Many head home to see what Ike left behind

updated 6:26 p.m. ET Sept. 16, 2008

ON  INTERSTATE 10, Texas - Nancy and Ricardo Garcia loaded their GMC Yukon with gas cans, clothes, tortillas, beer and the many files they took when they fled ahead of Hurricane Ike.

They left not knowing just how destructive the storm might be. On Tuesday, they ignored warnings to stay away and made the long journey home to find out.

“We’re driving back because our house is already flooded. We know that there’s water inside,” Nancy said as tears spilled from her eyes. Seven months’ pregnant, she reclined in the passenger seat, a pillow covering her bulging belly, as her husband filled the tank at the San Antonio Travel Center. They were 186 miles from their home near Houston’s Hobby Airport.

“My brother’s already there, and his house is completely destroyed,” she said. “We need to go back.”

More than a million people fled the Texas Gulf Coast last week and took refuge with family or in hotels and shelters to wait out the monster storm. Like the Garcias, many are now on an exodus back home — to communities that may have no power or water, or even houses to live in.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, and the mayors of big towns and small burgs, have urged folks to stay away while emergency crews complete search and rescue efforts and work to get the lights back on and the water running.

Flashing signs echoed those warnings all along Interstate 10, which runs the width of Texas from El Paso to Houston and on to places like Beaumont and the devastated communities of Orange and Bridge City.

“Do not travel to Houston and Beaumont,” said one. And: “Limited Fuel I-10 East.”

Galveston mayor's warning
In decimated Galveston, Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas announced residents and merchants would be allowed to “look and leave” between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m., meaning those who show photo IDs can return to gather belongings and assess damage. But that announcement came even as she encouraged an estimated 15,000 people still on the island to leave.

Historic Galveston looks to a different future Latino laborers are key to recovery Some may not be allowed to rebuild Insurers balk on paying surge damage Cowboys, others round up critters Newsweek: Riders on the storm First Person: Are you there? | Your photos Interactive map of Ike's wrath Explore images of the aftermath Join discussion, view images on Newsvine Coverage by Houston-area affiliates

“We are not going to go into somebody’s house and drag them out,” she said. “But they need to consider the risks of staying here. We have a blossoming health and medical concern.”

All of that mattered little to those who packed their cars for the second time in a matter of days and endured traffic, fuel lines and waits at roadside restrooms to get home and see for themselves what kind of havoc Ike had inflicted.

It wasn’t so much defiance driving them as circumstances, curiosity and the need to start cleaning up.

Reba Goble, a maintenance worker at the University of Houston, was more concerned with missing a paycheck than exasperating city leaders. She waited a half-hour for an open pump at a gas station off I-45 in Huntsville.

“If I don’t go back and tough it out,” Goble said, “I’m afraid of losing my job.”

Jessica Loera, a receptionist from Houston, headed back after staying with relatives in Dallas. Tired of watching the horror stories on TV, she wanted to check things out herself and called the warnings to keep away “unrealistic.”

“Hopefully the apartment complex is intact,” she said, “but I doubt it because we live right by a bayou.”

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