Houston, Texas airport has second wettest day on record: RMS
April 21, 2016 by Canadian Underwriter
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Weather events this week in Texas may be producing “one of the most severe flood events” in history, in Houston, not caused by a tropical cyclone Risk Management Solutions Inc. stated Thursday.
The Associated Press reported that the Houston area got 18 inches (nearly 460 millimetres) of rain Sunday night and Monday.
“Much of Harris County, which includes the greater Houston area, received at least 6 inches of rain on Monday, April 18, with some parts receiving more than a foot,” stated Jeff Waters, a meteorologist and Manager, Model Product Management at RMS said in a statement. “Houston Intercontinental Airport recorded 9.92 inches (252 millimetres) of rain, the second wettest day on record in the Houston area going back to 1889.”
Soldiers with the National Guard work alongside local and state first responders in Brookshire, Texas, April 20, 2016, following severe flooding. Photo by First Lieutenant Zachary West, United States Army National Guard
Newark, Calif.-based RMS provides models and data for the insurance industry.
AP reported Thursday that Harris County officials have catalogued about 1,000 homes with flood damage, but this number “will go up considerably,” Kim Jackson, spokeswoman for the Harris County Flood Control District, told The Associated Press.
“Although the causes and drivers of flooding were different, this is the largest flood event Houston has experienced since Tropical Storm Allison in 2001, which dumped more than 35 inches (890 millimetres) in rain in parts of the area,” RMS’s Waters stated. “It may end up being one of the most severe flood events not caused by a tropical cyclone in Houston’s history.”
Quoting from the national climatic data centre of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, RMS stated that flooding in the Houston area “has become increasingly common over the last 15-20 years due to significant property and population growth in the region.”
-With files from Juan A. Lozano, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
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