Hurricane Rita targeting Texas Gulf Coast

Thu Sep 22 01:03:49 UTC 2005

On Thu, Sep 22, 2005 at 12:01:53AM +0000, Fergie (Paul Ferguson) wrote:
> 
> This looks really bad, folks.
> 
> - ferg (in Austin, TX)
> 
> [snip]
> 
> 000
> WTNT63 KNHC 212351
> TCUAT3
> HURRICANE RITA TROPICAL CYCLONE UPDATE
> NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL
> 650 PM CDT WED SEP 21 2005
> 
> ...RITA BECOMES THE THIRD MOST INTENSE HURRICANE ON RECORD...

As far as biggest damage to the Internet goes, the obvious target is 
Houston. Most southern crosscountry paths go right through it, and many 
networks rely on it heavily in the construction of their rings heading 
north.

At least Google doesn't seem to think it would be that bad in terms of 
flooding and storm surge:

http://www.wxresearch.com/houhur.htm

But if the power can't be sustained etc a lot of networks are in for a 
world of hurt. Looks like folks buying longhaul from (3) may be the best 
positioned as far as Houston goes, it looks like traffic from Atlanta and 
further north would go directly in to Dallas as a primary path.

http://www.level3.com/userimages/DotCom/en_US/images/ir_full.jpg

-- 
Richard A Steenbergen <ras at e-gerbil.net>       http://www.e-gerbil.net/ras
GPG Key ID: 0xF8B12CBC (7535 7F59 8204 ED1F CC1C 53AF 4C41 5ECA F8B1 2CBC)