Legion of Angels News Archive

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A huge relief effort was accelerating in storm-struck Texas on Monday as the big oil center of Houston struggled to get back to business after it was battered by Hurricane Ike.

About 2,000 people have been rescued from flooded areas in the largest such effort in the state’s history as searchers scoured hard-hit places like the devastated island city of Galveston, which was shredded when the hurricane made landfall on Saturday morning before heading inland to Houston.

Reuters energy correspondent Erwin Seba reported that 12 of the 15 Texas oil refineries that had been shut as a precaution showed no visible signs of flooding or damage — a sign fuel production could resume more quickly than initially thought. But power outages could still hinder their start-up.

Over 4 million people, several refineries and many businesses and gas stations remained without power, but floods were receding as crucial aid such as ice, water and food was being delivered to distribution points.

“Sixty trucks with supplies rolled in earlier tonight. … As we are standing here, deliveries are being made,” Ed Emmett, chief executive for Harris County, which includes Houston, told a news briefing on Sunday night.

He added that six relief distribution points were already up and running and he expected 17 to be in operation by later on Monday.

The relief roll-out appeared to defuse tensions that flared between the Federal Emergency Management Agency and local officials as hard-pressed residents complained about the time it was taking to get supplies to those in need.

Local officials later attributed the rift to confusion over who was responsible for doing what in the relief chain, a situation that led to delays.

The Bush administration came under heavy fire for its botched relief efforts in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Floods have been among the obstacles to rescue efforts and aid operations, but officials said the waters were receding.

“The flood event should be behind us,” Emmett said. Local TV footage showed cattle driven onto roads by flooded fields.

DEBRIS, POWER OUTAGES

Houston Mayor Bill White said all city employees were expected to show up to work on Monday as the country’s fourth most populous city tries to get up and running again.

The city’s two main airports were to resume partial operations on Monday, but with debris still littering its streets and windows blown out of office buildings, as well as power problems, it seemed unlikely the city of more than 2 million people would return to business as usual soon.

That point was underscored by the imposition in Houston of a weeklong dusk-to-dawn curfew.

Power provider CenterPoint Energy reported it had restored power to 380,000 customers, but over 1.7 million or 76 percent of its clients remained without electricity as of Sunday night.

At least three bodies were found in Galveston, which sustained some of the worst damage of the storm. The scale of destruction became apparent as authorities allowed more people to return.

The downtown area, containing the few buildings that survived a hurricane in 1900 that killed thousands, was under a layer of foul-smelling mud and sewage.

“It looks like a war zone. Everything is gone. It’s heartbreaking,” said Susan Rybick, a retiree driving along the seafront with her husband, John.

Ike triggered the biggest disruption to U.S. energy supplies in three years and sent gas prices higher. But U.S. crude oil futures dropped more than $1.59 to as low as $99.59 a barrel on Sunday as traders shrugged off supply concerns.

Source — Yahoo!

MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AP) — Tropical Storm Hernan gained strength Thursday as it churned far off Mexico’s Pacific coast.

Hernan could reach hurricane strength over the next two days, the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida, reported.

The storm’s winds have increased to almost 60 mph (95 kph), but it was moving west-northwest at about 11 mph (17 kph) and heading further out to sea.

Early Thursday, Hernan was about 650 miles (1,050 kilometers) south-southwest of the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula.

Hernan is the eighth named storm of the Pacific hurricane season.

Source — CNN

(CNN) – Tropical Storm Edouard is not expected to make landfall in Texas until Tuesday morning, but forecasters warned the storm could spawn tornadoes as soon as Monday evening.

Forecasters expanded warnings early Monday along the Gulf Coast in Texas as Edouard picked up speed.

A tropical storm warning was in effect from the mouth of the Mississippi River, just south of New Orleans, Louisiana, to Port O’Connor, Texas.

A warning means that tropical storm conditions are expected within the warning area within 24 hours.

