Houston fears worst floods are yet to come
Hurricane Harvey may have calmed but record amounts of rain are being dumped on city reclaimed from bayou
The flooding that tropical storm Harvey unleashed on Houston, Texas, is likely to worsen as federal engineers release water from overflowing reservoirs to keep it from breaking through dams and surging uncontrollably into homes. Thirtythousand people were expected to be left homeless by Harvey, the most powerful storm to strike Texas in more than 50 years. Eight people were last night said to have died.
THERE is not much that Houston’s residents can do now other than hope it gets no worse.
Elaine Moore and her husband Mo sat in the garage of their single-storey home in north-east Houston yesterday, with their two pit bulls, looking out on the street and the flooded underpass beyond. An abandoned car, almost entirely submerged, told its own story. Ms Moore said it wasn’t there last night. Its passenger door, wide open beneath the water line, suggests a hurried escape.
She said this was the worst she had ever seen in a city she knows well.
“I’ve lived in Houston all my life,” she said. “My daughter lives on the east side and she’s been flooded out and taken to a shelter. We’ve been OK here so far, but we don’t have a plan. We’re just hoping it doesn’t get any worse.” She said her neighbours, too, planned to stay put.
Further down the road, residential streets were completely cut off by floodwaters; some people had driven their cars on to the motorway and parked there, hoping that they – and maybe some of their possessions – would be safer at a higher elevation.
Towards downtown, a Fiesta supermarket was open and a line of people snaked round the corner, queuing to get in. The rainbow of umbrellas – one a Texas flag – offered a striking splash of colour in an otherwise desolate scene.
Cars were driving the wrong way up the hard shoulder of I-69, one of the many arteries into Houston, the first signs that down the road the sheriff ’s office had installed a roadblock.
After the slightest break in the weather overnight, the rain had started again and by mid-morning was coming down in torrents once more. The death toll rose to eight last night, including six people in and around Houston.
Houston Grand Prix go-kart track was almost entirely submerged, water up to the roof of its buildings. Cars on the forecourts of dealerships along the highway were window-deep in water.
The only way into Houston’s downtown district is to follow a snaking path of side streets.
Yesterday it was eerily quiet – debris and abandoned cars in its underpasses the only signs of the worst of the flooding a day ago. That would usually offer signs that the disaster was over – that the floodwaters had receded. But more rain is forecast. For Houston this could be just the beginning.
Officials chimed in with dire warnings of worse to come.
The National Weather Service forecasts that flooding will not peak until tomorrow or Thursday.
“While the hurricane force winds have diminished, I want to stress that we are not out of the woods yet,” Elaine Duke, acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, said at a news conference. “Harvey is still a dangerous and historic storm.”
Hurricane Harvey barrelled on to shore on Friday night with winds of more than 130mph.
Since then it has slowed to a tropical storm, dumping record amounts of rain along the Gulf shore of Texas.
Some places have already been hit by 30in of rain, with another 20in possible. The result is that America’s fourth largest city is criss-crossed by grey-green rivers where its streets used to stand. In a rescue effort that resembles the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, helicopters buzz across the city plucking stranded motorists to safety while airboats patrol submerged neighbourhoods.
Police said they had rescued more than 2,000 people from cars and homes by Monday afternoon. And the city is gearing up to accommodate 30,000 refugees in shelters. More than 2,600 had already arrived at the George Brown Convention Centre.
Sylvester Turner, the city’s mayor, said he expected that number to increase “exponentially” even as the Red Cross said it had run out of beds. Yesterday, the state’s governor announced he had activated the entire Texas National Guard as part of the lifesaving effort, bringing the total of deployed troops to 12,000.
Donald Trump, who has kept up a steady Twitter commentary as the disaster has unfolded, returned to the White House from Camp David. He is expected to visit Texas today. Yesterday, Mr Trump praised Texans for their rescue work and said he would be talking to Congress to find funds for recovery efforts.
“As you know it’s going to be a very expensive situation,” he told reporters at the White House. Mr Trump said protecting lives was his top priority and added Americans’ core characteristics of “strength, charity and resilience” were showing through in the disaster response. The scale of the disaster has brought fresh scrutiny of Houston’s development into wetlands and the conflicting advice given to Texas residents as the hurricane moved towards shore at the end of last week. While the state’s governor urged people to flee their homes before Harvey hit, the mayor of Houston said people should shelter at home. Now, many of those people are trapped.
On Sunday, Gregg Abbott, the Republican governor, refused to blame his Democratic mayor.
“Now is not the time to secondguess the decisions that were made,” he said at a news conference.
Mr Turner said ordering 2.3 million residents to evacuate would have created chaos on the highways.
Houston has long been prone to flooding. The city is on the banks of the Buffalo Bayou and has a flat terrain which barely rises above sea level. The problem has also been exacerbated by the city’s development. Estimates suggest its population of 2.3million is growing at about 100,000 people per year and that, in the past 15 years, 25 per cent more land has been concreted over, with wetland capable of draining the water being replaced by suburbia.
‘We are not out of the woods yet. Harvey is still a dangerous and historic storm’