Its been a few years, but it seems to my weary memory, that if Bret hits east of Corpus Christi its going to be hitting an area that is loaded with chemical plant after chemical plant. It is a catagory 4 which is what Andrew was when it leveled southern Florida. The gulf coast has no hills or forest to slow it down. Those chemical plants run all the way up into the HOuston area. Would some Texans, who aren't in the process of evacuation themselves, comment on this and tell me if I am right or wrong?
Taz...just a rockin' and a worryin'.
-- Taz (Tassie@aol.com), August 22, 1999
Answers
You are right, Taz. The coast from Corpus to Houston and beyond is full
of chemical plants and refineries making everything from gasoline to
propane.
You may recall that there was a refinery explosion in Corpus a couple
of weeks ago.
I was in Galveston about a month ago, and I went through Beaumont to
get there. Beaumont, too, is a petrochemical center. All of the major
oil companies have facilities up and down the coast, so this storm
could impact deliveries.
-- Vic (Roadrunner@compliant.com), August 22, 1999.
http://www.msnbc.com/news/302747.asp
HURRICANE THREATENS GULF COAST
Bret expected to make landfall in Texas near Corpus Christi
MSNBC NEWS SERVICESBROWNSVILLE, Texas, Aug. 22 Shelters opened,
store shelves emptied and hundreds hit the road on Sunday as
residents of the Texas Gulf Coast braced for its strongest hurricane
in 30 years. Forecasters say Hurricane Bret could make landfall near
Corpus Christi as early as Sunday afternoon.
Hurricane Bret:
LOCATION: At 10 a.m. ET, 75 miles E-NE of Brownsville
STRENGTH: 140 mph
DIRECTION: 10 mph NW
A HURRICANE WARNING was in effect along the coast from La Pesca
in northern Mexico to the Texan town of Port OConnor, some 70 miles
north along the coast from Corpus Christi.
At 10 a.m. ET Sunday, Hurricane Bret was located about 75 miles
east-northeast of Brownsville, moving northwest at about 10 miles per
hour, with maximum sustained winds near 140 mph. That makes Bret a
Class 4 hurricane, the second-strongest on a scale of five classes.
more ...
-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), August 22, 1999.
All those 300+ miles of refineries are built to withstand any
hurricane. It's the unplanned rapid molecular expansions they don't
do so well with.
-- Mike T. (anita_martini@hotmail.com), August 22, 1999.
I saw some footage this morning and the coastal waters were already
churning quite a bit. The storm surge and flooding could be a serious
problem with this one.
Can a refinery really withstand sustained, 140 mph winds? That's
pretty amazing, those winds are on the same line as a strong Tornado.
Mike
==================================================================
-- Michael Taylor (mtdesign3@aol.com), August 22, 1999.
http://www.cbs.com/flat/story_178309.html
... On the mainland, the big worry is flooding, because generally
speaking, in a hurricane, water kills, not the wind, and this
hurricane system is packed full of rain.
The National Hurricane Center in Miami forecast up to 12 inches of
rainfall along the storm's path and a dangerous storm surge of up to
15 feet that would flood coastal areas.
As forecasters upgraded Hurricane Bret to the second-strongest
designation of Class 4 on Saturday, people who live along the coast
stocked up on gasoline and groceries. Building supply stores were
overrun with those seeking plywood, nails, flashlights and generators.
In addition to powerful winds, Bret was expected to spin off
destructive tornadoes, drench the region with up to 10 inches of rain
and hit the coast with 10-foot waves, forecasters said.
....
more ...
-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), August 22, 1999.
Simply wise to Be Prepared to survive unexpected Interruptions:
Another news tidbit highlighting Shift Happens, especially with those
volatile gas pipelines:
8/22/99 -- 11:39 AM
Eleven people injured in explosions, building collapse
HONG KONG (AP) - Three underground natural gas explosions collapsed 20
buildings and injured 11 people, some seriously, in southern China, a
Hong Kong newspaper reported Sunday.
