Houston is Flooding....

[Giordano]

They aren't dead, are they!

The hurricane hit SE Texas hard but more or less spared Austin (know in conservative hyperbole as the Berkeley of the South). What awful sins do people do in SE Texas that the evangelists can point to as the reason for this "wraith of God.?"

 

[William Parcher]

I wonder if the water being everywhere will create a natural form of cooling.

 

[GlennB]

I wonder if the water being everywhere will create a natural form of cooling.

Or become the source of appalling humidity and a breeding ground for a kajillion mosquitoes? iirc Katrina created a minor mozzie nightmare.

 

[KatieG]

From a post on FB:

Things non-Houstonians need to understand:

1. The streets and many of the public parks here are designed to flood. We sit just 35 feet above sea level, and most of the city is as flat as a pool table. We average about 50 inches of rain a year. The streets and parks serve as temporary retention ponds, accommodating slow, steady drainage through our bayous.

2. We average about 50 inches of rain a year, but in the last 48 hours, many areas of greater Houston received 25 to 30 inches of rain. That's six to nine month's worth of rain, in two days. The drainage system, which works well in normal conditions, was overwhelmed. Officials are calling this an "800 year flood": that means there was a one in 800 chance of its occurrence. Even with advance notice, there was little means of preparing for this.

3. It is impossible to evacuate a city the size of Houston. Harris County is 1700+ square miles, with a population of 6.5 million people. How do you evacuate 6.5 million people? During the hours leading to Hurricane Rita's landfall, tens of thousands of Houstonians attempted evacuation. The traffic jams lasted for days. One hundred people died. So far, six Houstonians have died in Hurricane Harvey, all of them (as far as I have heard) drowned in their automobiles. For more than a decade, the local mantra has been "shelter in place and hunker down." That's hard, but it's the right approach.

4. Some outsiders are treating this disaster with schadenfreude: Texans helped elect an anti-big government president, and now we're going to need big government help. Houston is the bluest spot in Texas, and voted Clinton in 2016. Suggesting this is karmic payback for backing Trump is as inaccurate (and offensive) as Pat Robertson's suggestion that Hurricane Katrina was God smiting sinners. We really aren't thinking Red or Blue right now. We are taking a royal beating, all of us. Disasters don't care about ideology.

5. You are going to feel this. Gas prices are going to skyrocket. Oil refined products, everything from PVC pipe to dry cleaning fluid, will rise in price. The stock market will take a hit. New Orleans is a fantastic city, but it's not a major economic force. Houston is the center of the nation's energy industry. It's home to dozens of Fortune 500 companies. And 85% of it is under water. It may be this way for weeks. The aftermath of Katrina captured the world's attention. The aftermath of Harvey is going to grab you by the lapels, and shake you 'til you're cross eyed.

 

[portlandatheist]

ProPublica ran a good story last year on why Houston is extremely vulnerable to flooding.

https://projects.propublica.org/hou...ial&utm_source=twitter&utm_content=1503846942

When it comes time to rebuild, I really hope they take into account planning for the future and to rebuild intelligently. Here in Portland, we've integrated rain gardens/swales everywhere to take some of the burden off of our water treatment and to prevent sewer overflows going into the river during storms (even our worst storms are nothing like what happens in Houston). Seems like they will have to do a great deal to prevent something like this from happening again.

 

[Marcus]

The hurricane hit SE Texas hard but more or less spared Austin (know in conservative hyperbole as the Berkeley of the South). What awful sins do people do in SE Texas that the evangelists can point to as the reason for this "wraith of God.?"

Here in Austin we're only getting a few inches here and there, not a problem. Houston is getting ready for round two, Harvey is looping around in preparation for going through there, another couple feet of rain predicted. Definitely an historic event. I was there for hurricane Carla, 1961, although only 5 years old, the rain was nothing compared to this.

 

[Checkmite]

Police have actually been expressing surprise at the number of homes they've had to do boat rescues at that still had working electricity despite being flooded with feet of water. It has led to serious safety concerns for the rescuers in a few cases.

