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Rita: Hurricane Rita
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Following less than a month after Hurricane Katrina devastated large parts of the central Gulf Coast region, Hurricane Rita was the second hurricane of the season to reach Category 5 status (on the Saffir-Simpson scale) in the Gulf of Mexico. This marked the first time on record that two hurricanes reached Category 5 strength in the Gulf of Mexico in the same season. Additionally, it was only the third time that two Category 5 storms formed in the Atlantic Basic in the same year.
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Hurricane Rita was the fourth-most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded and the most intense tropical cyclone ever observed in the Gulf of Mexico. Rita caused $11.3 billion in damage on the U.S. Gulf Coast in September 2005.[1] Rita was the seventeenth named storm, tenth hurricane, fifth major hurricane, and third Category 5 hurricane of the historic 2005 Atlantic hurricane season.
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Hurricane Rita made landfall as a category 3 storm near Sabine Pass, Texas on September 24, 2005. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), NASA, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the University of New Orleans, Louisiana State University, and the Texas Bureau of Economic Geology are cooperating in a research project investigating coastal change that has resulted from Hurricane Rita.
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"Hurricane Rita caused significantly less damage to Apache facilities than Katrina," said Apache CEO and President G. Steven Farris. "We lost one structure at Ship Shoal 193 B. Restoring the bulk of our Gulf of Mexico volumes currently affected by Rita is largely dependent upon the timing of repairs to third-party pipelines and facilities damaged by the storm."
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Hurricane Rita made landfall in southwestern Louisiana between Sabine Pass, Texas and Johnson's Bayou, Louisiana early Saturday morning, September 24, 2005. "Rita" was the second major hurricane to strike the Louisiana coast this season ("Katrina" was the first) and the third most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic Basin. Another significant hallmark of this event was the mass evacuations prompted by this storm in Texas and Louisisana. It is estimated that up to 2 million residents (most from the Houston/Galveston metro area) evacuated to avoid the effects of the storm. While Rita peaked as a Category 5 hurricane out in the Gulf...she made landfall over Cameron Parrish as a Category 3 hurricane.
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In some areas, the effects of Hurricane Rita were not nearly as severe as anticipated. The storm surge feared in Galveston and Houston struck farther east as the storm's center came ashore at the Louisiana border; winds blowing offshore in Texas actually flattened the surge, which was only seven feet (2 m), well below the height of the Galveston seawall. The five inches (130 mm) of rain expected to fall overnight in New Orleans ... did not happen, and the pressure on the levee system was eased. Still, storm surge of 15-20 feet (4.5-6.1 m) struck southwestern Louisiana, and coastal parishes experienced extensive damage. In Cameron Parish the communities of Holly Beach, Hackberry and Cameron were essentially destroyed. [7] In Calcasieu Parish the communities of Lake Charles, Moss Bluff, Sulphur, Westlake and Vinton also suffered heavy damage.
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Hurricane Rita