Sept. 23, 2005 — Coastal residents in Texas and Louisiana are being urged to consider their pets as they evacuate the area ahead of Hurricane Rita — the third largest hurricane ever recorded — according to animal welfare and news organizations.

Hurricane Rita, which was downgraded to a Category 4 storm on Thursday, is expected to make landfall near Galveston, Texas, late Friday or early Saturday.

The storm arrives less than four weeks after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, devastating large swaths of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, and flooding most of New Orleans, where thousands of animals remain stranded.

"It is imperative that the residents ... in the path of Hurricane Rita make provisions for their pets now," said John Snyder, director of companion animals for the Humane Society of the United States, on the organization's Web site.

"As evacuees of Hurricane Katrina now know, there are no guarantees that pets will survive the storm or that you will be able to go back and save your pets in time if they are left behind."

As coastal residents in Texas headed inland, the Humane Society urged officials and public facilities to adopt "pet-friendly evacuation procedures."

"We want to encourage officials and public facilities in Texas to place the welcome mat out for pets as well as people," said Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States, in a press release.

"In the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, many individuals chose to stay behind with their pets rather than evacuate without them because there was no place to go with their animals."

In a letter sent to Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Wednesday, Pacelle cited a November 2004 report in the Journal of Psychiatric Practice that said "animal owners will risk danger to themselves and may not evacuate disaster areas unless they're assured of their animals' well-being."

In the letter, Pacelle commended Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas of Galveston, Texas, for her decision to allow evacuees to take up to three pets per person on buses transporting them to safety, said the Humane Society release.

Hoping to avoid a situation like New Orleans, Texas Homeland Security officials are allowing evacuees to bring their pets with them to shelters in Austin, Lufkin, College Station, San Antonio and Huntsville, said the Humane Society on their Web site.

The Humane Society is working with the Red Cross, the Texas Animal Control Association and the Texas Animal Health Commission to coordinate housing for pets arriving at shelters with their owners.

The majority of these animals are being taken to large private shelters run by the Houston Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA), The SPCA of Texas, the Humane Society/SPCA of Bexar County and the Animal Defense League, according to reports.

Many of these shelters are already near capacity with pets rescued in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, so the Humane Society is asking anyone in the area with a climate-controlled warehouse space who would be willing to house some overflow pets to contact them, according to the organization's Web site.

Katrina Pets: In the Path?

On Tuesday, the North Shore Animal League — the world's largest no-kill pet adoption organization — called on the U.S. government to take "immediate action" to evacuate thousands of pets left homeless by Hurricane Katrina from areas in the path of Hurricane Rita, said the organization in a press release.

"This storm couldn't come at a worse time for these animals who are already in a race against time to survive given the lack of food, water and the 118° heat," said the organization's lead veterinarian, Eve Ognibene, in the release.

"This is a crisis of unprecedented proportions," she added.

Earlier this week, officials at the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center and 4-H Center in Gonzales, La., began evacuating some 1,300 animals affected by Hurricane Katrina, said the American Humane Association in a press release on Wednesday.

"We've already transported thousands of animals out of harm's way," said Dick Green, the American Humane Society's Animal Emergency Services team leader and an operations chief at the Lamar-Dixon shelter, in the release.

"We want as many as possible to be moved to safer locations until they can be placed in foster homes or reunited with their families."

The American Humane Association, along with other animal welfare organizations, suspended their rescue operations in New Orleans on Thursday as Hurricane Rita made its approach.

"We don't want to put our responders or the animals they are serving at risk for injury so we're doing all we can to stand by until this storm passes and we can get back to work," said Green in the release.

"We are still finding survivors and need to do all we can to bring them to the shelters."