 

[Checkmite]

Notice the ceiling light is on in that flooded nursing home picture.

Could be emergency battery powered but there's still a lot of light in that room if the power were off.

And calm I can understand but they would all be freezing and they don't look cold.

Are you skeptical that the photograph is genuine? It was taken at the La Vita Bella nursing home in Dickinson. There isn't really anything suspicious about the photo; the water level is not exceptionally high compared to other images of severe flooding coming from the Houston area, and flood water from a warm-core tropical storm would not necessarily be especially cold.

Here are some videos of similarly flooded places:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKKtt3izUTo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8N86t5w0NY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8UZHamYy9c

 

[portlandatheist]

3. It is impossible to evacuate a city the size of Houston. Harris County is 1700+ square miles, with a population of 6.5 million people. How do you evacuate 6.5 million people? During the hours leading to Hurricane Rita's landfall, tens of thousands of Houstonians attempted evacuation. The traffic jams lasted for days. One hundred people died. So far, six Houstonians have died in Hurricane Harvey, all of them (as far as I have heard) drowned in their automobiles. For more than a decade, the local mantra has been "shelter in place and hunker down." That's hard, but it's the right approach.

This feels very counterintuitive to me. Why not tell people in the 100 year flood plain to evacuate to another part of the city maybe instead of city wide evacuation? Why not tell people to move their cars to higher ground? Sheltering in place in a flooded house seems like a really bad idea to me unless the alternatives are even worse. Could they stagger an evacuation to prevent traffic jams? Or just evacuate the people in the worst places?

 

[NoahFence]

This feels very counterintuitive to me. Why not tell people in the 100 year flood plain to evacuate to another part of the city maybe instead of city wide evacuation? Why not tell people to move their cars to higher ground? Sheltering in place in a flooded house seems like a really bad idea to me unless the alternatives are even worse. Could they stagger an evacuation to prevent traffic jams? Or just evacuate the people in the worst places?

They didn't have a whole lot of warning.

 

[rwguinn]

This feels very counterintuitive to me. Why not tell people in the 100 year flood plain to evacuate to another part of the city maybe instead of city wide evacuation? Why not tell people to move their cars to higher ground? Sheltering in place in a flooded house seems like a really bad idea to me unless the alternatives are even worse. Could they stagger an evacuation to prevent traffic jams? Or just evacuate the people in the worst places?

Because it's ALL " floodplain", and not just Houston. 300 miles North of Houston, you finally reach a grand total of 700 feet above sea level
The gradient at Houston is very small. You have to go a long damn way to get any altitude, which means it is NOT going to drain worth a ****.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Are you skeptical that the photograph is genuine? It was taken at the La Vita Bella nursing home in Dickinson. There isn't really anything suspicious about the photo; the water level is not exceptionally high compared to other images of severe flooding coming from the Houston area, and flood water from a warm-core tropical storm would not necessarily be especially cold.

Here are some videos of similarly flooded places:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKKtt3izUTo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8N86t5w0NY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8UZHamYy9c

It sounds like the rescue was corroborated, and your videos were unneeded, of course I don't doubt one could have several feet of water in one's home.

But yes, the photo has some issues. In particular the residents look too warm and calm.

 

[Trebuchet]

This feels very counterintuitive to me. Why not tell people in the 100 year flood plain to evacuate to another part of the city maybe instead of city wide evacuation? Why not tell people to move their cars to higher ground? Sheltering in place in a flooded house seems like a really bad idea to me unless the alternatives are even worse. Could they stagger an evacuation to prevent traffic jams? Or just evacuate the people in the worst places?

Probably because the 100-year flood plain extends many miles inland; and there is no higher ground.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I think they could have evacuated the elderly and disabled.

I think if your house flooded before and you remain on a floodplain, the house you rebuild should have been built on stilts.

I think it is worthwhile in such a place to have some high ground evacuation locations identified.

There are many things that I hope someone does in the future because this has happened before and will happen again.

 

[Checkmite]

But yes, the photo has some issues. In particular the residents look too warm and calm.

