After making landfall at 3:10 a.m. this morning near Galveston as a Category 2 storm, Hurricane Ike's eye was just northeast of Conroe, Texas as of 8 a.m. CDT, according to the National Hurricane Center. With winds of 90 miles per hour (145 km/hr), it is now a Category 1 storm.

Overnight, Ike flooded Galveston's historic district and left all of Galveston County without power, the Galveston County Office of Emergency Management reported on its Web site. Four million people in Houston also lost power.

Officials have blamed Ike for three deaths. All 22 people aboard a Cypriot freighter that was caught in the storm off the coast of Texas were safe, however, according to the Coast Guard, which had earlier abandoned efforts to rescue the crew because of Ike.

It's going to be a long night for the people of coastal Texas.

As Hurricane Ike whips up the waters of the Gulf of Mexico on its way toward land, hurricane-force wind gusts have already been reported on Galveston Island, according to the National Hurricane Center. The storm, which as of 10 p.m. Central Daylight Time was about 55 miles southeast of Galveston, is expected to make landfall near the city sometime around between 2 and 3 a.m. CDT.

The storm's sustained winds of 110 miles per hour make it a Category 2 hurricane, but another mile per hour would put it into Category 3.

The storm could cause flood surges of up to 25 feet. Earlier today, meteorologists warned residents of Galveston -- much of which is surrounded by a 17-foot-seawall -- told that any who remained in one- or two-story homes would face certain death. The Coast Guard abandoned efforts to rescue 22 crew members on the Cypriot freighter Antalina, about 90 miles off the coast of Galveston.

All good cryptid stories come to an end and so it goes with the chupacabra video. Although it is difficult to make a definitive identification from the tape, biologist Scott Henke of Texas A&M University-Kingsville says: "It's a dog for sure."

Since coyotes run a little more gracefully, it's likely to be a bull mastiff or pit bull, or perhaps just a mutt. "Dogs just roaming and being stray is quite a problem in southern Texas," Henke says. "The probability of it being a mixed breed dog is higher than anything else."

He notes that the original chupacabra findings—headless goats with drained blood—turned out to be the work of a Mexican cult. And the chupacabra's other hallmark—not eating the livestock it kills—is also a feral dog favorite. "Feral dogs are much more of a problem than coyotes for losing livestock like goats," he says. "Especially if the animal is killed and the throat's bit. A coyote will eat the meat too, if they're going to go to the effort to kill it. If they're just torn up, it's most likely a feral dog."

Traveling all the way from its point of origin in Puerto Rico, the chupacabra (literally "goat sucker") has now popped up in the Texas town of Cuero. Or it allegedly has. Even better, sheriff's deputy (in training no less) Brandon Reidel caught the supposed chupacabra on tape.

The animal appears to have a long snout and forelegs slightly shorter than the hind legs, the textbook, or rather folkloric, description of the animal that likes to attack livestock, particularly goats, and drink their blood. Short-haired (rather than hairless like the classic chupacabra) the dread beast looks like a small dog, or perhaps a coyote crossed with a small dog such as a pit bull.

Or it could just be a coyote. After all, that's what the last chupacabra sighting in Texas turned out to be: coyotes suffering from a bad case of mange. Either way, the truth is out there.