Rescue efforts stepped up as Harvey moves inland
ORANGE CITY, Texas: Emergency workers in storm-hit southeast Texas on Thursday staged dramatic rescues by air and water in towns that were until now cut off by raging to move inland.
Nearly a week after the storm smashed into the US Gulf Coast as a Category Four hurricane, thousands of rescuers and civil conditions to reach victims of the
“We felt we’d be alright. We were wrong,” said Lonnie Givens, who refused to evacuate their one-story home in the town of Orange. Now, he and wife Missy have about four inches (10 centimeters) of water in the house and no power.
“We really got nowhere to go,” Givens said.
The story told by Givens held for many others 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.
So far, Harvey has been blamed for at least 38 deaths and tens of billions of dollars of damage.
“We are still in response mode and that means life saving,” Homeland Security adviser Tom Bossert told a White House briefing. “There are still people up to their waists in water.”
Bossert estimated that 100,000 - ing—some with eight feet (2.4 meters) of water or more—and said the White House would be asking Congress for emergency funds.
On Thursday, the lack of power to refrigeration units at a chemical plant in Crosby sparked twin black smoke, but authorities said the danger was limited.
There was a bit of good news— in Houston, America’s fourthlargest 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 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 $1 million for relief efforts Thursday, will return to the state on Saturday—and may also visit Louisiana, which has also
“He’ll pledge, proudly, $1 million of his own personal money to help the people of Texas and Louisiana,” spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters.
Rural Texas drenched
In Beaumont, to the 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.
Indeed, military trucks fanned out, loaded up with bottled water, military backpacks and personnel ready to help.
The breakdown of the water system forced the evacuation of nearly 200 patients from a Beaumont hospital, some by military helicopters.
“It is very, very organized,” hospital spokeswoman Mary Poole said. “We’ve practiced this many times before.”
“We’re trying to keep them as close as possible,” she said of the evacuated patients. “Part of the healing process is to be with your family.”
Early in the day, a pair of explo plant in Crosby, a town of around 3,000 people some 25 miles (40 kilometers) northeast of Houston, sending a plume of smoke into the air.
Officials ordered residents living within 1.5 miles of the facility to evacuate amid concerns about the fumes emanating from the facility, which produces organic peroxides— compounds that can combust if not cooled to the right temperature.
The Environmental Protection Agency said it was reviewing data from an aircraft that surveyed the scene and had no indication that dangerous amounts of toxic materials have been released.
“We believe along with the local authorities that we’ve moved everyone out of harm’s way, and that no one is in danger,” Richard Rennard, a senior executive for French plant owner Arkema, told a news conference.
Fifteen sheriff’s deputies who responded to the fire were briefly hospitalized.