Five members of a Texas family were found dead in their flat today, suspected victims of carbon monoxide poisoning from a generator used after Hurricane Rita caused power cuts across the region.

The tragedy was so far the deadliest single incident during the storm, which killed four others in separate incidents in Texas and Louisiana.

Twenty four elderly evacuees also died before the hurricane hit land in a bus that caught fire and another woman died of heat exhaustion in a traffic jam during the pre-storm exodus.

Rita slammed into the refinery towns of Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas, as well as Lake Charles, Louisiana, after an epic evacuation that emptied out a large swath of coastline and saved countless lives.

Some 3 million people fled from Rita’s path after seeing what Katrina did to New Orleans a month ago. "As bad as it could have been, we came out of this in pretty good shape," said Rick Perry, the Texas Governor, who called the absence of widespread fatalities "miraculous."

The Beaumont Enterprise newspaper said the bodies of a man, 46, a woman, 25, and three children aged 7, 9, and 12 were found in their apartment in Beaumont. Police told the paper there was a generator in the door to the apartment and carbon monoxide levels were six to seven times lethal levels.

Authorities say many people are still missing, especially along the west Louisiana coast, but they are hopeful there will no dramatic rise in the death toll.

The Enterprise also reported that a 43-year-old man and a 56-year-old woman in Liberty County, Texas, died after a tree knocked down by Rita’s powerful winds crushed their mobile home.

A 79-year-old man was killed by a tree in Texas and a tornado spawned by Rita killed one person in Mississippi, bringing the toll of storm-related deaths to at least nine.

Hard-hit towns along the Texas-Louisiana coast began to pick up the pieces. Crews worked to clear roads of fallen trees and other debris so that utility workers could begin restoring power.

The more than 110,000 people living in Beaumont were urged not to return home, though, since water, electricity and sewer services will not be restored for weeks. Police blocked exits off interstate highways leading to the city.

In Lake Charles, National Guardsmen patrolled the town and handed out bottled water and food to hundreds of people left without power. Scores of cars wrapped around the car park of the city civic centre, picking up food and ice. The storm knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of customers in Louisiana and Texas.

Forecasts of Hurricane Rita predicted that the storm would tear through a quarter of the nation’s petrochemical plants, but late last night just one major refinery near the Texas-Louisiana border was facing weeks of repairs. A further 21 refineries in Texas were unaffected.

Meanwhile, widespread flooding was avoided, as Rita dissipated more quickly than expected. The reflooding in New Orleans from levee breaks was contained in neighbourhoods that were already devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

But in some towns, the force of Hurricane Rita was plain. In Cameron Parish, just across the state line from Texas and in the path of the storm's strongest winds, fishing communities were reduced to splinters, with concrete slabs the only evidence that homes once stood there. Debris was strewn for miles by water or wind.

Holly Beach, a popular vacation and fishing spot, was gone. Only the stilts that held houses off the ground remained. A line of shrimp boats steamed through an oil sheen to reach Hackberry, only to find homes and camps had been flattened. In one area, there was a flooded high school football field, its bleachers and goal posts jutting from what had become part of the Gulf of Mexico.

"In Cameron, there’s really hardly anything left. Everything is just obliterated," said Kathleen Blanco, the Governor of Louisiana.

But the great contrast with Hurricane Katrina was the visibility of emergency help. In Beaumont, the Ford Park sporting complex outside was transformed into a staging area and medical triage centre with 80 ambulances and dozens of National Guard humvees ferrying relief supplies in one direction and evacuating patients in the other.

Search and rescue teams working with the Federal Emergency Management Agency arrived in Lake Charles in a convoy carrying water, ready-to-eat meals, medical supplies and fuel.

The gambling resort, where a stretch of Interstate 10 over the Calcasieu River was closed because barges broke loose and slammed into the highway bridge, was expecting help from police officers from as far away as California as outside assistance arrived in the disaster zone.

Even before the hurricane made landfall, the military deployed 50,000 troops to support relief operations — almost double the number that eventually responded to Katrina.

President Bush, hoping to counter criticism over Katrina, projected a take-charge image at the weekend as he hopscotched from one disaster command centre to another. At Randolph Air Force Base, Texas, he said he would study a proposal for the Pentagon to take charge in big disasters.

Explore World News

• World Agenda

• Iraq News

• US & Americas News

• Europe News

• Middle East News

• Afghanistan News

• Asia News

• Africa News

• Ireland News

Times Recommends

• A doctor, a daughter and a man called Johnny
• Mona Lisa's smile may belie ill health
• ‘Parasite economy’ lies behind Greek tragedy