#HURRICANE CARLA HOUSTON TEXAS DRIVERS#

“Now is not the time to second-guess the decisions that were made,” Abbott, a Republican, said at a news conference in Austin. The governor refused to point fingers on Sunday. Greg Abbott urged people to flee from Harvey’s path, but the Houston mayor issued no evacuation orders and told everyone to stay home. The deteriorating situation was bound to provoke questions about the conflicting advice given by the governor and Houston leaders before the hurricane. We expect that number to rise pretty dramatically.” “We have several hundred structural flooding reports. “I don’t need to tell anyone this is a very, very serious and unprecedented storm,” Turner told a news conference.

#HURRICANE CARLA HOUSTON TEXAS DRIVERS#

He urged drivers to stay off flooded roads to avoid adding to the number of those stranded. Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said authorities had received more than 2,000 calls for help, with more coming in. Others waded while carrying trash bags stuffed with their belongings and small animals in picnic coolers. Some people used inflatable beach toys, rubber rafts and even air mattresses to get through the water to safety.

“When they told us the current was getting high, we had to bust a window to get out,” Leho said. She tried to move some belongings upstairs, then grabbed her grandchildren. She said she awoke Sunday to find her downstairs flooded. The city’s main convention center was quickly opened as a shelter. “In my 40 years here, I’ve never seen the water this high.” “When I was younger, I used to wish I had a daughter, but I have the best son in the world,” she said. Marie Bartlett, 88, waited in her bedroom upstairs. Inside, the water reached halfway up the walls. It took them 45 minutes to reach the house. Tom Bartlett and Steven Craig pulled a rowboat on a rope through chest-deep water for a mile to rescue Bartlett’s mother from her home in west Houston. Rescuers had to give top priority to life-and-death situations, leaving many affected families to fend for themselves. That would be the highest amount ever recorded in Texas. Judging from federal disaster declarations, the storm has so far affected about a quarter of the Texas population, or 6.8 million people in 18 counties.Īs the water rose, the National Weather Service offered another ominous forecast: Before the storm that arrived Friday as a Category 4 hurricane is gone, some parts of Houston and its suburbs could get as much as 50 inches (1.3 meters) of rain. They urged people to get on top of their homes to avoid becoming trapped in attics and to wave sheets or towels to draw attention to their location. The flooding was so widespread that authorities had trouble pinpointing the worst areas. Volunteers joined emergency teams to pull people from their homes or from the water, which was high enough in places to gush into second floors. Some people managed with kayaks or canoes or swam. In a rescue effort that recalled the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, helicopters landed near flooded freeways, airboats buzzed across submerged neighborhoods and high-wheel vehicles plowed through water-logged intersections. The incessant rain covered much of Houston in turbid, gray-green water and turned streets into rivers navigable only by boat. HOUSTON (AP) - Tropical Storm Harvey sent devastating floods pouring into the nation’s fourth-largest city Sunday as rising water chased thousands of people to rooftops or higher ground and overwhelmed rescuers who could not keep up with the constant calls for help.

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