Hurricane Rita

While Hurricane Rita was still brewing in the Gulf of Mexico, many in the surrounding area were beginning preparation for the brutality of a category five hurricane. Residents began boarding up the windows of their homes and businesses and placing items of personal affection on higher shelves or in boxes to be taken with them during an evacuation.

Many of the faculty and staff of Brazosport College were also preparing for the storm at their home-away-from-home, unplugging computers and removing necessary paperwork to a more secure location.

The librarians had a much bigger task on their hands and covered every shelf in the library with plastic wrapping to keep any water that happened to get in from damaging the books.

The Information Technology department also prepared for the worst and spent the Tuesday and Wednesday before the storm securing the network and computers from the possible damage of the storm.

“We were able to keep our e-mail systems, web servers, WebCT course server and other systems online the whole time by using our generator,” Ron Parker, director of Information Technology, said.

Although Hurricane Rita’s final course did not affect Brazoria County and many coastal cities in the vicinity like the intended path had projected, there was still slight damage to rooftops, many broken limbs and erosion to the beach at Surfside.

Gary Johnstone, dean of administrative and business services, reported that there was minimal hurricane damage to the campus. A couple of tree limbs fell on the outdoors Shakespeare in the Glenn theater, damaging a brick wall, and another limb also fell on the new Clarion band hall, causing roof damage. Repairs for the damage have already begun to take place.

But now that Brazoria County evacuees are safely back in their own beds and the highways are populated only with business people and travelers, many students are wondering