Off topic -- AP News story on Tropical Storm Allison aftermath.
June 9, 2001
Three Die in Tropical Storm Aftermath
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:02 p.m. ET
HOUSTON (AP) -- Thousands of people were forced from their homes or stranded on
flooded freeways Saturday as torrential rains from the remnants of Tropical Storm
Allison swamped Houston and Southeast Texas.
Three deaths were blamed on the storms and floods as highways were turned into lakes
and rivers. Another death had been reported in Louisiana earlier in the week. Bayous
designed to handle runoff were rising out of their banks.
``It's bad, it is a disaster,'' Mayor Lee Brown said late Saturday after touring the city by
helicopter. ``We do have a real problem.''
Brown said one woman was found drowned in a downtown office building elevator that
lost power and went to a basement level where it became caught in deep water. One man
was found floating dead in a rain-swollen bayou, and another man died when his car was
submerged in water on a city street.
Brown said an estimate that 3,000 homes and businesses were damaged was ``very
conservative.''
``Some complete subdivisions are flooding over,'' he said.
The Texas Medical Center was hit with power outages because emergency generators
were flooded. Some telephone service was interrupted. The city's 911 service was
overwhelmed, and traffic signals were a mess. Police Chief Clarence Bradford said there
were only a few reports of vandalism or looting.
Coast Guard helicopters plucked some storm victims from the roofs of homes
surrounded by water, and Brown declared a state of emergency.
President Bush on Saturday declared a 28-county disaster area, ordering federal aid to
supplement state and local recovery efforts. Bush spent the weekend at his Crawford
ranch, about 175 miles northwest of Houston.
Stranded on highways along with vacationers and residents, long-haul truckers -- their
rigs stalled and damaged by flash floods -- bunked in their cabs, brewed coffee and aided
motorists whose ``four-wheelers'' sank or floated in the rising water.
``I came up on this little BMW two-seater, and this executive guy grabbed his briefcase
and what he could out of his car and got in,'' Oklahoma City truck driver Daniel Hock
said Saturday. ``That was the last we saw of the car. He just bought it; it had 18,000
miles on it.''
Trucker James Wilson had to swim from his truck. His trailer was floating on Interstate
10, straddling the center and pinned against a railroad trestle. His cab was nowhere in
sight.
``I tried to stay with it, but it was time to go,'' Wilson said. ``I ain't going to go down
with the rig.''
``As soon as we rescue one person and drop them off, we get diverted to another case,''
Coast Guard spokesman Rob Wyman said.
Joining in the effort were military trucks big enough to navigate through the deep water,
said National Guard spokesman Aaron Reed. The guard also sent five of its own
helicopters to help.
The deluge Friday and Saturday was produced by the lingering remnants of Allison, the
Atlantic hurricane season's first named storm, which blew ashore on the Texas coast on
Tuesday, then quickly dwindled but refused to leave. Some rain gauges in Houston
showed 24-hour rainfall amounts topping 20 inches.
The effects of the storm extended beyond Texas. The flooding disrupted access to an
estimated 76,000 automated teller machines in 22 states, said Julian Read, spokesman for
PULSE, a nonprofit electronic funds transfer network of more than 2,600 banks.
On Thursday, high wind gusts toppled a tree onto a truck near Baton Rouge, La., killing
the driver. Bobby Simpson, the mayor of Baton Rouge and president of East Baton
Rouge parish, said Saturday that authorities had helped at least 255 families evacuate their
homes.
One was the family of Gary Rains, who evacuated Thursday. He returned by boat
Saturday to bring supplies to neighbors who stayed behind in the upper lever of their
home.
``When I first left Thursday night there was a foot of water in my house. When I came
back today there were five feet. Everything's gone. All we got out with were some
clothes, wedding pictures and baby formula,'' Rains said.
Electricity and phone service was out in neighborhoods like Rains' along the Comite. His
neighbors used a generator for power.
Also in Louisiana, alligators agitated by the storm's thunder, lightning and heavy rain
wandered into residential areas.
Kathy Smith didn't believe her daughter had really seen an alligator in their yard in
LaPlace, La., until she saw a neighbor trying to catch the critter Friday. ``I said, 'You get
him, and I'm about to call 911,''' she said.
Trappers in Louisiana's St. John the Baptist and St. Charles parishes captured 40
alligators during the week. ``I'll release them back into the swamps unless they are big
and aggressive,'' said Richard Roussel IV, an alligator nuisance control officer for St.
John Parish.
Texas State Trooper Michael Smith arrived at I-10 as water started pouring into the
freeway from surrounding Houston streets.
``We found one minivan with a mother and two children. The water was coming in and
they were in shock, they weren't sure what they were going to do,'' Smith said.
A registered nurse who also was stuck on the freeway helped treat one of the children,
Smith said.
Two officers fell out of a police boat when the craft was swamped during a rescue
attempt.
``They were found and were safe, clinging to a tree,'' police spokesman Robert Hurst
said. ``It just shows how dangerous this situation is.''
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press |
