Search on for trapped victims
Emergency workers scouring for survivors in Harvey-hit Texas
ORANGE: One week after monster storm Harvey slammed into the Gulf Coast, rescue workers were scouring storm-ravaged southeast Texas for victims trapped in their flooded homes, even as some towns finally found slight relief as waters receded.
Emergency workers were staging dramatic rescues by air and water in Texas towns that were until now cut off by raging floodwaters unleashed by Harvey, which finally began moving inland after crashing into the region as a Category Four hurricane last Friday.
Thousands of rescuers and civilians eager to help battled difficult conditions to reach victims of the unprecedented flooding.
“We felt we’d be all right. We were wrong,” said Lonnie Givens, who refused to evacuate their one-storey home in the town of Orange. Now, he and wife Missy have about 10cm of water in the house and no power.
“We really got nowhere to go,” Givens said.
His situation echoed those of many in Texas towns inundated by days of torrential rains, with highways still submerged and homes destroyed. A hospital in the hard-hit town of Beaumont was forced to evacuate its patients – nearly 200 people – when the town’s water supply went down.
Harvey has been blamed thus far for at least 38 deaths and tens of billions of dollars of damage. A lack of power also triggered twin blasts at a Texas chemical plant, but authorities said the danger was limited.
Meanwhile, Hurricane Irma had intensified into a Category Three system, churning in open waters but heading straight toward the southern Caribbean, where it was forecast to reach early next week.
It was still too early to tell if the storm would impact Florida or the Gulf of Mexico, but anxiety was running high in the aftermath of Harvey’s pummeling.
Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert estimated 100,000 homes had been affected by flooding – some with 2.4m of water or more – and said the White House would ask Congress for emergency funds.
There was a bit of good news: in Houston, America’s fourth-largest city, some of the 2.3 million residents got relief as the raging waters receded.
Speaking from the coastal city of Corpus Christi, US Vice-President Mike Pence hailed rescuers and volunteers for their “compassion and concern”.
“Every American should know that even in this difficult time and this disastrous storm, the very best are the people of Texas, and the very best are the people of America shining forth,” he said.
President Donald Trump, who visited Texas earlier this week and vowed to donate US$1mil (RM4.3mil) for relief efforts on Thursday, will return to the state today and may also visit Louisiana, which has also seen serious flooding.
“He’ll pledge, proudly, US$1mil of his own personal money to help the people of Texas and Louisiana,” spokesman Sarah Sanders told reporters.
In Beaumont, northwest of the coastal city of Port Arthur, the water system was down.
Brock Long, the head of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), said his agency was working with the state and the military to open water distribution points for those affected. More than 30,000 people have found refuge in shelters across Texas, from the giant Houston convention centre to small churches, according to Fema. — AFP