A Massive Hurricane Ike Ravaged Southeast Texas - Galveston

Ike a huge hurricane ravaged southern Texas early Saturday, Batter the coast with rain and fierce winds that decided that the residents too late, they should have heard calls to evacuate appealed in vain for relief.

Although this would be the beginning of the storm toll was already clear, the damage has been significant. Thousands of homes were flooded, roads were washed away and several fires have burned without the crew could not reach. But the greatest fear was that thousands of people are entered for the relief flight would be submerged houses and neighborhoods.

"The sad truth is that we should go ... and our people in difficult circumstances to save people who have not chosen wisely. We will probably be the largest search and rescue operation ever conducted in the state of Texas," says Andrew Barlow, spokesman for the Governor Rick Perry.

The eye of the storm powered ashore at 3:10 am EDT Galveston with 110 mph wind, a strong Category 2 storm.

More than 1.3 million customers - 2.9 million people - lost power, and warned suppliers could be weeks before all service was restored. There was also concern wind could break the windows of skyscrapers that the sparkling profile of the city America's fourth largest city. Forecasters said the worst winds and rain will come after the center came ashore.

Although 1 million people fled the coastal residents near where the storm was landing, the three countries said only about 90,000 remained. As the storm front moved to Galveston, fire crews rescued nearly 300 people who changed his mind and fled at the last moment water wade through the execution of clothing and other goods.

"We do not know what we find. We hope to find people who are left alive," Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas said. "We keep our fingers crossed all the people who remained on the island of Galveston managed to survive."

Storm surge was pushing in the vicinity of an elementary school in nearby Johnson Space Center in Houston, where Mayor Bill White has made waves earlier with a bullhorn trying to force people to leave. Thousands of homes may be damaged, a spokesman for the mayor said, but it was too dangerous to go out and collect the district at the height of the storm.

A historic restaurant, Brennan's of Houston, was destroyed by a fire when firefighters were thwarted by a strong wind. The restaurant was an institution in the city center for more than four decades.

On the side of the far east of Houston, Claudia Macias was raised with her newborn and was tried in vain not to think of swaying trees outside its doors, wind or through its lively windows. She had been through other storms, but this time was different, because it was a new mother.

"I do not know who sleep here tonight, maybe the baby," said Macias, 34.

Before joining the shore, the storm about 600 miles, almost as big as Texas itself. As a result of the hurricane size, the shallow coastal waters and largely unprotected coastline, forecasters said the biggest threat would be flooding and storm surges, with Ike should launch a wall of water two storeys high - 20 to 25 meters -- the coast.

The fire left three buildings in Galveston burn because the water was too high for fire trucks to reach. Six meters of water collected in the Galveston County Court House, on the island of Montreal, according to reports on the storm National Weather Service Web site.

But there was some good news: a freighter failed with 22 men aboard, they have the bulk of the storm safety, and a tug was on the way to save them. And an evacuee Calhoun County gave birth to a baby girl in the toilets of a shelter with an expert in the field of geriatric psychiatry, who delivered her first baby in two decades.

"It's a bit like mounted on a bicycle," Dr. Mark Burns told the New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung after he helped Ku Paw pleased with his fourth child.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency said more than 5.5 million prepackaged meals are sent to the region, with more than 230 generators and 5.6 million liters of water. At least 3,500 FEMA agents were stationed in Texas and Louisiana.

If Ike is just as bad as feared, the storm could travel up Galveston Bay and send an increase in the Houston Ship Channel and the Port of Houston. The port is the country's second largest, is economically vital and complex of ports, pipelines, depots and warehouses that receive, cars, consumer electronics, industrial equipment and other goods across the world and on ships large quantities of petrochemicals and agricultural products .

The storm could also force the water up to seven bayous by wire Houston, flooding neighborhoods to flood, that they are flooded during ordinary storm.

The oil and gas industry was almost Ike, because it was addressed to the nation's largest refineries and petrochemical plants. Wholesale gasoline rose about $ 4.85 per gallon for fear of shortages.

Ike is the first hurricane hit a metropolitan area of the United States since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans three years ago. For Houston, it would be the first major hurricane since Alicia in August 1983 came on earth Galveston Island, killing 21 people and caused 2 billion dollars of damage. Houston has a population explosion, many residents of the now in the storm track has never experienced anger, full of a hurricane.

Although Ike's Center was to Texas, gave birth to the storms, the closure of schools and knocked on the power in the south of Louisiana on Friday. An estimated 1,200 people were in shelters in Monroe and Shreveport, and another 220 in the medical needs shelters.

In the south, near Houma, Louisiana, Ike breached dikes and flooded more than 1,800 homes. More than 160 people had to be rescued from the site of severe flooding, and Gov. Bobby Jindal said he expects the numbers to grow. In extreme cases, residents of low water, where communities have continued to rise continued to refuse the help of the National Guard to flee their homes, authorities said.

No deaths were officially reported, but the crew would resume the search at dawn near Corpus Christi for a man believed swept to sea as Ike closed in.