Tag: texas floods
As Rain Stops In Oklahoma And Texas, Downriver States Brace For Flooding

As Rain Stops In Oklahoma And Texas, Downriver States Brace For Flooding

By Matt Pearce, Los Angeles Times (TNS)

It finally stopped raining this week in Oklahoma and Texas, where a nearly nonstop series of storms resulted in deadly flooding and made for the wettest month in both states’ recorded history.

So what is happening to all that water?

Some of it, naturally, will evaporate. Some has replenished reservoirs in both states after a punishing five-year drought.

But like the end of a football game when everyone heads for the exits, the waters are inundating rivers across four states, bringing new flood worries for weeks ahead as the torrents barrel toward the Gulf of Mexico.

Water from Oklahoma will first head through rivers in Arkansas and Louisiana before reaching the gulf. The water in eastern and southern Texas will generally take more direct paths to the coast.

“It’s a giant web,” Brannen Parrish, spokesman for the Tulsa, Oklahoma, district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, said of the river system running through the lower Plains. “Ultimately that water ends up in the Gulf of Mexico.”

The rains in Texas and Oklahoma brought both sorrow and blessing — floods that claimed hundreds of homes and killed at least 36 people, but also ended a devastating drought.

A year ago, Texas’ reservoirs were only at 67 percent capacity, according to state water data. But in the last three months, capacity has jumped to 83 percent after reservoirs trapped enough rain to cover nearly 23,000 square miles of land — almost one-tenth of Texas — with about a foot of water. Some reservoirs in western Texas, not as hard hit by the storms, were still running low this week.

But in Oklahoma, almost every one of the state’s dozens of reservoirs has exceeded 100 percent normal capacity.

“The fact that we were in a drought helped mitigate some of the flooding issues we would have seen had they not had that extra space available,” said James Paul, a hydrologist for the National Weather Service’s Arkansas-Red Basin River Forecast Center.

However, Paul added, “once they get to the point of being as full as they can get, they have to start releasing that water.”
Many rivers in the region have grown dramatically more powerful because of the surging runoff.

About this time of year, the Red River typically passes between 8,000 and 15,000 cubic feet of water per second where it forms part of the border between Texas and Oklahoma, Paul said.

After last month’s deluge, the Red River has grown more than 10 times in volume and was pumping nearly 235,000 cubic feet of water per second downriver toward Arkansas and Louisiana as of Monday, he said.

“All that water in Oklahoma and northeast Texas that drains into the Red River is making its way to us,” said Aaron Stevens, the observing program leader at the National Weather Service’s office in Shreveport, La., noting that the region has already been deluged. “All the crops that have been planted in the lowlands have flooded, and we’ve lost those crops, and we have a lot of cattle that feed in those lowland areas.”

The Red River is expected to rise about 2 feet by Saturday as it passes through Shreveport in northwest Louisiana. Inmates in Caddo Parish, which includes Shreveport, have helped prepare sandbags for the river’s inevitable attack on the low-lying areas.

“We are not expecting any flooding inside residences, but there will be street flooding, if they aren’t experiencing that already,” Sheriff Steve Prator said in a statement Tuesday, warning the parish’s residents to be prepared. “We know our citizens are keeping a close eye on how the flood may affect their neighborhoods, and we want to make sure they are prepared for all possibilities.”

The Red River eventually dumps into the Atchafalaya River in east-central Louisiana, which then empties into the Gulf of Mexico.

The Arkansas River — which runs through Oklahoma and Arkansas until it flows into the Mississippi River — has also picked up strength, expanding from an average of about 50,000 cubic feet of water per second to roughly 300,000 to 350,000 cubic feet per second, according to Paul.

More than 40 homes have already been flooded downriver in Jefferson County in central Arkansas, where part of the courthouse and county facilities were swept away by the Arkansas River during a 1908 flood.

Some residents are taking boats to and from their homes and have put furniture, clothes and pictures on their roofs to prevent them from getting wet, Maj. Lafayette Woods of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said Tuesday.

