Ike is Bearing Down on Texas

Hundreds of thousands of people fled coastal areas in the path of Hurricane Ike on Friday as the storm gathered strength on a collision course with the Texas Gulf Coast, threatening to swamp populous areas around Houston under a massive wave of water.
Ike was a Category 2 storm with 105-mph winds and likely will come ashore late on Friday or early on Saturday as a potentially dangerous Category 3 storm on the five-step intensity scale with winds of more than 111 mph, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
The storm menaced Houston, the fourth-most populous U.S. city and hub of the oil industry.