Mostly they are calm because they are resigned to waiting. That was the first night of the flooding rainfall in Houston, and within hours of the rain beginning, the city's 911 center was at full call capacity, and official channels were communicating to the public that there was a waiting list for home rescues and urging people not to call emergency services if they had only a few inches of water in their homes. At that time all that were on hand to rescue anyone were regular city police officers and firefighters; they did not have Coast Guard or National Guard or volunteer assets available to help evacuate flooded areas until after sunrise. That meant a LOT of people sitting in flooded homes and waiting, exactly in that fashion.

 

[portlandatheist]

I think they could have evacuated the elderly and disabled.

I think if your house flooded before and you remain on a floodplain, the house you rebuild should have been built on stilts.

I think it is worthwhile in such a place to have some high ground evacuation locations identified.

There are many things that I hope someone does in the future because this has happened before and will happen again.

The elderly and disabled could have been evacuated, even if it was simply a nearby church or school that was also flooded, much easier to bring relief to those most in need when they are together.

Zoning laws and building codes: rebuilding residential in a 100 year flood plain is sketchy at best. We should rethink our zoning laws and building codes, whether that is not building there at all, or building on stilts, or only letting certain types of businesses exist there....or requiring all developers to build rain gardens/swales or whatever, we need to prepare and mitigate for the next event that will happen.

Everyone having a very precise relief map of relatively high places would also be good, even if it was simply a location to park your car. Some places that were flooded are just a few blocks away from places that weren't. Why not park your car there?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Mostly they are calm because they are resigned to waiting. That was the first night of the flooding rainfall in Houston, and within hours of the rain beginning, the city's 911 center was at full call capacity, and official channels were communicating to the public that there was a waiting list for home rescues and urging people not to call emergency services if they had only a few inches of water in their homes. At that time all that were on hand to rescue anyone were regular city police officers and firefighters; they did not have Coast Guard or National Guard or volunteer assets available to help evacuate flooded areas until after sunrise. That meant a LOT of people sitting in flooded homes and waiting, exactly in that fashion.

That's a nice hypothesis. But unless you have personal knowledge, I'm not sure you should state it as a fact.

Mind you I am not saying the photo is fake, I'm saying I'm skeptical.

 

[Trebuchet]

I think they could have evacuated the elderly and disabled.

And should have.

I think if your house flooded before and you remain on a floodplain, the house you rebuild should have been built on stilts.

I think it is worthwhile in such a place to have some high ground evacuation locations identified.

The tough part in Houston is that the whole city seems to be a flood plain and there's no high ground. Better than NOLA which basically sits below sea level; but not much.

There are many things that I hope someone does in the future because this has happened before and will happen again.

Seconded. Learn from the past; don't repeat it.

I'm even more happy than before that my house is 1/2 mile from the sea; and about 250 feet above it. It'd have to be biblical to flood us.

 

[Marcus]

I thought my Dad's house was safe, but they are telling them 2-3 feet of water in the house tonight. They are not in the 100 year floodplain, or the 500 year. This is more like a 1000 year flood.

 

[Sherkeu]

I think they could have evacuated the elderly and disabled.

I think if your house flooded before and you remain on a floodplain, the house you rebuild should have been built on stilts.

I think it is worthwhile in such a place to have some high ground evacuation locations identified.

There are many things that I hope someone does in the future because this has happened before and will happen again.

Don't hold your breath on that. Houston has been in denial about their situation for a while.

From an article 8 months ago:

...[Head of flood control] also said the flood control district has no plans to study climate change or its impacts on Harris County, the third-most-populous county in the United States.

Of the astonishing frequency of huge floods the city has been getting, he said, "I don't think it's the new normal." He also criticized scientists and conservationists for being "anti-development."

"They have an agenda ... their agenda to protect the environment overrides common sense," he said.

(...)Scientists and experts say communities need to move away from developing in the 100-year floodplain, or at least make the rules for doing so far more stringent. But after Allison, the pace of development in and near floodplains in the Houston area only seemed to accelerate