Storm's Chaos, Not Its Rain, Claims 5 in Texas(tragic: family asphyxiated)

[DeepModem Mom]

LAT: Storm's Chaos, Not Its Rain, Claims 5 in Texas
Back in Beaumont after enduring a frustrating evacuation, two adults and three children are asphyxiated trying to stave off the heat.
By Scott Gold, Times Staff Writer


BEAUMONT, Texas — Billy Coleman tried to play by the rules.

As Hurricane Rita lumbered toward Texas, he heeded calls to evacuate and fled to Mississippi in a three-car convoy — 14 men, women, children, stepchildren, boyfriends, girlfriends, cousins. They planned to stay away from Beaumont, in the southeast corner of the state, until authorities gave the all-clear.

But things went wrong in a hurry.

Unable to find a public shelter, they had to sleep in their cars the first night. They finally found a hotel in Marion, Miss., near the Alabama line. But it charged more than $100 a night, and they were running out of money fast. So on Sunday, they turned around and went home.

By Monday morning, Coleman, another adult and three children were dead, asphyxiated by fumes from the generator he had brought into the apartment to power a table fan.

Rita itself does not appear to have killed anyone in Beaumont, although the city shouldered the initial brunt of the storm. But there is no power, no sanitation, not even enough water pressure to fill firefighters' hoses....

***

"They keep saying that we didn't go anywhere for the storm," Quaneshia Haynes, Coleman's 25-year-old daughter, said Monday, tears streaming down her face. "We left. But we had to come back, and we didn't have any choice...."Let me tell you what they don't tell you about evacuating. They don't tell you that if you're poor, you're on your own. They don't tell you that people will charge $100 for a hotel that has dirty sheets, where the toilet doesn't even work. We didn't want to come back here, to live with no lights and no water. But we had no help up there. Nothing."...



http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-beaumont27sep27,0,7203557.story?coll=la-home-headlines

[babylonsister]

1. All very true. We returned to

Houston from Corpus Christi on Saturday after Rita made land, though the powers that be tried to dissuade anyone from returning.
My immediate reaction was concern for people who could not afford to stay in a hotel for 3 days to a week.
We were en route back home because we didn't want to have to sit in traffic for 9+ hours, plus concern for whatever happened back home was uppermost in our minds.
Since Beaumont got hit so bad, I imagine this family had no other choice but to return home, or they wouldn't have done so.
Another big problem that needs to be addressed is adequate public shelter. Why were schools or the mega-churches not utilized?

Very, very sad...

[DeepModem Mom]

2. Thank you, babylonsister, for your personal view of the problems there...

and this tragedy.

[MarsThe Cat]

7. are the large mega-churches hurricane proof?

just because a structure is large- it doesn't mean that it'll stand up to Cat 3-4 winds.

[Igel]

3. They missed part of the rules.

Authorities emphatically said *not* to head east when they issued the evacuation orders for E. Texas/SW Louisiana: shelters full there, no accommodations, everything was being set up up north. Dallas was also recommended against, they just had all the Houston refugees show up, swamping the area. All the traffic congestion was north and slightly northwest when people followed the rules, but they all, or nearly all, got out of the way; I know by 6 pm or so Luskin was full, I don't know if Nagadoches and other areas north of Beaumont had their shelters full up or not by midnight. Authorities were clear: don't return home until the all clear was given--find a state park and camp out in the car if necessary.

The PSAs on Friday and Saturday kept saying *not* to run generators inside apartments or houses if the power was out if you wanted to live. It's been brutally hot and nasty here--records temps in Houston--so I can understand wanting to run a fan.

I feel sorry for them. They survived Rita, and then unwittingly committed suicide.

[MarsThe Cat]

6. if it's brutally hot-

wouldn't keeping the generator inside make it even hotter?
I remember some morans i knew who set up a window ac unit in the middle of the room, and couldn't understand why it wouldn't cool off the room.

btw- i know that the part about the kids is tragic...but does billy qualify for the darwins?

[Igel]

9. It would in a closed space.

Probably not too noticeable, I have to assume the windows were open.

Air conditioner in the middle of the room ... ah, what would Carnot say?

This incident seems just too sad for the Darwin awards.

[FlaGranny]

4. I just don't understand

why so many people do not know about carbon monoxide poisoning. Somehow people have to be informed about this. Every single hurricane in Florida, several people, sometimes entire families, die because someone brought the generator INSIDE.

[ZigSteenine]

5. Last summer

I was without power for close to a week after major T'storms and straight line winds.

I hated to run my generator while it was on the patio for the noise alone. I couldn't fathom putting it in the house with me even if I didn't know about carbon monoxide hazards.

[Catherine Vincent]

8. This is so tragic.

Being without power and no air conditioning was the biggest thing I feared. And man has it been HOT and HUMID in Houston lately.:-(