Harvey Has Morphed into a Multi-Pronged Environmental Disaster ~Emily Atkin, New Republic

Huge and mildly terrifying list of issues so far reported at petrochemical facilities after #Harvey, via @SierraClub

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Calculating Harvey’s Aftermath ~Leah Binkovitz, Urban Edge
~The disaster is shaping up to be one of the costliest yet, after hitting the fourth largest city with the second busiest port in the country. It also hit the Coastal Bend area particularly hard, including Port Aransas, caused flooding in Beaumont and Port Arthur and made landfall again in Louisiana. Read more.

Louisiana shelters hundreds of Harvey evacuees from Texas, prepares for more ~Eliazbeth Crisp, The Advocate *

Harvey makes landfall again, Texas death toll mounts from record floods ~Reuters

Why Ordinary Citizens Are Acting as First Responders in Houston ~The Atlantic

Photo: Jon Bridgers, Houston Chronicle

~The ethos behind these efforts is straightforward and admirable: Some people are in trouble, and other people have the tools to help them. Why wouldn’t they? Clyde Cain, who runs a Cajun Navy Facebook page told USA Today last year, “The reality of the Cajun Navy is everybody out here with a boat that isn’t devastated gets out and helps others.” Read more

~Cajun Navy volunteers attacked in Houston while helping Harvey victims ~Houston Chronicle

How to salvage flood-damaged artwork, books and photographs

'Unseen Dangers' of Harvey: Petrochemical Plants Release 1 Million Pounds of Harmful Air Pollution ~Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch
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Harvey Moves Back Over Water; Historic Rainfall Will Continue ~Dr. Jeff Masters, Weather Underground
~When we first saw the model predictions last week of widespread rain amounts for Houston of 15 – 25 inches, with some amounts as high as 40 inches, we issued the required “Catastrophic rains coming” forecast, but our view of the forecast was tinged with a sense of unreality. Could the models be wrong? What would that kind of rainfall would do to Houston? Surely the heavy rains wouldn’t center directly over the nation’s fourth-largest city, would they? But they did. Here we are, in the midst of a mega-disaster on the scale only surpassed by Hurricane Sandy and Hurricane Katrina in recent decades, from a hurricane hazard we’ve never seen on such a large and destructive scale—torrential rain. The damages from Harvey will undoubtedly run into the tens of billions of dollars, making Harvey’s rains the most destructive ever experienced from a hurricane. Read more.

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Harvey's 2-day rain in Houston is 3 times floodwater pumped from New Orleans after Katrina ~Nola.com
~For the 48 hours ending at 11 a.m. Monday (Aug. 28), Harris County, Texas, which includes Houston, measured an average 23.7 inches of rain, which represents 732 billion gallons of water, said Jeff Lindner, a Harris County Flood Control District official. While sort of an apples to oranges comparison, that's almost three times as much floodwater as was pumped out of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 by the Army Corps of Engineers.

Of course, that's only the rain total in Houston for the past two days. According to the National Weather Service, the city saw 35.48 inches of rain for the four-day Harvey drenching, as of 11 a.m. Monday. Read more.

Pump at Station No. 6, which drains Lakeview, down again
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Early Monday morning Harvey Forecast Update ~Space City Weather

Radar as of 6 AM shows the heaviest rains oriented from about Beaumont and Lake Charles northwest to Livingston and Madisonville. (GR Level 3).

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Flood Calamity Continues In Houston and Beyond; Harvey Edges Toward Coast ~Bob Henson, Weather Underground

~The nation’s worst flood disaster since Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy continued to unfold late Sunday across Houston and nearby parts of southeast Texas, as Tropical Storm Harvey punished the area with record-shredding rainfall. As of 6:00 pm CDT Sunday, Harvey was centered about 10 miles northeast of Victoria, TX, moving southeast toward the coast at a mere 3 mph with top sustained winds of 40 mph. Despite its minimal tropical-storm-strength winds, Harvey is a superpowered rain producer. Parts of the Houston area have racked up 20” or more in torrential rainbands since Saturday; another 10” – 20” or more is expected, with flooding expanding into parts of southwest Louisiana. The National Weather Service has kept the Houston area in a Flash Flood Emergency since Saturday night—a truly unparalleled stretch—and a Civil Emergency has been declared. And as if we needed any more trouble, a Tropical Storm Watch has been issued for the North Carolina coast as newly designated Potential Tropical Cyclone 10 threatens to strike as Tropical Storm Irma on Tuesday. Read  more

