Hurricane Humberto surprises Gulf Coast

HIGH ISLAND, Texas — Call it the instant hurricane.

Humberto, which grew faster than any storm on record, from tropical depression to full-scale hurricane landfall, surprised the Texas-Louisiana coast early Thursday with 85-mph winds and heavy rain that knocked out power to more than 100,000, shut down three oil refineries and left at least one person dead.

Meteorologists were at a loss to explain the rapid, 16-hour genesis of the first hurricane to hit the United States since 2005.

"Before Humberto developed, you looked at the satellite imagery the day before, and there was virtually nothing there. This really spun up out of thin air, very, very quickly," said National Hurricane Center specialist James Franklin in Miami. "We've never had any tropical cyclone go from where Humberto was to where Humberto got."

Texas coastal residents had prepared for a tropical-storm rainmaker that would quickly flood the ground saturated from the wettest summer in 60 years. Although forecasts called for up to a foot of rain, Humberto produced no more than half that and generated much more wind.

By late afternoon, it had weakened to a tropical depression churning across the Deep South.

"We feel very fortunate and blessed it wasn't worse," said Beaumont resident Edward Petty, 50, who was clearing debris outside his home 50 miles northeast of High Island, near where the storm came ashore.

"It was amazing to go to sleep to a tropical storm and wake up to a hurricane," he said. "What are you going to do? You couldn't get up and drive away. ... You just have to hunker down."

The only reported death was a man killed in southeast Texas when the carport at his home collapsed, police said.

High Island, known for its sanctuary where exotic migratory birds rest each spring and fall, got walloped. Streets were littered with uprooted trees and other debris. Power lines and telephone poles blocked streets and roofs were torn off convenience stores and homes.

Late Thursday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Tropical Storm Ingrid, the ninth Atlantic storm of the year, formed east of the Caribbean islands.