People in Houston and the surrounding area in Texas woke up to a third day of devastation today, that is, if they slept at all.
The voices you just heard are some of the thousands facing catastrophic flooding, heavy rains and power outages from the wrath of Hurricane Harvey — which has now been downgraded to a tropical storm.
The storm made landfall in Texas as a Category 4 hurricane on Friday night. Harvey stalled over the city of Houston, which is the fourth largest in the country, with one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas.
More than two feet of rain inundated Houston and continued to fall on Sunday and into early Monday.
Paige Hellmann is one of those affected. She lives in Meyerland, a suburb just outside the central loop of Southwest Houston. It’s a neighborhood that is no stranger to floods. Both the Memorial Day Flood in 2015 and the Tax Day Flood in 2016 hit the Hellmann’s home, yet their house escaped major damage.
Built in 1960, it had never flooded — until Harvey hit. She says, in the past, the water has risen fairly close to her property line but had always receded. This time it’s different.
Eventually, the Hellmanns reached a friend’s house which was not yet flooded and they rescued the stranded families with kayaks and blow-up boats. Before they left their house, they put family mementos like wedding and family pictures in plastic bags on shelves, but, she knows they're ruined.
