Hi bill,

Here is an additional map of the storm surge areas in texas.
http://www.houstontx.gov/category5.jpg

and here is a beter one for the risk areas for different catagory storms.

http://www.txdps.state.tx.us/dem/Hurricanemaps/SabineStudyAreaMap.pdf

They are all listed on the houston texas city webpage.http://www.houstontx.gov

No one can predict the out come from Rita but it could damage the economy of the US more than the hit in LA due to texas's larger importance to GDP.

I hope everyone heads the warnings and moves to saftey

Thanks for the great site.
Andrew Ingram

Hey Bill -

Here's a site to share with readers interested in Rig companies. http://www.rigzone.com/news/stock_list_top.asp

Readers might appreciate this site as well -- It's daily data on put-call ratio as well as a chart of the 21 day moving average. Good to keep an eye on in along with others. http://www.vtoreport.com/sentiment/putcall.htm

As always best to you, Glenn

It's sobering to realize that 13% of the nations oil refining capacity resides in the Houston Ship Channel. Found that at Rigzone.com .....

"...The nation's highest concentration of refineries is along the Houston Ship Channel, a 25-mile waterway that handles more foreign tonnage than any other U.S. port, and is second only to Southern Louisiana and New Orleans ports in terms of overall volume.

Among the major facilities on the Ship Channel are Exxon Mobil Corp.'s 557,000 barrel-per-day Baytown refinery, the nation's largest. Across the channel is Shell Oil's 340,000-bpd Deer Park refinery.

The combined refining capacity of Houston's nine big refineries is nearly 2.3 million barrels a day, or 13% of the nation's total oil refining capacity.

Valero Energy Corp. was among refiners taking precautions Wednesday. Its 243,000-bpd refinery in Texas City lies on lower Galveston Bay, closer to the open waters of the Gulf of Mexico, making it especially vulnerable to the heavy 13-foot to 18-foot tidal surge that accompanies storms of this magnitude.

Galveston was destroyed by a hurricane in 1900 in what still ranks as the deadliest natural disaster in U.S. history.

BP Plc , which also operates a huge 460,000-bpd refinery at Texas City, confirmed it too is taking steps to secure the plant. The BP Texas City plant turns out about 3% of the nation's gasoline supply..."

http://www.rigzone.com/news/article.asp?a_id=25443