Hurricane Ike

Bobby and I made it through Hurricane Ike ok and thought we'd share
some pictures of our area -- they're only in the area where we live.
If I said I wasn't scared while it was going on, I'd be lying. When
the winds first started at our place they were coming from the Northeast.

For those that don't know, our apartment faces due east. We have an open
lawn between us and the adjacent building that runs north-south.

Looking east (as the storm is beginning to come in)

Looking northeast (as storm is coming in -- winds from northeast)

As I said, the winds were first coming from the northeast and there was one window in our apartment that was feeling the strain and growning. I was really concerned about this window because it seemed really stressed in the early stages of our wind development --- Ike still had not made landfall.

Well, around 2am Bobby and I went to lie down for a little while because we were getting really sleepy. Up to this point the wind really wasn't that strong, maybe 30-40 mph.

So, then around 3:30am or 4am -- I'm not quite sure the precise time because our electricity had gone out shortly after we lied down -- I heard this loud bang against our window and then I heard the wind. I'm not quite sure what the bang was, we think it may have been a bird or something. The wind however was running from north to south and was flowing pretty strongly through our open lawn. Bobby being the more brave ventured outside periodically and I would pull him inside when I thought it was unsafe -- which means he was eventually grounded inside. :) While we were watching we'd periodically see bursts of green light as transformers were bursting around town. It was truly the darkest I'd ever seen Houston.

By around 6am or so the wind shifted again so that it was blowing east to west, and about this time Bobby began to see debris flying off our roof and I began to grow concerned about the front windshield on my car. Of course, there wasn't much I could do about it because I was unwilling to allow Bobby to go outside and we had parked our cars so that the they would be protected from north winds -- which we felt would likely be the strongest. So as we're hanging out and we here the wind flowing through our corridor that is open east to west, our apartment began to shake. It wasn't the entire complex that was shaking, just the wall and floor immediately adjacent to the corridor. Since we were pretty sleepy, we figured it was a good time to retreat to the bedroom and take a nap.

I was woken up around 8am to the power coming back on and with the dawn of a new day I thought I'd take a look to around to see what had gone on under the cover of night. Here are the pictures:

Neighboring Apartment (wall faces east)

Lawn near apartment that runs north to south (roof tiles)

Showing roof of apartment across the way

Toppled tree

My car -- it's OK! Just a little covered in leaves :)

Drain that luckily didn't hit my car (or Bobby's)!

My roof looks bad!

Looking down from our balcony

Our door -- death by leaving

Another picture of drain

Another picture of our downed tree

More downed trees

Bushes torn apart

Bark ripped away from tree

Debris clog in pool

Neighboring complex that is missing siding

Overall, we got off lucky compared to the stories I've heard from around Houston. We are very thankful that our apartment was facing the best way to minimize effects from Ike. It's not completely over yet, but we're hopeful that our good fortune will continue. :)