Hurricane Harvey: How to help victims of the Texas storm ~Chron.com

Oil markets roiled as Harvey hits U.S. petroleum industry ~Ahmad Ghaddar, Reuters
~Texas is home to 5.6 million barrels per day (bpd) of refining capacity, and Louisiana has 3.3 million bpd. Over 2 million bpd of refining capacity was estimated to be offline as a result of the storm. Read more.
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Tropical Storm Harvey: Live updates as 'catastrophic' flooding swamps Houston ~Nola.com

NWS @NWS This event is unprecedented & all impacts are unknown & beyond anything experienced. Follow orders from officials to ensure safety. #Harvey

 Chief Art Acevedo‏ @ArtAcevedo have reports of people getting into attic to escape floodwater do not do so unless you have an ax or means to break through onto your roof #Harvey
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Catastrophic, Historic Flooding Happening Now in Houston, Death Toll Rising in Harvey ~Weather Channel
~Thousands of homes are taking on water and hundreds of people are trapped and stranded in rising floodwaters across the Houston metro after Harvey dumped more than two feet of rain. More than 1,000 people have been rescued across the area so far as the death toll from Harvey rose to six.

“There is life-threatening, catastrophic flooding happening now in Southeast Harris County,” Jeff Lindner of the Harris County Flood Control District told The Weather Channel.

Five people have died in the Houston area in unconfirmed flood-related deaths as torrential rain continues to fall, according to the National Weather Service.

Harvey from the ISS, image credit: NASA/Getty

~~Harvey Mangles Rockport, Texas: 'I've Never Seen Anything Like It'

Houston resident urged to climb to their roofs

Residents at epicenter of Harvey's landfall return to heartbreaking devastation

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@liprap Retweeted @BradDriverKHOU

The poor Waugh Ave bat colony...

Brad Driver KHOU @BradDriverKHOU click for video

There are bats swimming in Buffalo Bayou. #HurricaneHarvey

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Culprits in New Orleans' Pumps Crisis Will Soon Be Found Out ~Levees.org

Harvey Impacts Underway in Houston, Galveston: Hundreds of Thousands Without Power ~Weather Channel
Almost 300,000 are without power and possible tornado damage was reported in cities near Houston Saturday as heavy rain and strong winds from Harvey continued to threaten the area with dangerous flooding.
Heavy rainfall and gusty winds will persist in the Houston area through at least Monday, according to weather.com meteorologist Linda Lam. Rainfall totals of 15 to 30 inches are expected, with locally up to 40 inches possible through midweek. This amount of rainfall brings a serious concern of catastrophic and life-threatening flooding.
The storm left at least one dead in Rockport Friday night. A man was killed when his home caught on fire during the height of the storm. Read more

Why storm experts are so scared about Hurricane Harvey’s rain ~Brian Resnik, Vox

 Hurricane Harvey is a huge, life-threatening storm. It struck the Central Texas coast Friday night and brought with it 130 mph winds and several feet of storm surge. But perhaps more concerning is the rain still to come.

“Catastrophic and life-threatening flooding is expected across the middle and upper Texas coast from heavy rainfall of 15 to 30 inches, with isolated amounts as high as 40 inches, through Wednesday,” the National Hurricane Center reports in its forecast. That’s almost an entire year’s worth of rain over the course of a few days.

Hat Tweet for above graphic: Jeffrey Ray @cbs11jeffrey

And, it’s kind of mind-boggling. So I called up Hal Needham to help put in in perspective. Needham is a scientist (a geographer by training) and consultant who studies storm surge risk. He’s based in Galveston, Texas, and writes about storm surge science on his blog. He says when a storm like Harvey comes along, we tend to think too simply about storm risk: We fixate on wind speed, or storm surge height, or rain. But what makes this particular storm risky (and complex) is how all those elements mix together. Read more 

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