Note the NHC's takes Ike far inland rather fast and turns it into NW Louisiana and into Arkansas. As he hits land the banding will be massive on radar and there will be severe weather far inland.

One of my pet peeves is the NHC deals with landfall and the media hypes the beach towns but towns far inland will have inland flooding (especially in areas with bayous and rivers) and electric will be affected not just in Houston but to the areas inland people are evacuating to most likely.

Once inland the NWS takes over with giving local information to all the towns and...

The hurricane does not stop at landfall, though his winds may die down some his circulation spins and creates havoc.

So... just concerned that people be aware if they are evacuating from Houston in areas that do not need to be evacuated from homes that are well built with proper shutters and all the tie down straps tied down that by evacuating further north they will be further inland but they will still be possibly affected by power outages and other storm related problems.

Austin is good, Austin is better but you may also lose power in Austin or anywhere to the east of Austin. This storm is massive and the more damage over a large area (fallen trees, electric wires down, localized flooding) will take that much longer to put back the infrastructure.

Wilma in Miami was such a storm as FPL's answer was that so many people across such a large area were without electric and they had to basically rebuild the grid and fix substations across a large area.

something to think on..