Harvey is no longer a hurricane, but forecasters warn it’s still dangerous. The system was downgraded Saturday afternoon to a tropical storm as it…
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At least one fatality has been confirmed after Harvey tore into Texas’ Gulf Coast with fierce winds and unrelenting rain.
Aransas County Burt Mills Jr. reported one death in the hard-hit town of Rockport. There were also multiple injuries reported.
And while the storm is no longer a hurricane, forecasters warn it’s still dangerous.
The system was downgraded Saturday afternoon to a tropical storm as it weakened in intensity overnight and through the morning.
But while the winds abated, the rain has not, and forecasters expect up to 30 inches of rain and isolated totals as high as 40 inches, said Michael Brennan, acting chief of the center’s Hurricane Specialist Unit.
That could lead to potentially deadly flooding, even as far as the Hill Country in the coming days.
Houston has already gotten more than 5 inches of rain, and parts of South Texas, the Texas Hill Country and southwest and central Louisiana could see 5 to 15 inches of rain.
A storm surge warning is in effect from Port Aransas to High Island, the National Hurricane Center said, which means a dangerous amount of rising water is expected to move inland.
Harvey has been dumping nearly 3 inches of rain an hour at times and has left some streets in flood-prone Houston submerged in water.
Harris County Judge Ed Emmett, the chief administrator of the county that includes Houston, says flooding so far is a “minor issue.” He says most of the watersheds are well within their banks “but we’re not out of this.”
Some freeway service roads and streets and some scattered neighborhoods that normally experience high water in heavy rain have been flooded.
Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner cautions that though major flooding hasn’t happened yet, “that can change.”
Despite the continued risks, the dangers were dissipating in some areas. Evacuees have been told they are safe to return to their homes, though they will need to boil water to ensure its purity and limit their wastewater use.
But families who escaped Rockport before Hurricane Harvey slammed into the Texas coastal city are worried about neighbors and whether their homes are still standing.
Johanna Cochran says she’s panicking over whether her house or the McDonald’s where she works survived the storm, which dealt Rockport a direct blow. She and her boyfriend evacuated to a San Antonio shelter along with dozens of other coastal residents.
Another Rockport resident, Pamela Montes, says she’s also worried about her friends and her home. She says she knows many people who stayed behind because “no one felt like it was going to hit.”
Texas officials say they are evacuating about 4,500 inmates from three state prisons in Brazoria County south of Houston because the nearby Brazos River is rising from Hurricane Harvey’s heavy rain.
The Department of Criminal Justice says inmates from the Ramsey, Terrell, and Stringfellow Units in Rosharon are being taken by bus to other prisons in east Texas.
Additional food and water has been delivered to the prisons receiving the displaced inmates.