A row of apartment buildings were reduced to rubble as flames soared
more than 30 feet during the three consecutive blasts Saturday in
Shenzhen, near Hong Kong, the Beijing-backed Ta Kung Pao daily
reported. Rocks and debris showered down on passers-by, the paper
said.
Eleven people, most of them burned or hit by debris, were
hospitalized, it said.
Initial investigations indicated that natural gas leaking from an
underground pipe hit a high voltage power cable, causing the
explosions, the paper said. City officials have ordered checks on
all underground natural gas pipes, it said.
------------------------------------------------------------
xxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxx
xx
-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), August 22, 1999.
Mike:
Not to be contentious, and 140 mph winds over a large area are not to
be laughed at, but that would be the same as a really weak tornado.
Best,
-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), August 22, 1999.
The poster who said the flooding would be the problem is our winner.
These refineries and Pet-Chem plants are pretty sturdy structures
considering they contain processes which take place under enormous
heat and pressure. However, I do recall a hurricane/storm which
hit Louisiana (last year?) that knocked out the refinery for more
than two months as it was flooded severely from the storm surge/heavy
rains. There were actually alligators in the control rooms! Yeehaa.
Look for crude oil to go up monday. We may actually have a good idea
of the actual capacity impacted by Monday morning,so not sure how much
it will go. If I was betting, I'd tack a buck onto Friday's Nymex
close and then it will probably come back off a little, settling up
50 to 60 cents or so.
-- Gordon (g_gecko_69@hotmail.com), August 22, 1999.
Gordon, we remember that from last year! Flooding around Nola and @
800 alligators loose from an alligator farm. Wild. We sorta watch
the Nola area news, Anne Rice territory.
-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), August 22, 1999.
Z1X4Y7,
Carla(1961?) & Camille(1978?) flooded a lot of petrochemical
processing units but didn't flatten them.
However, 140+ mph wind and tidal surge for residential/commercial
structures = devastation.
Glad I'm 200 mi. inland from the gulf coast...ground cracking here
for a month. One of my barbadoes stepped into to a crack and broke
its leg yesterday....it's in the deep freezer now. We'll welcome the
rain.
-- Mike T. (anita_martini@hotmail.com), August 22, 1999.
Camille... August of 1969. I lived in New Orleans at the time. We had
100 mph winds there. My dad took us to see the Mississippi coast
after it was over. UNBELIEVABLE! I've had great "respect" for the
power of a hurricane ever since!
-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), August 22, 1999.
Mike T:
I agree with you. I lived through them on the east coast when I was
young. In some ways, they are worse than tornados[but of course they
can spawn tornadoes]. But the >240 mph winds of a tornado [Even in a
small area] are unbelievable. My guess is that they would flatten a
chemical plant.
Best
-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), August 22, 1999.
Bret has a small eye and is hitting the desolate coast between
Browsville and Corpus. Corpus has about 600,000 barrels a day of
refining capacity which wont be damaged and prob won't even shut
down. Planned shut downs (hot) aren't a big deal. There's very little
oil or gas offshore production in the area. Some of this risk was
already built into the markets late last week. NYMEX markets might be
up a dime or so on the crude (/bl) and maybe .5 cent (/gal) on the
products- a very minor move. To compare Bret to Andrew is WAY off
base.
-- Downstreamer (downstream@bigfoot.com), August 22, 1999.
Taz, I believe Andrew was category 5.
Luckily, the area where Bret is finally coming ashore is fairly
desolate; miles and miles of ranching country that is mainly empty of
towns. Really pretty though, if you like that empty look.
-- mommacarestx (harringtondesignX@earthlink.net), August 22, 1999.
FWIW, a local radio station announced this afternoon that the area
Bret was headed for was only populated by tens of thousands of
cattle. Hope Bessie (and everyone else) makes it through ok.
-- Brooks (brooksbie@hotmail.com), August 22, 1999.
Just recieved this FEMA update on hurricane Bret:
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 1999 15:02:49 -0400 (EDT)
From: Emergency Information Media Affairs
To: roboaccount@fema.gov
Subject: Hurricane Bret Update
Hurricane Bret Operations Update
Washington August 22, 1999 - As Hurricane Bret approaches the Texas
coast,
FEMA is preparing to help state and local officials respond.
