Hurricane Rita roared through the Florida Keys yesterday, dumping a foot of rain – and the rapidly growing storm is now threatening to ravage Gulf Coast areas still struggling from her sister Katrina.
Rita grew from a 70-mph tropical storm to a 110-mph hurricane – just 1 mph short from Category 3 – yesterday, as it churned through the Florida Straits, which separate the Keys from Cuba.
Forecasters said it could become a Category 4 storm with winds of at least 131 mph.
Florida’s governor told any residents who hadn’t obeyed orders to leave the Keys that it was too late to run now.
“Now it’s time to hunker down,” Gov. Jeb Bush said. “As we say, ‘Turn around, don’t drown.’ ”
Nearly 1,000 miles to the west, officials made plans to move refugees from Katrina once again – from Texas to Arkansas.
About 1,100 Katrina victims who had been evacuated from Louisiana to Houston shelters last month began making their way to another emergency haven at Fort Chaffee, Ark.
Authorities said homeowners from Florida to Texas were taking Rita very seriously, because of fears they would end up like the residents of New Orleans.
Key West Mayor Jim Weekley said about half of his city’s 25,000 residents had fled – twice the number who evacuated during previous hurricanes.
By late yesterday, Rita pelted the Keys with up to 12 inches of rain. More than 6,000 homes and businesses from the Keys to Miami lost electrical power.
Rita was moving at a rate of 13 mph toward the Texas coastline for likely landfall by the weekend.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry recalled emergency personnel who had been helping Katrina relief so they could be home to prepare for tornadoes and flooding.
On the Texas coast, by 5:30 a.m. yesterday, residents were lined up at a Home Depot in Texas City, just north of Galveston, to buy plywood and other supplies.
Beau Shirali, one of those on line, said he had already stocked up on canned food and water.
“There is only so much you can do,” he said. “The rest is up to the hurricane and God.”
Rita appears headed for landfall between Galveston and Corpus Christi, but its outer fringes also could lash the area from Louisiana to Mexico.
Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco urged everyone in the southwest part of her battered state to prepare to evacuate.
Voluntary evacuations began yesterday in Galveston, with mandatory evacuations set for today.
A Louisiana official warned that levees in New Orleans, where hundreds died in Katrina’s floods, would fail again if the city were smashed by a new storm surge.
With Post Wire Services
HURRICANE RITA Category 2
* Wind speed – 110 mph, moving west at 113 mph
* Expected to hit Texas coast between Galveston and Corpus Christi by Saturday
* Hurricane-force winds extending 45 miles from its center
* Better than 10% chance it’ll hit New Orleans