Hurricane Harvey: County Leaders Urge Calm In The Face Of The Storm

HOUSTON, TX — Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner and Harris County Judge Ed Emmett held a joint press conference at the Harris County Office of Emergency Management Friday afternoon, and urged residents to remain calm, remain safe, and stay off the streets as Hurricane Harvey moves inland.

“Right now, let’s not panic,” Turner said. “Do what you need to do to take care of your families, and stay off the streets as we move forward into the weekend, and then make sure you’re listening to the reports.”

Hurricane Harvey has been moving slowly through the Gulf of Mexico since Tuesday, and was upgraded to a Category 3 storm Friday with winds as high as 135 miles per hour. (Want to get daily updates about Hurricane Harvey and other events going on in your area? Sign up for the free Houston Patch morning newsletter.)

Harvey is expected to make landfall Friday or early Saturday just north of Corpus Christi, resulting in high winds and torrential rainfall all along the Texas coastline.

While residents south of the Houston area are dealing with the full force of a hurricane, Emmett said this isn’t the case in Houston or Galveston.

“This is a rain event for us,” he said. “At this time...there will be no massive evacuations. There are a few municipalities that have called for voluntary evacuations, because of the small storm surge that is coming in. We are dealing with a major rain event, and we have dealt with those in the past.”

Since 2015, the Houston area has endured three major flooding events when ara bayous and creeks were overwhelmed with with heavy rain.

With anywhere between 15 to 30 inches of rain expected in the Houston area between Friday night and Monday morning, flooding is the greatest concerns among local officials.

“From the county point of view, we are geared up and ready to go,” Emmett said. “Our job is to keep the city of Houston safe.”

If there is major flooding in Houston neighborhoods, residents may be forced to find emergency shelter.

Turner said the may be as many as 56 Red Cross emergency shelters in the Houston area, but he didn’t say where those would be set up.

“This is a rain maker” Turner said. “We have been working with the Red Cross and identified about 56 different possible locations...the faith based community has stepped up...about 30 churches have made themselves available.”

Meanwhile, the city will operate with essential personnel,with offices for BARC, the Houston Public Library, municipal courts and city parks closed for the weekend.

Police, fire and emergency first responders will be on duty.

“We want people to be alert, prepared, informed, on guard, stocked up, patient, sheltered, calm and ready,” Turner said. “Chaos and panic are our enemies,and we all know that. People need to be very patient. Every storm is different.”

This satellite image provided by NASA on Thursday, Aug. 24, 2017 shows Hurricane Harvey off the Gulf of Mexico. Harvey intensified as it steered toward the Texas coast on Friday, with forecasters saying it had strengthened to a Category 2 storm with the potential to swamp communities more than 100 miles (161 kilometers) inland. (NASA via AP)

Image: AP via NASA

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