Situation:
* The National Hurricane Center (NHC) has posted hurricane warnings
from
La Pesca, Mexico to Port O'Connor, Texas.
* The Texas coast in this area has a low elevation that could result
in
substantial storm surge flooding.
* NHC forecasters also warn there is the possibility of the system
producing isolated tornadoes over the mid-Texas coastal region this
afternoon and the south Texas coastal region tonight.
* Voluntary evacuations are underway in Corpus Christie (Nueces
County),
South Padre Island (Cameron County), San Patricio County, Willacy
County,
Galveston County, and the western side of Galveston Island.
Operations:
* The FEMA Headquarters Emergency Support Team has been activated and
is
operating 24 hours/day.
* FEMA's Hurricane Liaison Team is already on scene and working at the
National Hurricane Center.
* The Mobile Emergency Response System (MERS) staff and equipment have
been activated. The Denton MERS Emergency Operations Vehicle(EOV)
http://www.fema.gov/r-n-r/mers.htm
and Multi Radio Vehicle (MRV) http://www.fema.gov/r-n-r/mrvdex.htm
* FEMA's Regional Operations Center in Denton, Texas (Region VI) has
been
activated and operating 24 hours/day.
* The regional office in Denton has activated an advance Emergency
Response Team and pre-positioned the team in Austin, Texas.
* Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas has been designated ad the
Mobilization Center for logistics support.
* FEMA's Logistics Center is shipping the following commodities to the
Fort Sam Houston Mobilization Center:
-- 2,000 cots
-- 4,000 blankets
-- 1,000 tents
-- 250 portable toilets
-- 72,000 liters of water
-- 2,464 rolls of plastic sheeting
-- 100 electric generators (of various sizes)
-- 6,000 personal wash kits
-- 40,000 Meals Ready to Eat (MREs)
* The U.S. Public Health Service has sent two Disaster Medical
Assistance
Teams (DMATs) to Fort Sam Houston - the El Paso DMAT
http://rgfn.epcc.edu/users/dmat1/dmat.html and the other
is the Albuquerque DMAT.
* The Texas State Emergency
Operations Center http://www.txdps.state.tx.us/dem/ has been
activated and is operating 24 hours/day.
* Texas National Guard personnel have been activated and are
pre-positioned in San Antonio.
* The American Red Cross http://www.redcross.org has
shelters open in Hidalgo and Zapata Counties. Four shelters are also
open
in Brownsville.
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
Office of Public Affairs --- Washington, D.C.
Information Available 24 hours a day . . .
... on the World Wide Web: http://www.fema.gov
... via fax-on-demand: phone in the U.S.A. (202) 646-FEMA (646-3362)
... via digital audio for broadcasters & print: contact eipa@fema.gov
and listen to the FEMA Radio Network on the FEMA Website using
RealAudio
-- Chris (%$^&^@pond.com), August 22, 1999.
Hurricane Bret comes ashore
Threat of storm surge, flooding expected
MSNBC News Services
BROWNSVILLE, Texas, Aug. 22 Hurricane Bret, the biggest storm to
hit Texas in nearly 20 years, roared ashore Sunday with horizontal
sheets of rain and 125-mph winds that whipped and bent palm trees and
forced thousands of people to flee inland. "Hurricane Bret has the
clear potential of producing a major disaster. It has the ingredients
to threaten life and property in many ways," National Weather Service
spokesman Jim Hoke said at a news conference in Washington.
HOKE SAID Hurricane Bret is very much like Hurricane Andrew, which
devastated south Florida in 1992. He said both hurricanes had speeds
of 140 mph.
But unlike Andrew, which hit densely populated South Florida, Bret
hit between Corpus Christi (population of 275,000) and Brownsville
(132,000).
The good news is that the core of the hurricane ... is not over the
more populated areas, said Max Mayfield of the National Hurricane
Center.
The path resembles that of 1980s Hurricane Allen, which packed winds
of 185 mph and did $55 million in property damage but killed only two
people when it came ashore.
