Beta stalls along Texas coast, bringing floods

HOUSTON – Beta weakened to a tropical depression Tuesday as it parked itself over the Texas coast, raising concerns of extensive flooding in Houston and areas farther inland.

Beta made landfall late Monday as a tropical storm just north of Port O’Connor, Texas, and has the distinction of being the first storm named for a Greek letter to make landfall in the continental United States. Forecasters ran out of traditional storm names last week, forcing the use of the Greek alphabet for only the second time since the 1950s.

By mid-morning Tuesday, Beta was 15 miles east-northeast of Victoria, Texas, with maximum sustained winds of 35 mph, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. The storm was moving toward the northeast at 2 mph and is expected to stall inland over Texas through Wednesday.

The National Weather Service said areas south and east of Houston had already seen 10 inches or more of rain by midday Tuesday because of Beta.

Street flooding was reported in parts of Houston, but there were no reports of buildings being flooded, Mayor Sylvester Turner said late Tuesday morning. Turner urged residents to stay home and, if they couldn’t, avoid driving around the 70-some barricades that have been placed throughout the city.

The slow-moving storm was expected to bring multiple rounds of rain to Houston.

“It’s going to be moving very slowly heading east, and until it clears and gets on the east side of Houston, we’re going to have to deal with these rain bands,” Turner said.

Beta was the ninth named storm that made landfall in the continental U.S. this year. That tied a record set in 1916, according to Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach.

Beta was expected to eventually move over Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi later in the week, bringing the risk of flash flooding.

Forecasters warned of heavy rainfall Tuesday on the middle and upper Texas coast, which will cause significant flash flooding. Six to12 inches of rain were expected, with some isolated areas of up to 20 inches, forecasters said.

However, forecasters and officials reassured residents Beta was not expected to be another Hurricane Harvey or Tropical Storm Imelda. Harvey in 2017 dumped more than 50 inches of rain on Houston, causing $125 billion in damage in Texas. Imelda, which hit Southeast Texas last year, was one of the wettest cyclones on record.

On Monday, Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for 29 Texas counties ahead of Beta’s arrival.

Beta is forecast to dump heavy rain on the southwestern corner of Louisiana three weeks after the same area got pounded by Hurricane Laura. The rainfall and storm surge prompted Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards to declare a state of emergency.

In Lake Charles, Mayor Nic Hunter worried that Beta’s rainfall could set back efforts in his Louisiana community to recover after Laura, which damaged about 95% of the city’s 30,000 structures.