Hurricane "Ike" was strengthened on Wednesday in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico while en route to the coast of Texas, where authorities began evacuating the first of several million residents who might be in the path of the meteor.
"Ike" rose to Category 2 and is likely to gain even more strength before its vortex clash against the Texas coast Saturday morning.
The authorities warned on Wednesday one million people who shy away from the coast before the path toward Ike point where Texas is the largest concentration of chemical plants and refineries in the country.
Four counties in the south and east of Houston announced voluntary or mandatory evacuations, and authorities began to move in buses or weak patients with chronic ailments to San Antonio, 305 kilometers (190 miles) from Houston.
It also issued an evacuation order mandatory for the eastern end of Galveston Island. No immediate evacuations were ordered in Harris County, which includes Houston.
Approximately one million people live in coastal counties between Corpus Christi and Galveston. Additionally, 4 million reside in the Houston area, to the north.
The federal authorities pledged not verify the immigration status of people in areas where residents gather to be evacuated or roadblocks inland.
Residents, however, seemed skeptical and there are fears that many undocumented refuse to deal with buses and go to shelters for fear of being arrested and deported.
The county judge of Hidalgo J. D. Salinas said that if an evacuation is ordered compulsory, visited the neighborhoods of immigrants and forced residents to flee their homes.
After the hurricane "Katrina" and "Gustav",''there were many immigrants who said 'I'm not''' said Salinas, chairman of the county in the Bravo River delta. ''It will be difficult.''
''People are nervous''said Father Michael Seifert, a defender of the rights of immigrants. ''The message I got is that going to be a real problem.''
One reason to be skeptical is that last May, the secretary of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, said the Border Patrol would not do nothing to prevent an evacuation in the event of a hurricane.
However, when Hurricane "Dolly" hit the Rio Grande Valley in late July, not any mandatory evacuation was ordered as a result and the Border Patrol remained open their checkpoints. The officers then stopped a van with immigrants without papers.
The authorities of Matagorda County, halfway between Houston and Corpus Christi, began a mandatory evacuation for those residing in coastal areas. Judge Nate McDonald said the county hoped that the region is the site where land tap the center of the storm.
