AP: Texas

09/27/2005

Associated Press

City officials say they weren't prepared for hurricane-force winds nearly 100 miles inland. But in this city, nicknamed The Jewel of the Forest, trees that fell on power lines and damaged homes proved problematic.

"We sustained hurricane winds of about 100 to 120 mph for about a nine-hour period, so we have thousands of trees down within our city," Jasper Police Chief Todd Hunter told The Lufkin Daily News in its Tuesday editions. "People are becoming desperate. They've been three days without water. They weren't prepared."

The city was also running out of food and gas.

Denise Kelley, Jasper's acting city manager, said the emergency won't be quickly resolved.

"We are told it could be anywhere from one to two months before we get power again," she said.

Jasper's electric provider is based in Beaumont and, until Beaumont is up and running, Jasper will have to wait.

"We never thought we'd get hit this hard being this far inland," Kelley said.

Jasper was under a mandatory evacuation Thursday, but many stayed. Some evacuees from farther south headed for Jasper.

"We had too many people coming up here to take care of," justice of the peace Ronny Billingsley said.

"We are 120 miles from the Gulf and you don't expect this kind of damage from a hurricane," Billingsley said, looking over at his neighbor's broken home. "We've never had a Category 3 storm come through like this. People didn't know what to expect. But we do next time."

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HOUSTON — Funeral homes have been shut down and burials delayed from Houston to the Louisiana border because of Hurricane Rita.

Some funeral directors plan Tuesday to conduct their first services since Wednesday, while some families may have to wait weeks to bury their loved ones.

"It's going to be a while, I can promise you that," Jack King, a volunteer with the Texas Funeral Directors Association disaster response team, told the Houston Chronicle for its Tuesday editions. "I don't foresee (burials) happening for at least two weeks."

King was waiting in Beaumont on Monday afternoon for two refrigerated trucks to arrive from Barksdale Air Force Base in Shreveport, La. Each truck can preserve as many as 50 bodies for as long as needed, King said.

The disaster response team had powered a temporary morgue with a generator at Broussard's Mortuary in Houston.

"Any funeral director in earshot can come in and utilize this equipment," King said.

State law requires funeral home operators to embalm or refrigerate bodies within 24 hours of receiving them, said Mitzi Chafetz, spokeswoman for the Texas Funeral Service Commission.

"That could potentially be a problem if you had a funeral home without power or refrigeration," she said.

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AUSTIN (AP) — Texas Department of State Health Services officials have announced an urgent need for more Texas nurses to volunteer to relieve health care workers in special needs shelters in East Texas.

Flooding and a lack of electricity in several counties north of Hurricane Rita's initial landfall have led to an increased need, officials said.

Some 720 nurses have volunteered so far, a department news release said.

Those who can volunteer should call the department at 1-800-942-5540.

Nurses also can volunteer online at http://www.dshs.state.tx.us .