# It's Flooding Down In Texas



## Marcus (May 13, 2012)

As I'm sure most of y'all have heard by now, there was quite a bit of flooding in Central Texas over the weekend. I'm mentioning it since I read a very interesting article by a staff member of the Austin paper.

http://www.mystatesman.com/news/new...ial_facebook_2014_sfp#d245fcd1.3606639.735743

These folks had easily survived earlier floods and thought they and their property were safe from this one. But they thought wrong. It was the worst flood in that area since 1929. In other words, it was at least a 100 year flood.

Their house was on a 35' bluff about 100 yards from the river itself. They were very lucky that the river crested at 40' and they suffered only minimal damage.

A woman I grew up with got stuck in Boerne. Luckily, she and her husband were wise enough not to try and make it home Saturday night. On Sunday, it took them 5 different routes and 4.5 hours to go a little over 50 miles.

There were 2 bridges washed out in that area. It will probably be at least 6 months to a year before these bridges can be replaced.

So what does all this have to do with this website?

A wise person will check their location against the FEMA Flood Map.
https://msc.fema.gov/portal
It may be necessary to prepare for something else.

Additionally, there are other resources for motorists. Here is the one for Texas: http://drivetexas.org/#/7/32.340/-99.500


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## alwaysready (May 16, 2012)

DD took a one day art class Saturday afternoon in Austin 4 hours later her car was flooded.


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## RevWC (Mar 28, 2011)

It's been flooding down in Texas for a long time. Stevie Ray Vaughan performed Texas Flood in 1989.


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

Meanwhile in Texas...


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

About 2 weeks ago I took the grandson to look at the river(Brazos), the bridge bed is about 50-60 feet above the river bed and the water was better than halfway up, the official word was that that storm raised the river 32 feet. At normal flow the depth is no more than 5-6 feet.

About 25 years ago the water got high enough on that stretch of river that the bridge was completely washed out, "Hopefully" it wont get that high again for a long while.


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

tsrwivey said:


> Meanwhile in Texas...


That must be where all those critters were heading a few hours ago when the rain stopped! lol


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## zombieresponder (Aug 20, 2012)

I live near a very major lake. It's only supposed to crest the spillway once every 100 years or so. It started going over early yesterday morning. I'm in my thirties and this is the third time I've seen it do so. We went out to take a look at the lake and the spillway earlier today. I had a feeling the weather was going to turn for the worse again so I grabbed a dual band HT on the way out the door. Good thing I did since there was at least one tornado touchdown and the storm was moving in our direction. There's still more coming I think, so I might have a long night......after being up all last night working on my jeep.  There are downed trees/limbs/debris all over the place and it's only adding to all of the existing piles from storms over the past few weeks.

The earlier post with the Ark....yep, it's getting close to being necessary.


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## alwaysready (May 16, 2012)

RevWC said:


> It's been flooding down in Texas for a long time. Stevie Ray Vaughan performed Texas Flood in 1989.


Thanks Rev it sounds as good today as in 89.


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## millertimedoneright (May 13, 2013)

My front and back yard


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

We had some pretty bad storms pass through last night, dropped another 1.5 inches of rain. Sure wish I had my rain catchment system set up


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## Mase92 (Feb 4, 2013)

Hoping everyone and their family came out of this ok. 

We had some flooding here last year and I can say, it's a mess, recovery is not easy and it leaves you unsure of whats going on for weeks.


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

tsrwivey said:


> We had some pretty bad storms pass through last night, dropped another 1.5 inches of rain. Sure wish I had my rain catchment system set up


We had a bunch of rain again tonight, about 3 inches, the counties to the north and south of us had funnel clouds again but haven't heard if any touched down or if there was any damage.

The water at the river was higher this evening than it was the last time we looked, looked to be around 40 feet up the pylons. The thought of crossing with the water that high was a bit unsettling so I turned around, it's built sturdy and they dont close it down until the water laps the bridgebed but didn't want to "have an accident" while sitting in the drivers seat.


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## OldeTymer (Feb 17, 2014)

Local weatherman on KPRC said that an estimated 162 billion gallons of water fell out of the sky.

