Up and down

What's it like to be the mayor of a city of 111,000 on the day a hurricane hits? WORLD spent Saturday, Sept. 24, with Beaumont, Texas, Mayor Guy Goodson and over the next three days looked at which reputations took a hit and which improved | John Dawson, Marvin Olasky

John Dawson reports from Beaumont with Marvin Olasky in Austin

Duck, dodge, weave . . . duck, dodge, weave," Guy Goodson, 54, said as he made his way past chairs, cans of food, bottles of water, and elected officials at Beaumont's downtown emergency center near the end of a long day. He might as well have been talking about his city and the entire state of Texas, which survived Rita with only 10 direct hurricane fatalities, six of them resulting from faulty generators that led to carbon monoxide poisoning and electrocution.

The hurricane did wipe out some small coastal towns in southwestern Louisiana; all that Rita left in Holly Beach, a vacation and fishing retreat of 300, were the stilts that used to hold homes out of the surf. In Lake Charles, La., which lost its electric grid and suffered flooding, police arrested 15 people for looting. The biggest disaster: An explosive bus fire during the evacuation of Houston and coastal cities took 23 lives. But those bracing for death and devastation spoke during succeeding days about witnessing deliverance—and that afforded time to think about what officials and citizens alike have learned.