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Houston has a Rita problem

Hurricane Rita has been upgraded to Category 5 and is whipping across the Gulf of Mexico at 220 kilometers per hour. Houston`s 1.5 million residents have been urged to evacuate the region, and hundreds of trucks were on their way to the city with food and emergency supplies.

US President George W. Bush declared Texas and Louisiana federal disaster areas in anticipation of the damage expected after Rita hits, Army Radio reported.

The Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, has been shut down temporarily due to the danger posed by the storm, there are no active space missions going on that the shutdown will affect, as there are other NASA stations around the world that can probably take the load off Houston for a short time.