Since Hurricane Ike seems to be heading this way, I thought I’d post the story of my nightmarish evacuation experience for Hurricane Rita. Believe me, I have no intentions to evacuate this time.

So far as I know, I hold the land-speed record for driving from Houston to Dallas, Texas. My fiance, Angela, my parents, and I did it in a little over 44 hours. We started out at 3:45 on a Thursday morning. At the time, a category 5 hurricane named Rita was heading for someplace between Galveston Island and Matagoro Bay. Nobody knew what the hurricane would do to Houston — the mayor hadn’t even ordered voluntary evacuations yet — but we weren’t sticking around to suffer through the end of summer without air-conditioning, working toilets, and decent BBQ. So we packed our most cherished possessions, including two cats, into our two cars and headed inland. When we left, the online traffic report showed a stop-and-go mess on I45, but clear sailing out of town on 59.

That clear sailing came to an end just outside of town. It took us two hours to cover the distance between Houston’s two loops, a distance we normally drive in about 5-10 minutes. Once we got to the outer loop, Beltway 8, we were really wondering if the hurricane wouldn’t just clobber us on the freeway less than 20 miles from home.

I have never been stuck in gridlock like this before. It took us 5 hours to cover 9 miles of highway 770.

On the radio, people were calling in with their secrets for getting out of town in a hurry. Somebody called in just as we were approaching the beltway and said that I10 East, was wide-open all the way to Louisiana. So we decided to loop around on the beltway to I10, and shoot out towards Saint Charles. It was a good plan, and would have worked if Rita had gotten with the program. About the time we were approaching Beaumont, TX, the forecasters changed their predictions. Rita would now strike land further east at Beaumont. Civic leaders in the area immediately called for mandatory evacuations, and we suddenly found ourselves stuck in a traffic jam for life and death.

I grew up in Los Angeles. I know traffic. I had an hour commute through downtown L.A. to get to my high school. I have never been stuck in gridlock like this before. It took us 5 hours to cover 9 miles of highway 770. We would move the car a couple of car lengths, then turn it off for twenty minutes. We couldn’t run the car constantly because we were hearing on the radio that people and gas stations were running out of gas. It was a mid-September day in Texas, triple-digit heat, and we were without air-conditioning.

We weren’t happy, but the cats were worse. Cats aren’t amenable to travel in the first place. These cats were stuck in unbearable heat and frightened out of their minds. They weren’t eating or drinking. This all created a huge strain on my fiance who feared she might very well lose both of them before they even got a chance to face the hurricane.

One guy said he’d labeled some duct tape with this name and address and wrapped it around the tails of his cows so he could find them after the hurricane.

We thought about turning back or finding another highway, but the folks in the other vehicles assured us that the other highways out of here were as bad or worse. We weren’t familiar with the area, so we had no choice but to stick it out. The amazing thing was that everybody seemed in such good spirits. Some boys were tossing a football around while wait for the next opportunity to advance their car. People called into the radio station to tell jokes. One guy said he’d labeled some duct tape with this name and address and wrapped it around the tails of his cows so he could find them after the hurricane. Another guy called in offering his radar detector for sale. If you were interested, just wrap on the window of the red Tacoma pickup in lane two.

Eventually we got through to highway 105 and were able to make it west to highway 146. All lanes on 146 were open for northbound traffic, so things were at least moving in the direction of Livingston. We got to Livingston around 10 pm, and that’s when I first realized I was living in a Mad Max movie. There were just so many cars, trucks, and people milling about. Cars were parked on both sides of the road. They were either broken down or out of gas. Little communities had sprouted up in gas stations where people were camping out waiting for the next shipment of gasoline. Supposedly gasoline tankers were going to show up at 6 am, fuel up all these cars, and send them on to safety. I have no idea if that really happened.

“Yeeeeeeehhaaaaaaa!!!!!!” everybody just took off over the median and started down the other side of the highway. I felt like a cowboy in a stampede.

By midnight, we had passed through Livingston and made it back onto highway 59 North. 59 had the same bumper-to-bumper traffic we’d been dealing with all day. Throughout the day, we’d been hearing reports about how citizens had taken it upon themselves to impose contraflow traffic on 59. To outsiders, that might seem to be a drastic measure, but it’s very Texan. Since moving here, I’ve learned that traffic laws aren’t absolute; they are prudent advisories except when they aren’t. So it didn’t surprise me at all, when a few good ol’boys decided to instigate their own contraflow on 59 that night. It started with a police car running down the other side of the freeway escorting a few buses. People around us seemed to take that as an invitation, and “Yeeeeeeehhaaaaaaa!!!!!!” everybody just took off over the median and started down the other side of the highway. I felt like a cowboy in a stampede. Cars charging down the highway without any motivation but north. Occasionally, we’d encounter the unfortunate driver who thought he might slip by in the other direction. He would flash his headlights at us in protest, but eventually realize that a column of cars was in his lane and there would be no arguing.

Continue on to Day 2…