Rains and river surges from Oklahoma have “not been good for us,” Woods said in an earlier interview, adding that the water had lapped over some sandbags protecting low-lying homes.

In Texas, the Nueces River will remain at major flood stage northwest of Corpus Christi through at least the rest of this week. The Trinity River, which is expected to flood for weeks, neared a record high southeast of Dallas on Tuesday before beginning to decline.

Both rivers, which flow through Texas before dumping into the gulf, are projected to threaten some homes and river farmland but have a generally beneficial effect on the environment.

“For river systems, these sort of flood events are a natural part of the landscape that resets the systems in many respects,” said Thomas Hardy, who studies rivers and river ecosystems at the Meadows Center for Water and the Environment at Texas State University.

The new freshwater flows after years of drought will also be welcome for wildlife at bay and estuary systems along the coast, Hardy said.

Meanwhile, recovery continues in Hays County, Texas, where at least eight bodies have been found and three people remain missing after the Blanco River overflowed. On Tuesday, county officials said the last unidentified body discovered in the county belonged to Kenneth Reissig, 81, whose remains had been found May 28.

Officials say downriver flooding would be even worse if it weren’t for flood-control infrastructure built several decades ago as part of a long-running struggle between the government and the nation’s unruly rivers.

“It’d be a catastrophe” if an extensive system of levees and reservoirs weren’t keeping the waters in check, said Greg Raimondo, a spokesman for the Vicksburg, Mississippi, office of the Army Corps of Engineers. “There’s a lot of flat ground out there, you know?”

(c)2015 Los Angeles Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: Flood waters being released from Lake Bridgeport in Bridgeport, Texas, on Monday, June 1, 2015. Tarrant Regional Water District officials now say the West Fork of the Trinity has grown to three quarters of a mile wide around Boyd. The flows haven’t peaked yet and may not for several days. (Max Faulkner/Fort Worth Star-Telegram/TNS)

Texas Reels, Braces For More Flooding

Texas Reels, Braces For More Flooding

By Molly Hennessy-Fiske, Los Angeles Times (TNS)

HOUSTON — Across the state, Texans took stock of the damage wrought by a week of punishing storms while they braced for more flooding.
The floodwaters touched city and country. About 40 miles northeast of Houston, ranchers used an airboat to corral and feed a herd of about 500 cattle stranded when flooding Saturday along the Trinity River turned their pasture into an island outside the city of Liberty.

“That’s about $1 million in cows,” said Tom Branch, Liberty County emergency management director. “They’ve been trying to get them out of there for days.”

In Houston, fans fled a baseball game between the Astros and the Chicago White Sox when water started pouring through the dome-shaped roof of Minute Maid Park.

“The entire roof, especially our section, it was like a waterfall,” said Sam Alford, 26.

In Houston’s Meyerland neighborhood, residents were salvaging what they could from homes inundated with water from nearby Brays Bayou. Jennifer and Warren Liao were working their way through their ruined brick ranch house at 9 p.m. after watching a tow truck haul away their flooded cars.

They had been in New York, attending their youngest daughter’s graduation from Columbia University, on Monday when their home flooded. A foot of water poured in, destroying seven of their three children’s string instruments and three pianos, including a Steinway with ivory keys.

They managed to save their son’s cello, but had to throw out almost everything else _ a washer, dryer, George Foreman grill and another daughter’s diploma.

They have flood insurance, mandated by their mortgage, but it doesn’t cover everything. “Today the adjuster came. We maxed out already,” Jennifer Liao said.

The storms that started during the Memorial Day weekend have 33 killed people, with 6 victims in Oklahoma and 27 in Texas.

Hays County officials in central Texas reported that two women’s bodies had been found there Saturday after flooding on the Blanco River.

Officials have found several bodies from a nine-member group whose vacation house was swept away overnight Saturday, including retired Corpus Christi dentist Ralph Carey, 73; daughter Michelle Charba, 43; and family friend Andrew McComb, 6, whose father was the lone survivor.