A hurricane watch, which means hurricane conditions are possible within 36 hours, was in effect from west of Intracoastal City, Louisiana, to Port O’Connor.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida, said in its 2 p.m. ET advisory, “Isolated tornadoes are possible over portions of southern Louisiana and the upper Texas coast later today and tonight.”

Despite the threat of inclement weather, Edouard seemed to be causing few problems in the Gulf of Mexico, where employees on thousands of oil rigs and platforms produce and search for oil.

The price of oil dropped $3.69 Monday to settle at $121.41 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

“That’s going to be a nonevent,” said Tom Orr, head of research for Weeden & Co. “It’s moving away from oil-producing facilities.”

Some companies reported minor disruptions and small-scale evacuations, but others said Edouard posed no threat to their workers, some of whom are more than 100 miles (160 kilometers) offshore.

ConocoPhillips said Edouard is not disrupting its exploration or production activities. Shell Oil reported that it had evacuated about 40 personnel from its operations in the western Gulf, but the company didn’t expect any impact to its production activities.

Rowan Cos., a drilling outfit with nine rigs in the Gulf, left most of its workers in place, except on its rig about 30 miles off the coast of Galveston, Texas. Employees also were preparing for flooding at a company shipyard in the Sabine Pass, on the Texas-Louisiana border.

Rowan spokesman Bill Provine said Monday morning that one of its rigs was in Edouard’s eye and employees were reporting winds of about 35 mph.

“They’re probably shooting pool or probably eating,” Provine said of the rig workers. “It’s not a big deal.”

Diamond Offshore Drilling Inc. also expects to evacuate a rig outside Galveston, said Senior Vice President Gary Krenek.

Richard LeBlanc, spokesman for ENSCO International Inc., said the storm formed too quickly to evacuate workers but said oil rigs in the Gulf were designed to withstand tropical storms.

“We’ve certainly ridden out much tougher storms than this,” he said.

Edouard’s center could be “very near the upper Texas coast or the coast of southwestern Louisiana by Tuesday morning,” according to the hurricane advisory.

“Edouard could be nearing hurricane strength before reaching the coastline,” it said.

The storm started as a depression Sunday in the Gulf of Mexico.

At 2 p.m. ET, the center of the tropical storm — the fifth one this season — was about 145 miles south-southeast of Lafayette, Louisiana, and about 240 miles east-southeast of Galveston, the hurricane center said.

The storm was moving west-northwest at nearly 8 mph. Its maximum sustained winds were near 45 mph, with higher gusts, the hurricane center said.

Tropical storm-force winds extend up to 45 miles from the center.

Edouard is expected to dump up to 5 inches of rain along the Louisiana coast, and “maximum amounts of 10 inches are possible over southeastern Texas,” the hurricane center said.

Source — CNN

NEW YORK (AP) – Oil prices were steady near $125 a barrel Monday as the market kept on eye on a tropical storm that could affect oil facilities in the Gulf of Mexico. Concerns that a showdown over Iran’s nuclear program could threaten crude supplies out of the Middle East also buoyed up prices.

By midday in Europe, light, sweet crude for September delivery fell 7 cents to $125.04 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract gained $1.02 on Friday to settle at $125.10 a barrel.

In London, September Brent crude was up 29 cents at $124.47 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.

The National Hurricane Center issued a hurricane watch Sunday for the coast of western Louisiana and eastern Texas, which means that hurricane conditions are possible from Tropical Storm Edouard within the next 24 hours in the area.

The fifth named storm of the 2008 hurricane season has sustained maximum winds of about 50 miles per hour. By Sunday night, Edouard was located about 80 miles east-southeast off the mouth of the Mississippi River and about 390 miles east of Galveston, Texas.

Regarding Iran, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Saturday that the United States would have no choice “but to begin again to prepare sanctions resolutions for the (U.N.) Security Council” if Iran did not halt the development of its uranium enrichment program.

Rice said that given the U.N.’s current scheduling, sanctions probably could not be expected in the next few weeks, but the U.S. will begin working with allies toward that goal.

