Hurricane Ike

Hurricane Ike was a powerful tropical cyclone that swept through portions of the Greater Antilles and Northern America in September 2008, wreaking havoc on infrastructure and agriculture, particularly in Cuba and Texas. In these places, Ike remains the costliest tropical cyclone on record. Other locations were also seriously affected by Ike, which was ultimately the third-costliest of any Atlantic hurricane and resulted in $37.5 billion in damages.

On the night of September 12, 2008, the eye of Hurricane Ike approached the Texas coast near Galveston Bay, making landfall at 2:10 a.m. CDT over the east end of Galveston Island(near Texas City). In regional Texas towns, electrical power began failing before 8 p.m. CDT, leaving more than 3 million people without power.

The storm had come ashore hours before daybreak with 110-mph (175 km/h) winds and towering waves, pushing boats ashore, smashing many houses, flooding thousands of homes, knocking out windows in Houston's skyscrapers, uprooting trees, and cutting electric power to millions of customers (estimates range from 2.8 million to 4.5 million customers) for weeks or months. Rainfall estimates indicated that 2-day rainfall totals from mid-day Friday through mid-day Saturday exceeded 20 inches (50 cm) in parts of both northern Harris County and southern Montgomery County, with a multi-county area receiving at least 10 inches (25 cm) of rainfall.

More than 140,000 residents in the Texas Gulf Coast danger zones in Ike's path had failed to evacuate, partly due to fears of multi-hour traffic jams as during Hurricane Rita, but over 940 were rescued from rising waters, and nearly 2,000 rescued afterward. As of December 27, 2008, 37 people are known to have lost their lives in Texas due to Ike while hundreds are still missing.

Property damage in Texas from the storm was estimated to be $29 billion. The storm also had a large lingering negative economic impact to the state long after the storm with estimates totaling $142 billion according to a Hurricane Ike Impact Report by the Texas Engineering Extension Service

The effects of Hurricane Ike in Texas were crippling and long-lasting. Ike's effects included deaths, widespread damage, and impacts to the price and availability of oil and gas. Hurricane Ike also had a long-term impact on the U.S. economy. Making landfall over Galveston, at 2:10 a.m. CDT on September 13, 2008, "giant" Hurricane Ike caused extensive damage in Texas, with sustained winds of 110 mph (175 km/h), a 22 ft (6.8 m) storm surge, and widespread coastal flooding.

From Effects of Hurricane Ike in Texas and Hurricane Ike in Wikipedia
Image from NASA