Many Louisiana residents who sought refuge from Hurricane Gustav in Denton loaded buses headed for home on Wednesday.

“I’m ready,” said Margaret Ann Brown, as she waited for a bus to pull up outside the University of North Texas’ Super Pit coliseum to take her back to New Orleans. “I’m ready as I can be. It’s not too soon for me.”

DRC/Gary Payne

Hurricane Gustav evacuees prepare to leave the University of North Texas Super Pit Wednesday on buses bound for Dallas and then on to Louisiana.

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More than 150 evacuees left shelters at UNT and Camp Copass in Denton after officials sent word that they could return to their parishes. More were expected to leave this morning, three days after the storm made landfall in Louisiana.

The Camp Copass shelter closed late Wednesday morning, and the last buses carrying evacuees from UNT were expected to leave today.

John and Brenda Thomas of Jeanerette, La., southeast of Lafayette, planned to be on a bus carrying residents back to Iberia Parish this morning. Wednesday evening, the couple sat on plastic chairs inside the Super Pit, quietly watching as residents of neighboring parishes carried garbage sacks filled with belongings out to the waiting buses.

For the Thomases, the return home will be bittersweet.

Earlier Wednesday, they learned the storm ripped off half the roof of their mobile home. Many of their belongings are ruined, and they don’t know how they’ll afford repairs. Brenda Thomas couldn’t talk about it without crying.

“It makes us — how can I say it — heavy hearted,” she said, pausing to wipe away a tear. “It’s hard on us because it hurts. But God’s taking care of us.”

As the migration back into Louisiana began, what’s left of Gustav moved north into Arkansas, knocking out power to nearly 100,000 homes and businesses there as lashing winds and several inches of rain caused flash flooding in parts of the state.

In Louisiana, 1.2 million homes and businesses were without power, including about 77,000 in New Orleans, where Mayor Ray Nagin lifted a mandatory evacuation order.

More than 100 New Orleans-area evacuees arrived on buses early Monday at Camp Copass, a Baptist church camp near Lewisville Lake that housed more than 300 Hurricane Katrina evacuees in 2005. Later that day, buses dropped more evacuees off at UNT. By Tuesday, 248 evacuees were registered at the two Denton shelters.

Mark Joseph, a pipe cutter from New Iberia, La., planned to take a bus home from the UNT shelter this morning. Joseph survived Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and is haunted by its images — bodies floating up from cemeteries, a woman he saw drown and couldn’t save.

He said he doesn’t understand people who say government leaders overreacted by ordering people to evacuate Gustav’s path, even though the storm wasn’t as powerful as many feared.

“No, I don’t think they overreacted — I ain’t gonna say that,” he said. “After being in Katrina and going through it again, I think the government did the right thing.”

Meanwhile, state and regional officials were closely watching two other storms and preparing in case they reached the Gulf Coast, said John Cabrales, a spokesman for the city of Denton. The U.S. Hurricane Center said it is too early to say whether Hurricane Ike, marching westward across the Atlantic, will threaten land. Forecasters said Tropical Storm Josephine, behind Ike, is weakening.

A conference call for Texas emergency management officials was planned for Friday.

“We may be going through this exercise again,” Cabrales said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

LOWELL BROWN can be reached at 940-566-6882. His e-mail address is lmbrown@dentonrc.com .