The Chron.com SciGuy asks, “Should we rebuild Galveston?” Galveston’s leaders are asking for billions to bailout, er, rebuild. My short rebuttal, leave the public money out of it. Build at your own risk, and expect the insurance to be high in risky territory.

He follows up with the story of Indianola

After the [1875] storm [Indianola] rebuilt, only to be struck by an even more intense hurricane 11 years later. This 1886 Indianola hurricane remains the fifth-most intense hurricane at landfall ever to strike the United States.

After this second hurricane residents abandoned Indianola. Due to storm-caused and other erosion during the last 120 years, the original town of Indianola now lies 10 to 15 feet under Matagorda Bay.

NatGeo:

• Destruction 1 2 3 4
• Before & After

Blown out windows:

• DailyMail
• Yahoo

Downtown Houston’s Tallest Plyscraper

An office

Hanging blinds

From Flickr

• Downtown Houston
• Kemah, Texas

Before an after pictures of Hurricane Ike by the USGS. Stuff does remain on Galveston and Bolivar.

• Galveston
• Bolivar Peninsula

USGS pictures on Google Maps.

And the Gustav link for our Louisiana friends.

SciTechBlog blog on CNN points out that the actual surge was less than predicted.

100 AM CDT FRI SEP 12 2008

“COASTAL STORM SURGE FLOODING OF UP TO 20 FEET ABOVE NORMAL TIDE
LEVELS…ALONG WITH LARGE AND DANGEROUS BATTERING WAVES…CAN BE
EXPECTED NEAR AND TO THE EAST OF WHERE THE CENTER OF IKE MAKES
LANDFALL… SURGE FLOODING OF UP TO 25 FEET COULD OCCUR AT THE HEADS OF BAYS.”
(National Hurricane Center, Miami, FL)

The National Hurricane Center predicted huge storm surges that, for most areas on the coast, didn’t happen. Had those dire predictions been true, the chemical and oil refineries along Galveston Bay could have taken a much larger hit.

These are the actual recorded surge heights:

STORM SURGE Max Heights in FEET (Tidal Surges Will Vary .5’-2’) TEXAS

–Galveston

Galveston State Pleasure Pier.. 11.19’
Rollover Pass……………… 11.06’
Eagle Point……………….. 10.75’
Port of Galveston Pier 21…… 10.25’

–Harris County

Manchester………………… 11.74’
Morgans Point……………… 7.76’
Battleship Texas State Park…. 6.11’

LAKE CHARLES, LOUISIANA –Jefferson

Sabine Pass……………….. 12.54’
Texas Point……………….. 11.79’
Port Arthur……………….. 11.25’
Rainbow Bridge…………….. 9.29’

One home on Bolivar Peninsula survived the surge and waves of Ike.  Living on Church Street is a good thing.

There’s a new landmark in Gilchrist, one of the towns on Bolivar Peninsula that Hurricane Ike ravaged and left for dead.

…  Every structure on the gulf side of this tight-knit community is gone.

Except for one house.

– Chron.com

Another person stayed on the peninsula instead of evacuate and tells the tall.

During the most frightful moments of Hurricane Ike, 60-year-old Carole Hamadey sat upstairs in her bed and breakfast on the Bolivar Peninsula, desperately trying to hold a window shut. – Chron.com

My Little Pony meets Star Wars:

• Storm trooper
• Princess Leia
• Darth Vader

If the iPhone doesn’t do enough, try one that does everything.

If a biz card says too little about you, put a webserver on it. However, there are smaller web servers.

• People will be allowed to stay for first time since Ike hit September 13
• Hospital and utility services on island are minimal, officials warn
• Be careful with gas and electricity, residents are cautioned
• Curfew from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. remains in place

– CNN.com

Went shopping.

Finally ate a big salad.  Only had a taco salad last Sabbath.  Coleslaw, romaine, olives, completed with a Grand Mariner.

Bought four packages of ground meat, two turkey, two beef.  ONly planned to buy one, but there were specials I didn’t refuse.  Don’t wonna’ start trusting the power system blindly yet.  But I will start bagging my ice, to have a large stash of ice in the freezer.

cNET, reports the release of slotMusic.  At least is uses the microSD format, instead of trying to push something new.  It is DRM-free, using the old but ubiquitous MP3 audio file format.  MP4 is new, but only the Apple iPods support it.  Amazing that the new multi-body supported standard is not used much.  slotMusic continues the tradition of DRM-free music offered by CDs and allows you to buy in brink-n-mortar stores.  Downloads, like iTunes, are available only online.  It provides a convenient, compact format, that doesn’t require ripping music.  CDs must be “ripped” to have the music on an iPod or iPhone.  With slotMusic, just pop in the music like a CD into your phone or player.  However, depending on how you like your music mixed, you’ll want a jukebox to switch between albums.  A stack of media, whether CD or slotMusic is less convenient that browsing through a large music collection available on an iPod or iPhone.  You’ll be a disk jokey swapping slotMusic cards.

After returning stuff a Walmart, I walk to Academy to return a leaking five gallon water bottle.  I browse the store to see what I could see.  I find the Streamlight Nanolight.  At 10 lumens, it should be very adequate when you find yourself in the dark.  It’s compact, so you can carry it everywhere, like the mini Swiss Army knife a gal gave me.  I wonder if she could use a miniature flashlight.

The aftermath pictures of Ike are now online.