Sometimes all you can do is watch.

http://www.click2houston.com/news/severe-weather-pounds-houston-area/33202420


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## Balls004 (Feb 28, 2015)

Hope everyone here makes it through without any major damage or loss. Unfortunately for Texans, flooding and drought are just two of the perils for living in that great state.

Be safe y'all...


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## TheLazyL (Jun 5, 2012)

Those that prayed for rain got their prayers answered.

And a unfortunate example of why you should be careful on how you pray to God.


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## jimLE (Feb 25, 2015)

*yeah.this would be a great time to have a rain catchment system..my yard is staying way to wet for mowing..in which i want to use the clippings in my garden.and i cant even work on my garden on acount of all the rain we're getting here..*


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## Marcus (May 13, 2012)

Meanwhile in Houston:


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## GrinnanBarrett (Aug 31, 2012)

I have seen a lot on this topic over the last few days. One lady was asking how to prepare for a flood. In response most people gave her the get out as soon as you find out it is coming. That brought up the issue of how much lead time you have. In a hurricane you have advance warning and can get out if you have some common sense. In a case like Wimberley, Texas and the Blanco River you may have an hour to a few minutes to leave. 

Having lived through a major hurricane as a kid and evacuated only after the water was very deep and almost losing our lives, I learned a great lesson. If you can afford a trailer (either travel trailer or box) use them. Have backups of your important documents in at least two places. Backup your family photos that are dear to you on solid state drives in the same two places. Don't get caught up in the I have to get this or that thing you cannot live without because you may not live if you stay to go get it. 

We had friends on the river this week who lost their home but did not lose their lives because they chose to leave with what they had on their back. They got out with fifteen minutes to spare before the wall of water hit their home. They did not have flood insurance. Bad move but good move to get out as soon as they heard the evacuation order. 

Right now I feel naked with my trailer being worked on. I will be glad to get her back to the yard behind our house. Even in a power down situation it is nice to have her out there to move to when the water is down and electricity is off. With solar cells/batteries and water tanks on board she is our home away from home. It takes less than thirty minutes to be on the road if we have to have her move. 

You cannot help people who do not want to be helped. I saw people die back in 61. A family across the waterway from us chose to stay and ride out the storm. All died but a kid my age and they found him miles away in a tree. No one thinks it will be them that gets killed. They have no idea of how powerful water can be. this is like preaching to the choir here. It is sad that those who need the help the most mock those who prepare. GB


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## Balls004 (Feb 28, 2015)

The only people who do not respect the power of rough or swift waters, is those that have never experienced the power of water.

My Granddad had an absolute fear of water, of his 3 brothers, two drowned in the Mississippi River while swimming. My other Grandfather lost his home near Bandera, when the Medina River ran over it's banks.

I learned the power of water as a young kid in Key West, with my dad in a 16 foot boat in 4 or 5 foot seas when a storm suddenly overtook us. Later, in the USAF Water Survival School, I got a refresher course on just how easy it is for water to kill you. 

If you see the water rising, head to high ground. Only the really lucky win this fight.


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## zombieresponder (Aug 20, 2012)

Marcus said:


> Meanwhile in Houston:


I've been down in houston when there wasn't anywhere near as much rain and it was flooded then. I can't imagine it now.... Sharks on the freeway?! Hope you got kevlar sidewalls.


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

So far so good in our neck of the woods. We had some small tornadoes that got a little close for comfort & helped us see where the disaster plan for our daughters needed some work. (Daughter hears tornado sirens, calls me instead of taking shelter. :gaah. Some flooding in low lying areas that always flood but nothing out of the ordinary. We are watching closely what happens on our river property though so we know how deep & wide the creek, pond, & all the drainage ditches get in addition to the river. Our future home site sits over 100ft above the river but we'll also build a small cabin down closer to the river that we want to make sure isn't in danger of flooding either. We are all sick of rain  it rained more than this in May of 2000 though.


