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Hurricane Rita

'We're sitting in the crosshairs'

With Beaumont, Texas, fearing a direct hit, nervous emergency workers were about the only people still in the coastal city on Friday night.

By ALEX LEARY
Published September 24, 2005

BEAUMONT, Texas - The captain of the ship had just finished laying down the rules - no smoking, conserve water, breakfast at 0730 hours - when Tony Viator's cell phone rang.

A friend was desperate for information about his mother, who refused to be chased from her home by Hurricane Rita.

"I'll see what I can do," said Viator, a 43-year-old sergeant with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office. He snapped the phone shut and took a deep breath.

"We're not used to this here," he said with a sigh. This southeastern Texas city has had hurricane warnings before, but the storms always headed elsewhere, sparing its residents and sprawling oil refineries.

This time, Hurricane Rita appeared headed straight for Beaumont, a city of 114,000 people about 60 miles east of Houston.

"We're sitting here in the crosshairs, waiting for a bomb to go off - a big ol' weather bomb," Viator said.

By early Friday afternoon, Beaumont was largely deserted. Without the lessons of Katrina, police said, most residents likely would have shrugged off Rita.

If there was a safe place to be in Beaumont, it was aboard the Cape Vincent, a 650-foot Merchant Marine vessel transformed into a floating command post.

The Cape Vincent, whose normal duties include ferrying tanks, helicopters and Humvees to Iraq, was headed Thursday for New Orleans. But plans changed as Rita took aim at the Texas coast.

Dozens of fire, police and rescue trucks and boats were put on board for safekeeping. When the storm passes, emergency workers will move out on search and rescue missions.

"It's kind of like Noah's Ark. Everybody goes aboard, waits for the flood and when the sunshine appears, they go back ashore," said Ralph Ortolano, a U.S. Navy officer supporting the Maritime Administration.

Rescue workers will take cadaver-sniffing dogs with them today. Not everyone in Beaumont left town.

Viator said he was worried about the men he saw earlier Friday, standing around a barbecue drinking beer. They had decided to stay put. Viator asked the men if they had a Sharpie.

"Write your name on your chest," he told them, "so we know how to identify you when it's over."

[Last modified September 24, 2005, 01:01:06]