With the forecast calling for more rain, Texans prepared for more floods.

“They say in the month of May, the rainfall has been enough to cover the entire state 8 inches,” Warren Liao said as he and his wife stood on the porch watching the latest downpour.

One thing was certain, Jennifer Liao said as they left to stay at a friend’s house. “It’s not over yet.”

(Staff writer Katie Shepherd in Los Angeles contributed to this report.)

(c)2015 Los Angeles Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: Cody Ogle, with TxDot, a one side of the roadblock on FM 730 in Boyd, Texas, with the West Fork of the Trinity River flowing over the road behind him on Saturday, May 30, 2015. (Paul Moseley/Fort Worth Star-Telegram/TNS)

More Flooding Could Hit Beleaguered Texas Communities This Weekend

More Flooding Could Hit Beleaguered Texas Communities This Weekend

By Asher Price and Sean Collins Walsh, Austin American-Statesman (TNS)

AUSTIN, Texas — Even as Central Texas waterways recede from their Memorial Day weekend flooding and insurers began processing claims, emergency officials and meteorologists warned that the area could see more flooding this weekend.

Texans downstream of flooded areas should be careful because swollen rivers are rolling their way, the chief of emergency management for the state said Thursday.

With waterways overflowing their banks and more rain in the forecast, “all of these rivers are going to heavily impact downstream communities,” said Nim Kidd, the Texas Department of Public Safety emergency management chief. “I don’t think the worst is over because of the way the weather is running and because we’re so saturated throughout Texas.”

The forecasts come as rescue crews continue to search for eight people missing in Hays County and five others who are still unaccounted for in Blanco County. As of Thursday evening, the death toll from Saturday night’s flooding along the Blanco River stood at seven, including an unidentified man whose body was found Thursday morning in a creek near RM 32 in southeastern Blanco County, and another man’s body was found in flood debris near Fox Road in San Marcos. Two other flooding victims — one each in Williamson and Travis counties — died as a result of Monday’s storm.

Travis County Judge Sarah Eckhardt on Thursday issued a disaster declaration for that Monday storm, allowing local municipalities to apply for state and federal aid.

Meanwhile, attention is turning to the next band of rain that is expected to punish an area that was desperate for water months ago.

In the Colorado River basin, the National Weather Service estimates that the river could crest in Wharton County, about 125 miles southeast of Austin, at 45.5 feet on Saturday. It’s typically below 20 feet.

Similar downriver crests are forecast for the Guadalupe River, whose waters are fed by the Blanco River.

“Because of how the rivers run, even if it’s not raining in your part of the state, you could get flooding in your area under blue, clear skies,” Kidd warned.

He said his main message is to be mindful of warnings and to not drive around high-water barricades.

Kidd said the ground was so saturated that it could take 10 to 14 days “to dewater the state when the rains stop,” meaning back to the point that waterways aren’t overrunning their banks.

It’s not going to start dewatering any time soon: Forecasters said Central and South Texas face a flash flood watch through Friday morning.

National Weather Service meteorologist Paul Yura declared all of South Central Texas an “area of concern” over the next few days, with an “emphasis on areas in the Hill Country and (Interstate 35) corridor, including areas that have been hit so hard in the past week and where there is ongoing search and rescue.”

“Some areas could see an additional 1 to 2 inches with isolated 3-inch rain totals,” he wrote in a bulletin. “We will likely NOT see the type of totals that caused the Saturday Night flood … but with the soil so saturated … it won’t take as much rain to see significant rises in creeks/rivers as well as urban/rural flash flooding.”

Forecasts call for at least a 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms Friday and Saturday, as fronts move in from West Texas, with the odds tapering to 40 percent Sunday and 20 percent Monday.

The prospect of further weather-related problems comes as families and friends grieve over the lives lost in the storms that raked the state.

In Wimberley, friends and relatives of the Corpus Christi families whose vacation house was swept away in Saturday’s flood told reporters Thursday they remain hopeful that their loved ones will be found.