“There’s concern about a potential confrontation down the line,” said Victor Shum, an energy analyst with Purvin & Gertz consultancy in Singapore.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Sunday that diplomacy is the only way out of his country’s standoff with the West as an informal deadline expired on an offer of economic and other incentives by six world powers if Iran agreed to curb enrichment.

Iran’s leader made the comments a day after asserting that his country would not give up its “nuclear rights,” signaling that it would refuse demands to stop enriching uranium or at least not to expand its enrichment work.

The United States and its European allies fear Iran intends to use the technology to develop material for nuclear weapons under the cloak of a civilian nuclear power program. Iran denies the accusation.

On Friday, oil shot up as much as $4 after news reports quoted Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz as saying that Iran’s nuclear program was nearing a “major breakthrough” and that his country must be “prepared for every option.”

Mofaz, a hawkish former defense minister and military chief, is a top contender to succeed Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who announced last week he will resign in September amid a corruption probe.

In Nigeria, two French oil workers were kidnapped in that country’s volatile southern oil region Sunday. A statement released by France’s Foreign Ministry confirmed the kidnappings of the French nationals, but did not provide additional details about the two or say for which company they worked.

“You’ve got three supply-side worries pushing oil higher today: Iran, the storm and Nigeria,” Shum said.

In other Nymex trading, heating oil futures rose 0.68 cent to $3.4454 a gallon, while gasoline prices gained 1.66 cents to $3.1009 a gallon. Natural gas futures increased 9.1 cents to $9.48 per 1,000 cubic feet.

Source — CNN

HAMILTON (Reuters) - A tropical storm watch was issued for Bermuda on Friday as Hurricane Bertha, the first hurricane of the 2008 Atlantic storm season, neared the wealthy mid-Atlantic British colony, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

Conditions in the major offshore finance center were sunny and calm on Friday and few of Bermuda’s 66,000 residents appeared concerned about the storm.

While it remained unclear how close Bertha would eventually come to Bermuda, a tropical storm watch means that tropical storm conditions, including rough seas and storm-force winds, are possible within the next 36 hours.

“Large swells and high surf are affecting Bermuda … and these conditions are expected to persist for the next few days, the Miami-based hurricane center said.

At 5 p.m. EDT, top sustained winds from the hurricane were blowing at 90 miles per hour (150 km per hour), making it a minimal Category 1 storm on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale of hurricane intensity.

Bertha’s center was about 270 miles southeast of Bermuda, according to the hurricane center, which said it was moving north-northwest at a slow 5 mph (7 kph).

Forecasters expected the storm to turn more to the north and make its closest approach to Bermuda, home of some of the world’s biggest reinsurance companies and a major resort center, on Saturday or Sunday.

“The core of Bertha is expected to pass well east of Bermuda but any deviation to the left could bring stronger winds to the island and adjacent waters,” the forecast said.

Residents of the island, which has tough building codes to ensure structures weather storms, appeared largely relaxed.

“People are buying the usual staples — tarps, batteries,” said Bermuda Chamber of Commerce President Philip Barnett. “We are watching the track of the storm, and we hope it will stay well to the east of us,” he added.

To better gauge the intensity of the storm — which surprised forecasters when it strengthened briefly into a “major” Category 3 hurricane on Monday — an air force “hurricane hunter” airplane flew into Bertha to get a close look on Friday. Forecasters said afterward that no significant change of strength was expected.

Jahkima Kirkpatrick, sales manager for hardware store Masters Ltd, said most Bermudians seemed to have dismissed Bertha as a non-event.

“We have seen an increase in battery sales and flashlights in the past two or three days, but it’s nothing like the rush we have had in the past when other hurricanes have been bearing down on us,” Kirkpatrick said.

“Usually, when people feel it’s a real threat, they have their houses boarded up by now, but you just don’t see any of that happening this time around,” he said.

“The weather’s been great and it’s very early in the season for us to get hit — I think everyone is pretty skeptical that Bertha is going to have any impact at all.”

But there remained enough uncertainty to justify issuing a storm watch for Bermuda, the hurricane center said.

Source — Yahoo!