STORM TRACK: March 31, 1984 (Volume 7 Issue 3)

This is a different account of Hurricane Alicia from another location along the Texas Gulf coast, and from a different perspective. ST is devoting part of two issues to hurricane chasing, since inquiries have been received from other readers on how to chase these storms.

That evening, as I drove home from work, listening to the radio, the announcer interrupted regular programming to say that Alicia had become a hurricane and was heading slowly toward the Texas coast. ... I found my old hurricane tracking map and brushed the dust off. When I opened it, the path of Hurricane Allen stood out -- reminding me of that chase in 1980. I said, 'Here we go again.'

Shortly before noon on August 17, another engineer, John, and I departed Dallas in a rented van and headed toward Houston. The sky over Dallas was clear and winds were calm, in contrast to the weather just a few hundred miles to the south. It appeared that landfall of the eye would be sometime around midnight, near Freeport, southwest of Galveston about 45 miles.

Within the hour, altocumulus formed to the south and later gave way to lower cumulus. By 2:30 PM, we were about 150 miles north of Freeport and could see an extensive cirrus shield to the south (Photo 1). At times, several overshooting tops could be seen. A brief rain shower occurred as we penetrated the first line of towering cumulus about 3 PM. Winds were consistently 150 deg at 10 MPH. Static crackled over the radio as the announcer said that Alicia's maximum winds were 105 MPH, and it had stalled off-shore. We cheered.

Photo 1

We reached Houston by 5 PM. The sky was grayish overcast with dense cirrus, and darkest toward the south. We stopped to eat our last hot meal for awhile, then proceeded to Freeport with John driving.

Figure 1

At 9:57 PM, we arrived in Freeport just as the first rain band hit. Sheets of rain, whipped by northerly winds approaching 50 MPH, pelted the road. With visibility nearly zero, we drove slowly along Rt. 332 toward the town of surfside (Figure 1). Driving rain and strong winds hit the van broadside and, at times, the van moved laterally a few inches. Winds were pushing 70 MPH as John and I were beginning to worry whether we should really be out there. As we approached the Surfside bridge, we could see sprays of water coming up through the bridge drains like a car wash (Figure 2). Going over the bridge, I held my breath as the wind suddenly increased. I imagined seeing the van being pushed off the bridge into the ocean. Then, in the distance, a howl from the Dow Chemical Plant siren sounded like the call of death, somewhere out in the darkness. My hands were now cold, and I must admit, it was scary. As we came off the bridge, I regained my composure. We entered Surfside and encountered six inches of water over the road. We stopped and blinked the van lights down the street but could only see white caps in the distance. We could go no further (Surfside is only eight feet above sea level). Casually, I mentioned to John, "Well, we're in the ocean."

It was now 10 PM. We turned around and continued slowly westward. Suddenly, John hit the brakes hard as a large blue object blew in front, of us. We were concerned about flying debris but not a flying 'porta-Johnny'! What would our relatives be told, if we were killed?

Soon thereafter, we noticed power lines along the road, oscillating violently. Wind gusts continued to hit the van with a loud 'WHUMPF!" Then, the poles began to snap in succession and fall like dominoes into the ocean. A transformer in front of us plunged into the water end exploded in a vibrant, aqua-blue flare of sparks. Just up the road, power lines fell onto a metal building and a shower of sparks scattered. Our tape-recorded conversation marked the excitement:

Tim: Boy, sparks are flying all around here!

John: My...My... I'm glad we're windward of that.

Tim: These lines are going down! (pause) WOAH...WOAH...WOAH... Tremendous sparks ladies and gentlemen! That's something else. I've never seen that before.

John: (hastily) Me neither, Me neither!

