Hey there!  My uncle used to work on fishing boats in Florida.  He'd take people out on trips into the Gulf of Mexico.
Cool! I used to leave near the Gulf of Mexico, in Galveston.
Were you there during Hurricane Ike in 2008?  It was a CAT 2 when it made landfall and caused a lot of flooding.
I was! It was scary, but fortunately I was not affected. There was a lot of flooding.
Effects of Hurricane Ike in Texas
The effects of Hurricane Ike in Texas were crippling and long-lasting. Ike's effects included deaths, widespread damage, and impacts to the price and availability of oil and gas. Hurricane Ike also had a long-term impact on the U.S. economy. Making landfall over Galveston, at 2:10 a.m. CDT on September 13, 2008, Category 2 Hurricane Ike caused extensive damage in Texas, with sustained winds of 110 mph (175 km/h), a 22
located near Hallettsville, Texas. Weakening to a tropical depression the following day, it dissipated at 1200 UTC on August 30 near Sweetwater, Texas.
Preparations and impact.
Despite making landfall on the Yucatán Peninsula on August 27 as a Category 2 hurricane, no damage was reported there. As the storm traversed the Gulf of Mexico towards the Texas Gulf Coast, evacuation procedures were conducted across the region. In the storm-warning area of Galveston, Texas, roughly 50,000 people evacuated inland