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## Marcus (May 13, 2012)

In DFW, we've had 12.31" this month. It's the second most ever (13.66" in 1982) and the forecast is for more so there is a chance we'll break the record _as measured at the airport._ There are other areas that have received more than 20" so far this month. As for me, I have decided to learn a new survival skill: how to walk on water. Any help would be appreciated.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Marcus said:


> As for me, I have decided to learn a new survival skill: how to walk on water. Any help would be appreciated.


No problem:

http://www.awmi.net/extra/article/water_walker

http://www.awmi.net/tv/2015/week18
http://www.awmi.net/tv/2015/week19


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

Here's the new map of Texas.


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## PreparedRifleman73 (Nov 2, 2012)

I do Insurance in MN. Nobody buys flood insurance unless they're up on the red river by Grand Forks ND. Do many people in TX buy it?


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

hawkmiles said:


> I do Insurance in MN. Nobody buys flood insurance unless they're up on the red river by Grand Forks ND. Do many people in TX buy it?


We don't have it, maybe people closer to the water or on low lying land do. I would suspect anyone with a mortgage would be required to carry it in those areas. I remember it being expensive.


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

Went shopping for some appropriate shoes.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

hawkmiles said:


> I do Insurance in MN. Nobody buys flood insurance unless they're up on the red river by Grand Forks ND. Do many people in TX buy it?


Most don't, but if you are in the "flood plain" area on the FEMA maps, then your mortgage company forces you to buy it. It's EXPENSIVE.


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## Country Living (Dec 15, 2009)

tsrwivey said:


> Here's the new map of Texas.


At least we're still on land.

If you're looking for a storm shelter, we bought ours from a company in Terrell. It's one of those concrete bunkers with 2/3 under ground and 1/3 above ground. We put a lot more dirt around ours as well as on top of it so I can just run the mower over it.

PM me if you want their contact information. You have had some nasty weather up there. Do you have a NOAA weather radio?


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## Balls004 (Feb 28, 2015)

It always amazed me when I learned of my granddad's home getting washed away, as the house was a good 70 feet above the Medina river, close to it's headwaters. I guess it just goes to show that mother nature is a better planner than we are.

Again, y'all be safe...


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## Cotton (Oct 12, 2013)

The amount of rain yall have received is staggering. During a drought a few years ago (and trying to water 7 acres) I learned that 1 inch of rain on 1 acre of land is just over 27,000 gallons.

Yall be safe!


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

Last year in our area west of DFW we had a little over 26 inches of rain, to date we've had 28 not counting the near 4 inches tonight.

Most of that 28 this year has come in the month of May.

I think I'm going to nix the garden and start raising crawdads and bullfrogs.


And, No - we dont have flood insurance either. We live on high ground about a mile or two from the Brazos river, if flood waters got anywhere near us - it would literally be TEOTWAWKI.


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## OldeTymer (Feb 17, 2014)

Cotton said:


> The amount of rain yall have received is staggering. During a drought a few years ago (and trying to water 7 acres) I learned that 1 inch of rain on 1 acre of land is just over 27,000 gallons.
> 
> Yall be safe!


In 2001, during Tropical Storm Allison, Houston caught 32 trillion gallons of water falling from the sky. (According to FEMA)

We went almost a month with no electricity as the above ground electrical infrastructure had pretty much been destroyed. All of the stores closed due to no refrigeration. Pretty much, the FEMA response was to have trucks driving around passing out MRE's.

Nice training if you can find it........


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

Country Living said:


> At least we're still on land.
> 
> If you're looking for a storm shelter, we bought ours from a company in Terrell. It's one of those concrete bunkers with 2/3 under ground and 1/3 above ground. We put a lot more dirt around ours as well as on top of it so I can just run the mower over it.
> 
> PM me if you want their contact information. You have had some nasty weather up there. Do you have a NOAA weather radio?


Our plan is to build a partial basement when we build on the property, if we decide not to, we'll definitely get a storm shelter.

We've been lucky so far, the really bad stuff is happening in neighboring areas. We have 3 weather radios, one in hubby's truck & two portables. We've sure been glad to have them lately! I miss the old days when you could listen to the police scanner & find out what was going on quickly.


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

I posted as little too soon on that last one, got another 2 inches by daylight, makes about 6 inches total for yesterday.


