Dear Houstonians, Hurricane Ike is moving towards Texas coast with strenthening on warm waters of Gulf of Mexico. Hurricane is expected to landfall along the central to upper Texas coast by as early as late Friday night as a Category 2 or Category 3 hurricane. Models are honing in on a landfall location from the Freeport-Lake Jackson area to Galveston, Texas.

A strike in this portion of the Texas coast will provide dangerous, perhaps life-threatening impacts.

As Raindrop Helping Hands we prepared ourselves to help you as we did in Katrina, Rita and Gustav Hurricanes.

  You can get the updates about the Hurricane from these web pages;

http://www.stormpulse.com/ fullscreen/current

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/

http://www.weather.com/

http://www.readysouthtexas. gov/

http://www.hcoem.org

www.srh.noaa.gov/hgx

From our previous experiences, we would like to give some safety tips to minimize the effect of the Hurricane;

1. Make sure you have full tank of gas

2. Keep your mobile phones with you and charger with you.

3. Move your belongings to a second floor if you live in a duplex, otherwise put your belongings especially electronic ones on shelves or on table. Make sure your doors and windows closed tight.

4. Be prepared to have enough food for a long journey.

5. Sleeping bag will help you in your journeys.

6. Lighter, pocketknife, knife, torch, battery, whistle are important instruments to have.

7. Keep some cash with you and have some money on your debit card.

8. Have a first aid kit with you.

9. If you are on medication, make sure you have enough with you.

10. Keep your umbrella with you.

11. Choose the safest destination in the shortest time.

12. Keep updated yourself with official announcements.

13. If you want to stay in Houston, make sure you have a radio with battery, and enough supply of batteries.

14. If your have a child, make sure you have enough stock of milk and other needs of kid.

15. To have mosquito spray, non-perishable food, milk powder, ice etc. is for your benefit.

16. Keep your and your families important documents with you such as passport, social security cards etc.

17. Keep documents in waterproof folders.

18. Keep important telephone numbers with you.

19. Call your relatives whom our should inform.

In addition to these safety tips, Raindrop Helping Hands have three crisis centers in three cities, Houston, Dallas and Austin. Telephones of these centers will be reachable 24 hours. If you need a shelter or anything, for your self or for your friends contact to these persons.

Houston – Yasar Tiryakioglu (832) 863 6737,   Veli Baysal (713) 922 3058,   Ali R Candir (832) 830 2549 

Dallas – Kerim Yüksel: (972) 369 3201

Austin – Ömer Kaya: (512) 850 1176

Please contact us to volunteer in case of catastrophe.

Regards,

Raindrop Helping Hands

713 974 1412 Ext.108

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