Hurricane Harvey

[sseelhoff]

Texas has spend decades shouting, "We don't need no stinking planning," and bragging about their cheap real estate prices. I figure the bill just came due. They plated a few hundred square miles with concrete and asphalt, then act all surprised when it rains. I would be interested to see how rural areas are doing, if there are any left.

Who said Texas didn't need planning? Be specific-who and when? Pretty easy to Monday morning quarterback from afar. Even easier when you allow yourself to remain woefully uninformed.

Nobody is surprised that it rained. This is not just a rain event. This is an 800 year rain event. The storm morphed from a tropical depression/tropical storm to a cat 4 in less than 24 hours.

As to the 800 year flooding, nobody builds to that spec and nobody can plan for that. The flooding is extreme, and it speaks volumes about the planning and execution on the ground. The fact that Houston citizens en masse have aided the first responders is a testament to the people who live here.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

Umm, no. Once again your knowledge is lacking. This went from a tropical depression to a cat 4 in under 24 hours. People died on the roads during a mass evac. This was a no win situation. Evac for no reason, which be largely ignored based on weather projection at the time, or try to evac once this thing bloomed and cause a disaster on the roads.

Pretty sad that anyone feels the need to go into attack mode to score political points during this event.

Sad.

You must not have been watching the weather reports. When Harvey was still a Category 2 offshore, NOAA was predicting that it would stall over the coast and dump massive quantities of rain at least a day and a half before it made landfall. They were predicting catastrophic flooding, in so many words.

There's nothing political about a population of idiots who can't be bothered to take care of themselves.

 

[txdon]

Umm, no. Once again your knowledge is lacking. This went from a tropical depression to a cat 4 in under 24 hours.
.

True, but the 20+ inches of rain for Houston was predicted since Wednesday.

For the younger generation it is hard to for them to act unless the government acts. They have been taught to rely on the government. So even though everyone knew there would be massive floods the lackadaisical attitude of the local government made them passive when they should have been taking action.

Luckily, these are Texans and they are rallying to get through this despite the shortcomings of the local government.

 

[sseelhoff]

And God Bless the Cajun Navy.

 

[sseelhoff]

Why do the admins keep removing my posts?

 

[sseelhoff]

True, but the 20+ inches of rain for Houston was predicted since Wednesday.

For the younger generation it is hard to for them to act unless the government acts. They have been taught to rely on the government. So even though everyone knew there would be massive floods the lackadaisical attitude of the local government made them passive when they should have been taking action.

Luckily, these are Texans and they are rallying to get through this despite the shortcomings of the local government.

20 inches over 3 days. We are double that in terms of rain volume and storm duration.

 

[dmccarty]

I haven't read all the posts and this may have been mentioned before. The news is covering the cities, but what about the farmers and ranchers? How long can a cow tread water?

When Floyd dump 15ish inches of rain, after a previous hurricane dropped 15ish inches of water, I went down east to help with the clean up.

The part of eastern NC I went too had low land and high land so people could move out of the flood waters if they left in time. Some did not leave or went driving when they should have stayed home and died. So far I am seeing very few death in Texas compared to Floyd and I hope the numbers stay that way.

One of the places I visited was in low land that was flooded. The waters had just gone down for the most part and I saw flood debris 15-20 feet up in trees. :shocked::shocked::shocked: Crops where still in the fields, Soybeans and I think cotton, but they were just black. It looked like a plaque had hit. I think all of the chemicals and sewage in the water just wiped everything out.

There was a diary with 100 head of cows. They all died. They were cleaning up the cows by dumping them into dump trucks to take them off to be burned. Kinda surreal seeing a dump truck go by with cow legs poking up from the bed. :shocked: The smell kinda hit you in the face a bit.

The worst scene was a single wide trailer that was burned down. The reason the trailer was torched was because a couple of dairy cows, looking for "high ground" had gone inside to escape the flood. Not a bad idea except the water kept rising. :shocked: The cows drowned inside the trailer.

So what do you do with thousands of pounds of dead bovine in a trailer that is condemned because of the flood waters, and now, two dead cows? No way you can get the dead cows out....

Answer. Pour diesel fuel, strike a match and let it burn.

The time I got there, the trailer was just ashes and burned out metal, bed/couch springs, bed frames, appliances, axles, frames, etc. Oh yeah, and two burned cows. Seeing still smoking ribs of a cow sticking up near bed/couch springs in a burned down trailer is, well, odd. :shocked::laughing::laughing::laughing:

Twas not looking for BBQ anytime soon...

Later,
Dan

 

[dmccarty]

Got in touch with a ex coworker who had moved Huston. His family and house was ok because they were a bit north of the worst flooding but they said that some areas of Huston had 50 inches of rain with another 15 on the way!!! :shocked::shocked::shocked:

Given that the Hurricane Floyd and the previous storm dropped 30ish inches of rain, which was a 500 year flood, what is happening in Huston is unreal. I am amazed that their have been so few deaths. Hope it stays that way.

Later,
Dan

 

[sseelhoff]

It is amazing watching the sheet of wind driven rain move across my fields. It has been raining in FEL buckets since early morning, and will not relent. The power of nature is awesome to watch.

 

[ruffdog]

I can't imagine how bad it can be in a very large city like Houston. All that rain with all those people.....good luck. I hope we can show the world our humane actions during very tough conditions. :thumbsup: