Rita weakens to a Tropical Depression

The rain is good for places like George County, with most of their timber on the ground now. Possible fires were getting to be a real issue there in the weeks after Katrina. I do think it was a blessing however for all the people that were left out in the open along the entire MS Gulf Coast in the weeks afterward that had little shelter, that they didn't have to contend with rainfall. Of course there are still folks camping out on their slabs (Frank P is going to be one of them, but at least he'll have a trailer).

BTW heard from my brother today and they did manage to get all those folks out of the flooded Ocean Springs communities overnight Thursday night before Rita hit and they had the 4-5 additional feet of water plus the 2.2 foot high tide. He said that they just barely got the patrol cars out on the last trip, as the flooding was increasing, just as they picked up the last folks. The water didn't start to go down until about mid-morning Friday.

Also - he said that now since it has been a month and there is still no housing for about 80% of the people in the county, with a lot of houses that are intact having maybe four, five families in them, he said it is really getting on everyone's nerves. This last four days he was on duty he says they answered the same amount of "domestic dispute" calls they usually handle in a month.

Also - saw an overhead shot from a helicopter on Fox News today that was labeled "Campron LA" (under a photo section called "Scenes from Rita") but which was clearly Holly Beach, although they may have meant to say Cameron instead. There was nothing left except pilings, slabs and telephone poles. The city was completely gone.

I found more on Holly Beach, also apparently called "The Cajun Riviera" as well as this comment:

"The structures, which appear to be of a temporary nature, are "built to be rebuilt." Their close proximity to the Gulf makes them a prime target for the ravages of hurricanes and other tropical storms."

Here's a story about the last two people to leave town before Rita:

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/09/23/MNG64ESMQE1.DTL

I also found these great USGS coastal classification maps of the entire western LA coastal area:

http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2005/1261/holly-beachSW.html

Edited by Margie (Sun Sep 25 2005 09:07 PM)

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