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## Marcus (May 13, 2012)

Cotton said:


> The amount of rain yall have received is staggering. During a drought a few years ago (and trying to water 7 acres) I learned that 1 inch of rain on 1 acre of land is just over 27,000 gallons.
> 
> Yall be safe!


I saw somewhere that we had the equivalent of 8" over the entire state. By my quick calculations, that makes 35,000,000,000 gallons or 5000 gallons for every person in the world.


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## zombieresponder (Aug 20, 2012)

Marcus said:


> In DFW, we've had 12.31" this month. It's the second most ever (13.66" in 1982) and the forecast is for more so there is a chance we'll break the record _as measured at the airport._ There are other areas that have received more than 20" so far this month. As for me, I have decided to learn a new survival skill: how to walk on water. Any help would be appreciated.


If you're in the DFW area, you're fairly close. I'm an hour or so north.



tsrwivey said:


> Our plan is to build a partial basement when we build on the property, if we decide not to, we'll definitely get a storm shelter.
> 
> We've been lucky so far, the really bad stuff is happening in neighboring areas. We have 3 weather radios, one in hubby's truck & two portables. We've sure been glad to have them lately! I miss the old days when you could listen to the police scanner & find out what was going on quickly.


I don't want to preach, but I no longer trust NOAA to update quickly enough to save me or anyone I care about. NOAA gets a significant amount of information from local weather spotters via ham radio. The Ft. Worth National Weather Service station(roughly 80 miles away) checks in regularly on our local repeater frequency when severe weather is expected or in progress. We had a tornado in the neighboring town at the start of the week, and one that came through a couple miles from my house about two weeks ago. NOAA takes _minutes_ to update after a spotter reports rotation and lowering from clouds or an actual touchdown. Also, NOAA doesn't particularly care about specific locations. They just want a general idea of the area it is occurring in.

My wife and I are giving inexpensive Baofeng ham radios for Father's day. Four of them cost me something like $135 shipped from amazon. Pretty reasonable in my opinion. 

It ain't just flooding in Texas. My off grid property in Oklahoma is almost completely inaccessible right now, and a friend's house(also in OK) is partially underwater.


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

I'm in between Tyler & Longview, DFW always gets hit harder that we do. They get the brunt of the storm & we get what's leftover (which can be pretty bad sometimes). I'm so glad I don't have to go to Children's Medical Center in the next couple weeks, it looks like there's some major flooding on my route. Y'all stay safe! We'll likely be begging for rain come August!


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## OldeTymer (Feb 17, 2014)

Marcus said:


> I saw somewhere that we had the equivalent of 8" over the entire state. By my quick calculations, that makes 35,000,000,000 gallons or 5000 gallons for every person in the world.


According to the National Weather Service; during the month of May, Texas has had 43 trillion gallons of water fall on it in the form of rain. More on the way.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/president-obama-signs-disaster-declaration-texas/story?id=31409890


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## jimLE (Feb 25, 2015)

*i've started making 4 diff list on my nook color.1st one i worked on,is all the camping gear i have.in which some of it is good for power outages.the 2nd one,is my power outage haves.in which im working on right now.then i'll start working on my other 2 list.one,is my camping gear dont haves.and the other is my power outage dont haves..then i'll start working on my power outage dont haves,seeing how we had some foods go bad on us.simply because i dont have a way to keep the fridge and freezer cold dureing a outage..*


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

Went down and loked at the Brazos again a few minutes ago, you could do a "Belly-Flop" off the bridge and it wouldn't hurt a bit.


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## jimLE (Feb 25, 2015)

*NACOGDOCHES COUNTY, TX (KTRE) -
In the wake of the heavy rainfall Tropical Depression Bill dropped on East Texas, the estimated cost for the extensive damage the Nacogdoches County Road Department is dealing with after yesterday's floods is in the millions.

It's too early to provide an exact amount, but county officials know one thing. It's way more money than county leaders initially budgeted for road repair in Nacogdoches County.

As many as 50 Nacogdoches County roads were closed Thursday due to flood damages. There were so many that the county ran out of emergency signs.*


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