“We also feel a tremendous sense of responsibility and resolve. This effort is not over. We are 100 percent committed to finding Laura, Andrew, Leighton, Randy, Will, Ralph and Sue,” said family friend Kellye Burke, referring to the seven members of the group who haven’t been found.

Every day at 8 a.m., the family and volunteers from Corpus Christi and Hays County have been meeting at the First Baptist Church in Wimberley and organizing search parties, said Burke, who addressed reporters Thursday while six other relatives of the missing stood behind her.

On Wednesday, the body of one of the vacationers, Michelle Carey-Charba, was identified, and the body of a male child that might be one of two boys in the group was found. Jonathan McComb, whose wife and two kids are still missing, was rescued after the flood and is being treated for injuries.

“Physically he is expected to make a full recovery, though emotionally he has a long road ahead and will need the love and support of all of us,” Burke said.

(Staff writer Eric Dexheimer contributed to this story.)

(c)2015 Austin American-Statesman, Texas. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: Linda Balas pauses at the remains of a vacation home on Thursday, May 28, 2015, in Wimberley, Texas, where eight of her friends from Corpus Christi were swept away in the flood.(Jay Janner/Austin American-Statesman/TNS)

Texans Don’t Like Federal Aid. Until They Need It.

Texans Don’t Like Federal Aid. Until They Need It.

Texans don’t trust the federal government, and Texas politicians don’t like federal disaster relief. Until they do.

As floodwaters ravaged Central Texas, President Obama reached out to the state Tuesday afternoon to pledge the full cooperation and support of the federal government, exactly the kind of aid Texas has desperately needed and vocally rejected for so long.

Kriston Capps at Citylab has a comprehensive account of the Lone Star State’s tangled and troubled relationship with FEMA. As Capps notes, “Texas suffers more natural disasters than any state in the nation” and it “absorbs more federal disaster assistance funds than any other state.”

The state’s antipathy toward any kind of federal involvement reached comical heights in recent weeks, when residents of Bastrop County, Texas became convinced that a training exercise taking place near them was part of a federal plot to invade the state. Texas governor Greg Abbott caved in to the insanity when he ordered the Texas State Guard to monitor the wargames, and Ted Cruz (R-TX), senator from Texas and GOP presidential candidate, supported the move.

Unfortunately, this mentality has destructive consequences. As Capps writes:

FEMA plays a prominent role in this fever dream: Conspiracists fear that the agency means to erect prison camps. In fact, FEMA stands to play a prominent role in places like Bastrop, where county emergency officials performed multiple water rescues after the Bastrop State Park dam failed.

The tragedy unfolding in Texas highlights why it was so dangerous for Governor Abbott to flirt with extreme paranoia in the first place. By endorsing extremist skepticism of the federal government, even tacitly, the governor exacerbates unfounded fears of FEMA and other federal assistance providers. And at a time when the state cannot provide for adequate flood-control infrastructure—and cannot pass legislation to let cities lead the emergency housing response—the state of Texas cannot afford to promulgate widespread fears about FEMA.

Looking forward, it doesn’t seem like Texas’s knotty relationship with FEMA will get any better.

Under new FEMA rules, states seeking federal money for disaster preparedness will be required to summarize the future hazards facing them, and that includes acknowledging the “changes in weather patterns and climate” that pose a threat. For governors who, like Abbott, deny the science on climate change, this makes it difficult to adequately protect against natural disasters.

Other governors in a similar fix include Florida’s Rick Scott, who has banned all mention of climate change, and Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal, who called FEMA’s new policy an act of “coercion” that was forcing states to “submit to [Washington’s] liberal ideology.”

ViaCitylab

Photo: Volunteers Steven Moon, from left, Joseph Buswell and Garett Roy help remove a flattened house on the banks of the Blanco River after the flood in Wimberley, Texas, on Tuesday May 26, 2015. (Jay Janner/Austin American-Statesman/TNS)