Businesses and homes were shuttered from Brownsville to north of
Corpus Christi, and highways leading inland were packed for miles
with bumper-to-bumper traffic as residents braced for its strongest
hurricane since 1961's Hurricane Carla.
Waves were reaching 26 feet at a buoy 45 miles off the coast, the
weather service said, and tidal surges of 10 to 15 feet were possible
when the storm hit the coast. Up to a foot of rain could fall on
coastal areas and there was also a threat of tornadoes, the officials
warned.
A storm surge of 10 to 15 feet could inundate barrier islands and low-
lying coastal areas, forecasters said.
-- (just@helping.out), August 22, 1999.
I did animal rescue work in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, two
days after Hurricane Camille hit 30 years ago. Plaquemines is a heavy
oil- and gas-producing parish south of New Orleans. I remember
particularly gigantic storage "drums" labeled Getty Oil crumpled like
badly dented ping-pong balls. The whole of lower Plaquemines was
scoured, except for odd low piles of rubble here and there, so some
refineries and other storage facilities were wiped out. Incidentally,
Camille struck only a glancing blow at lower Louisiana.
During Betsy, four years earlier, my ex-mother-in-law and others were
re-evacuated by boat from a flooded high school evac center to the
Tenneco refinery in Chalmette. They sat high on metal catwalks--with
their feet just above the 15 to 20 feet of flood water below. They
were rescued by the National Guard in amphibs after about 12 hours. I
don't know how long Tenneco and other South Louisiana refineries were
out, nor do I know how long the Chalmette Kaiser Aluminum or other
industrial plants were down, but it must have been weeks if not
months.
It didn't help that New Orleans authorities dynamited levees so that
southern parishes suffered even worse flooding than the devastated
city. (Flood walls now protect the city from the Mississippi.)
I'm not so sure that the affected petrochem facilities were rebuilt to
a greatly raised standard of hurricane preparedness or that those not
in the direct path of devastation were improved. It will be
educational to see how the Texas plants fare.
-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), August 22, 1999.
Sunday night NYMEX electronic trading on crude and products just
opened. Crude is up 7 cents / bl from Fri's close. Gasoline and
heating oil are up approx .5 cents/gal. No biggie. Probably not even
Bret related...
-- downstreamer (downstream@bigfoot.com), August 22, 1999.
Sun night NYNEX electronic trading just opened. NYMEX crude = 12
cents higher. NYMEX gasoline and heating oil up about .60 cent / gal.
No bigee. Prob not even Bret related...
-- Downstreamer (downstream@bigfoot.com), August 22, 1999.
It's always fun to post on a thread along with Mike T. : )
The thing that I guess I was worried about with regard to the 140 mph
winds was that they could pick up a lot of stuff and throw it around.
I'm a west coaster so I don't know a whole heck of a lot about
hurricanes other than I'd be among the first to leave the area : )
I did hear that the storm was going to hit shore during low
tide...that's a big relief.
Mike
==================================================================
-- Michael Taylor (mtdesign3@aol.com), August 22, 1999.
Downstreamer, and others, I agree with you that of ANY area of TX that could be hit and have the least possible impact, between Brwonsville and Corpus is about the best.
Few people, no cities, no industry, and little "crossing" industry like gas pipelines or natural gas field that far south.
It's really pretty desolate. And a good thing too:
If FEMA is only bringing this much for a hurricane, they've got to figure there is little to destroy:
<<2,000 cots
-- 4,000 blankets
-- 1,000 tents
-- 250 portable toilets
-- 72,000 liters of water
-- 2,464 rolls of plastic sheeting
-- 100 electric generators (of various sizes)
-- 6,000 personal wash kits
-- 40,000 Meals Ready to Eat (MREs)>>
___ Now think about it: FEMA is only going to supply 100 generators? And 40,000 MRE's won't feed 5,000 people for 3 days!
(Not even one neighborhood much less one suburban area, much less a city for seven days. Just how much supplies do they have ready for this upcoming "winter storm" .....
-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), August 22, 1999.
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