Hurricane Ike damage may be less than feared

By Chris Baltimore and Anna Driver

HOUSTON (Reuters) - Hurricane Ike slammed the Texas and Louisiana coast on Saturday with ferocious winds and a wall of water that flooded hundreds of miles, cut power to millions and caused billions of dollars in damage.

But relieved officials and residents said Ike may not have caused the catastrophe they had feared in the densely populated region.

The storm, which idled about a quarter of U.S. crude oil production and fuel refining capacity, swamped the island city of Galveston and paralyzed Houston, the country's fourth-largest city, shattering skyscraper windows and showering streets with debris.

There were unconfirmed reports of "a few deaths" from Ike, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said. He cited "significant surges" -- high seas pushed ashore by hurricanes -- and damage in Texas and Louisiana.

But Galveston and the Houston Ship Channel were not hit as hard as expected. Emergency officials had predicted a 20-foot (six-meter) storm surge that could have caused far greater damage and swamped refineries.

"Fortunately the worst case scenario that was spoken about, that was projected in some areas, did not occur," Texas Gov. Rick Perry told a briefing in Austin, Texas. But he said there had been "very heavy damage" to the power grid. About 4.5 million people could face weeks of power outages.

Ike came ashore at Galveston as a strong Category 2 storm at 2:10 a.m. CDT with heavy rains and sustained 110 mph (175 kph) winds, the National Hurricane Center said.

It had weakened to a tropical storm by mid-afternoon as it barreled northward on a path expected to bring heavy rains across a swath of the country stretching to Canada.

The storm flooded Galveston, sending waves over a 17-foot (5-metre) sea wall built to protect the city after a 1900 hurricane killed at least 8,000 people.

More than half the city's 60,000 residents fled before the storm. There were no reports yet of any deaths among those who stayed behind.

It was not clear yet how bad the damage was in Galveston, which is popular for beachgoers with second homes. The first aerial pictures showed homes surrounded by sea water.

In Bridge City, a small community along the upper Texas coast, frantic calls for rescue overwhelmed emergency workers.

"We just received one call from a guy in his attic and the water is rising and he can't get out," said Orange County spokeswoman Jill Frillou. "There were a lot of people that did not leave and just did not expect water to come that high."

Chertoff refused to say whether he expected the death toll to rise. "If someone stayed in an area predicted to be largely flooded, they put their lives at risk," he said.

UP TO $18 BLN INSURED LOSSES