Severe storm in Valley killed at least 6 people; hundreds rescued

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At least six deaths were caused either directly or indirectly by the massive storms that struck the Rio Grande Valley March 26-28, according to an initial summary of the event from the National Weather Service Brownsville/RGV station.

According to the summary, released Tuesday, two Sebastian residents died in “trailer-type house fire” in Willacy County between 4:30 a.m. and 5:30 a.m. due to a suspected lightning strike, and a juvenile drowned after being driven into a flooded canal in Hidalgo County near Edcouch after an encounter with U.S. Border Patrol.

A woman also died in that incident, according to criminal complaints filed against the two suspected smugglers.

Hidalgo County law enforcement also reported two other drownings, and one person drowned in Reynosa, according to the NWS, which said full details on the fatalities would be determined at a later date.

A preliminary summary of known impacts and response related to flooding includes several hundred residents being rescued from floodwaters between March 27-29.

“Emergency management response included dozens to hundreds of high-profile vehicles and watercraft to rescue people in homes and vehicles,” wrote the summary’s authors, NWS meteorologists Rodney Chai and Barry Goldsmith.

Meanwhile, at least 1,000 buildings were flooded with more than a foot of water in some cases; frontage roads along I-69E between San Benito and Sebastian, and between Harlingen and Mission, were “generally flooded and closed through March 28, with up to four feet of water depth in the worst instances,” according to the report.

At least 1,000 vehicles were flooded out and abandoned, from compact cars to even tractor-trailer rigs in some instances, while hundreds of street, roads and highways were closed due to high water — three feet or more in some places, while “an unknown number of roads and bridges sustained structural damage due to the floodwaters, according to the NWS.

The report notes that Valley International Airport in Harlingen was forced to cancel all flights through March 31 due to flooded taxiways and sunken/soft pavement, while communities around the Valley jumped into action to provide shelter for residents driven out of their homes by floodwaters.

“At least a dozen shelters were opened across the region, with at least several hundred rescued residents staying in them until they could return to their homes,” the meteorologists reported. “Community-based organizations and larger nonprofits aided in sheltering and food/water provision to impacted communities.”

Those groups included the American Red Cross, Salvation Army and Food Bank of the RGV.

Drought conditions in the Valley had risen from severe (Level 2) to extreme (Level 3) over nearly four weeks of a series of “dry fronts” and warm weather, contributing to a spate of wildfires, when the skies burst open on March 26. Through early March 28, nearly 20 inches of rain fell over much of the Valley according to measured totals, with potentially more than 21 inches falling according to radar estimates, from eastern Starr County through southern Hidalgo County and into northern Cameron County, according to the NWS.

Harlingen got hit the hardest, with the Arroyo Colorado in Harlingen cresting at 30.44 feet on at 7 a.m. on March 28 — a new record. The previous record was 24.22 feet, set on July 21, 2010.

“The rainfall crushed prior daily, multi-day, and monthly (March) records at many locations, and rivaled all-time two-day records in a few locations — including those from tropical cyclones such as Labor Day 1933, Beulah (1967), Allen (1980), and Dolly (2008),” Chai and Goldsmith reported.

“Unfortunately, the floods were devastating in dozens of neighborhoods across the Valley, with the most notable damage centered on northern Cameron County, where the heaviest rains fell,” they said.

As of Tuesday, recovery efforts by local and state emergency units were in full swing, with the NWS continuing to collect data on those efforts. Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr and Willacy counties on March 29, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency was asked to help with damage assessment, the NWS said.

“Based on preliminary reports, which suggested that this event rivaled that of the Great June Flood of 2018, damage and recovery totals from the flood were likely to exceed $100 million,” according to the report.

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