John and Tim: (Laughs)

Figure 2

All of this was enough excitement for awhile, so we returned to high ground, guided by our topographical maps, to spend the night in the van. We set up a portable weather station just across from the Dow Chemical Plant B, between Freeport and Clute. We had a microbarograph, anemometer, wind vane, display console, and a twenty foot tower. We began taking observations around midnight. A summary is presented in Figure 3 (note that these data are referenced to a standard 10m (33 ft) height by the log law -- this correction was necessary, since our tower height is 20 feet and Galveston's is 54 feet, and to compare raw wind speed values would be more inaccurate without correction for the height differences). Peak gusts were between 60 and 70 MPH from midnight to 1 AM. By 1 AM, the wind began to shift to a northwesterly direction. This event seemed anticlimatic, as I knew the eye had slipped to the east (according to Galveston radar, the eye made landfall on west Galveston around 12:35 AM -- Cb tops on the northeast side of the circulation were 45,000 ft). Between 1 and 2 AM, the difference in wind direction between our location and Galveston was 180 deg. It is interesting to note the different times of maximum gusts between the two stations. The maximum at our location was 81 MPH at 2:33 PM -- from the west, whereas Galveston's maximum was 94 MPH at 12:34 PM -- from the southeast, moments before the storm made landfall. Our lowest pressure was 28.90, as compared to Galveston's 29.22.

Figure 3

Interestingly, the first cloud to ground lightning didn't occur until 2:30 AM, and even then it was infrequent, for about half an hour. The bolts took on an aqua-blue color. It was interesting to note that the thunder was a sharp 'pop' followed by a rapidly decreasing crack. No rumbling noise was heard. Perhaps the rain laden air and strong winds had a dampening effect. Some additional cloud to ground lightning occurred as the wind switched from north and northwest to west. About 3 AM, a gas flare from the nearby Dow Chemical Plant was lit, and orange flame illuminated the night sky for miles. We could see a low stratus-like cloud base, with ceilings around 500 feet.

Rain and strong winds continued until around 9:30 AM. As soon as the rain ended, I jumped out of the van and took a photo of the hurricane to the north. Rain could be seen in the distance, along with several layers of spiraling cloud bands wrapping around to the north as the hurricane was pounding Houston." During one of these exits outside the van and after the storm had passed, Tim reached over to grasp the anemometer shaft, to pull it out of the wet ground. He was roundly stung by fire ants on the pole, who had claimed the high ground. At another exit, Tim came close to becoming the posthumous Mr. Marshall, as he reached down to clear away kelp from the road in front of the van. Another motorist, stopped on the other side of the temporary road-block, yelled, 'Hey! Stop!! Wait a minute!' Mixed in with the kelp were two wet rattlesnakes, looking for action!

"We spent the next several weeks documenting the wind and surge damage from Freeport through Galveston Island and up through Galveston Bay. We took over 400 photos of the damage and over 30 surge locations with water markings. Wind damage was most severe along coastal and bayfront sections, where the wind fetch is long and unobstructed. The hardest hit areas were subdivisions on West Galveston Island, just east of the eye. Bay Harbor, Sea Isle and Jamaica Beach were hardest hit. A wide variation in residential damage was noted, which was the result of widely varying construction practice rather than from random skipping tornadoes (as most people believed). Of the 140-150 reported, only about a dozen were verified. In some cases, residences which were not adequately anchored to their support piers had moved laterally off the piers and into the water, while adjacent structures stood intact.

There were two locations where water marks measured 12 feet above sea level. The first was the Sea Isle community on West Galveston and the second was at the north end of Galveston Bay. The high surge at the end of the Bay appeared to be from rising water, occurring under predominant southeasterly winds over the Bay throughout the hurricane. Thus, the water had nowhere to go but up. Low lying areas like Brownwood and Clear Lake Shores sustained considerable damage to residences due to rising water. In most cases, the roof of the structure was intact, but only the bare frame of the first floor was left (Photo 2).

Photo 2

Finally, we interviewed several people in the disaster areas and found these similar opinions:

1) Most people in low lying areas evacuated when they heard the hurricane warning.

2) Most believed that Alicia was a severe hurricane in comparison to Carla and were amazed by the extent of damage.

3) Most believed that the variations in damage were caused by hurricane spawned tornadoes and not from the actual hurricane winds or surge.

4) There was also a tendency for the new, recent residents to leave, whereas the old timers, those there 10-20 years, tended to stay. This may also reflect a little Texas 'macho' among these 'veteran' residents.