yet. It looks like there is going to be damage and delays, so some increase is certainly warranted, but those kind of dramatic reports like you've seen with the i-Reports, that's crazy. Se, we are maybe seeing case of gouging, here, but that's pretty tightly controlled, so we'll know about that fairly quickly.
LEVS: Is it panic? Are people so afraid there won't be any gasoline that they're going and taking everything there and quickly driving up the demand?
KERR: Sure, especially in the Gulf Coast. Now, these retail guys are worried they are just not going to get any more supply and they'll be out of business for weeks, so what they are having to do is ratchet those prices up for those last drops coming out of the tank so they can protect their businesses and also so they can buy more gas when it is available.
LEVS: Kevin, how can a driver know? Let's say someone who goes to a gas station today and sees that gas is 50, 60, 70 cents more than it was yesterday, how do they know if they're getting gouged or if that station is just passing along the price from the wholesale?
KERR: Well, I guess it's like usual, you know,, you just have to look around at all the other stations. If all the other stations are cheaper, you're going to have to shop around. What I believe, though, especially in the Gulf Coast, you're going to have trouble finding any station that's going to be cheap for a while. LEVS: Wow. Well listen, we really appreciate this. We're going to keep talking to you throughout this because this is something we need to watch very closely. We're getting more and more reports like this. We encourage you to send us your i-Report. Kevin, we'll talk with you more a little bit latter about this.
T.J., over to you.
HOLMES: All right, Josh, we appreciate you and we'll be checking in with you again, here, plenty this morning.
Of course, relief agencies are mobilizing right about now. We even talked to some of them this morning, some of their representative. There are ways that you can help out the storm victims, as well. You can go to CNN.com's Impact Your World page and find links to organizations offering assistance. Again, that is CNN.com/impact
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: Good morning, everybody. This is Betty Nguyen, live in downtown Houston where, as you can see, the rain is still pouring, the wind is still howling. We are hearing this howling sound through the downtown area and we are really not sure if that is a direct result of how strong the winds are or if it's just kind of making that sound as it makes its way through the buildings. And many of these buildings have windows that have been blown out.
But, here is a major concern that we just noticed as daylight has occurred, here in Houston. If you look down that street, you can see some of our CNN crews in the red jackets headed down that way, Jeanne Meserve is one of them. But, that is the Buffalo Bayou. It has flooded its banks. That is the entrance to the Houston shipping channel and we went down there a while ago and that current is really swift. The water is moving extremely fast. And we just heard a piece of corrugated steel fall as I was talking to you right now to the left side. You can see a lot of debris in the streets.
And we're going to be talking with two business owners at the top of the hour. They took an assessment of the damage to my right, right near the JPMorgan Chase building and they have told me that 50 percent of the buildings and one portion of that -- 50 percent of the windows and one portion of that building have been blown out. So, we're going to get a better look at what exactly what has occurred, there.
Stay with us. We are following Hurricane Ike right here on CNN.
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HOLMES: Hurricane Ike is still thumping Texas this morning. It's been downgraded to a Category 1 storm. That happened within the past hour, but it is still packing a pretty hefty and dangerous punch. The storm made landfall about seven hours ago. The flooding, however, started well before that with the first storm band, they have been going through this for quite some time, now. We've seen lots of flooding along the coast in places, certainly Galveston.
