Tropical Storm Harvey

I've been watching the horrific events in Houston and surrounding areas.  The flooding is overwhelming.  My cousin's daughter and family live in Spring, Texas.  I follow her on Facebook and she posted on Sunday church was cancelled and there would be no school on Monday or Tuesday. Today I spoke with her mom.  They are not flooded but there is flooding all around where they live.  School is cancelled for the remainder of the week.   Her husband is a journalist for the Wall Street Journal and headed out yesterday.  He was unable to get home as the roads were flooded.  He fortunately found a hotel to spend the night and made it home this morning.

Here is his report:

More rain was forecast in the coming days; the city could receive a total of as much as 50 inches of rain—about equal to its annual average total. The disaster swamped businesses, including patches of the energy industry, and will disrupt travel this week.

The White House said President Donald Trump plans to travel to Texas on Tuesday to survey the damage.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner on Sunday said only one death in the city was confirmed so far as storm-related. He said a woman drove into high water in southwest Houston and drowned while trying to escape.

Even in a city accustomed to flooding and bracing for the impact of the storm, the rapidly rising waters caught many off-guard, raising questions about whether the city should have been evacuated.

“No one thought it would be this bad,” said Aeisha Brimzy, a stay-at-home mom plucked from the rising waters around her apartment building by constables, who also rescued her six daughters, mother and sister. The family went to the George R. Brown Convention Center downtown, which the city had turned into a giant evacuation center.

Rescued families sat on folding chairs or laid on the floor, many still clutching white towels they had been given with which to dry off as they received assistance from the Red Cross.

Mr. Turner said the city was also opening libraries, community centers and other locations as “lily pads” to provide safe harbor from the waters in neighborhoods.

“This is a storm that is testing the city of Houston,” he said.

Most rescues were from vehicles that got stranded after driving into floodwaters, with responders assisting on foot, in large vehicles, by boat and via helicopters.

By Sunday morning, officials warned that 911 services were at capacity and urged people to take whatever steps they could to find safety. When their calls couldn't get through, families issued pleas over social media for help.

Wireless networks along the Texas coast suffered outages, federal regulators said, leaving customers in some counties with limited or no cellphone service.

State officials said Sunday evening that a widespread power outage caused a sewage overflow into a Corpus Christi creek.
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This was posted on Facebook tonight:

This is where her children play soccer!  Notice the top of the goals and concession stand.  Apparently it's on it's way down!