Sugar Land and Missouri City continue to dry out nearly two weeks after Hurricane Harvey pummeled the cities, along with the rest of the Greater Houston area, dumping on it an immense amount of rain and causing two deaths in Fort Bend County.

Fort Bend County Judge Robert Hebert said Sept. 5 that trucks were ready to begin making rounds through the county to pick up debris left from the storm. 

“We are really going into recovery now,” Hebert said.

According to Jeff Braun,   emergency management coordinator, Federal Emergency Management Agency agents are working to set up teams to help people register for FEMA assistance. Meanwhile, FEMA inspectors are in town calling individuals to make appointments to verify damage to homes.

“Every storm is different; even if they are both Category 3s, they have different characteristics,” Hebert said.“Basically, every storm I’ve ever dealt with before came in­—­­and you had 24 to 30 hours of miserable weather—and then they were gone somewhere. This was not the case with Harvey.”

News outlets began reporting on the tropical depression that became Hurricane Harvey days before the eye of the hurricane formed. When it became clear the storm would slam into the Texas coast and that Houston would be hit hard, residents, businesses and government entities began taking precautions. Many offices closed, Fort Bend ISD canceled classes, oil refineries began cutting production, and people began to stockpile supplies. 

By the morning of Friday, Aug. 25, some gas stations had only diesel fuel left, if any at all, and some store shelves were cleared of diapers, milk and other staples as residents stocked up in preparation for the storm. 

Evacuation orders issued

The first evacuation orders for areas near Sugar Land and Missouri City came soon after the storm hit Houston, as forecasts projected record level rainfall totals. 

Fort Bend County issued mandatory evacuation orders for the areas on the banks of the San Bernard River first, while issuing only voluntary evacuation orders for areas near the Brazos River. However, as the storm worsened, the county upgraded its assessment of land near the Brazos and ordered residents close to its banks to evacuate as well. 

Both rivers set new records for recorded heights, with the Brazos River cresting at over 55 feet. 

Tornadoes touched down in parts of Missouri City on Saturday, Aug. 26, causing damage at a shopping plaza on Texas Parkway and in a residential neighborhood in Sienna Plantation. Dozens of homes there were reported to have suffered serious damage, including roofs being torn from houses and walls and trees being knocked over. 

In a video recorded in the city’s emergency operations facility, Missouri City Mayor Allen Owen said city staffers were working around the clock in double shifts to help and inform residents. 

“Every employee in Missouri City is working these shifts, eating on-site and sleeping on-site,” Owen said. 

By the night of Monday, Aug. 28, only a few days after the storm hit, streets had turned into streams and many major roads were impassable. By that time, over 5,000 evacuations had been conducted in Fort Bend County, according to Hebert. He said the county was receiving help from a number of public safety departments outside of the state. 

“We are getting wonderful help from the state and federal government,” Hebert said. “Assets and manpower have come from throughout Texas, Arizona Task Force 1, Louisiana, Florida and the federal government to help our citizens with airboats, high-water rescue vehicles, drones and helicopters. All these agencies—they are not waiting for us to call them—they are calling us to see how they can help.” 

Water levels peaked on Monday, Aug. 30, but it was clear the amount of water dumped on the area would take time to recede. 

Referring to the record level water heights of the Brazos River, Owen said, “It will stay at that level for probably an entire week, and then we’re looking at another week for that water to recede. So we’re talking about another week to two weeks of dealing with this.”

As bad as the flooding was, initial predictions by the National Weather Service were even worse. Weather service had forecast even larger amounts of rain and projected the Brazos River to crest at 59 feet. 

“Fifty-nine feet represents at least an 800-year flood event and there’s no levee designed to prevent an 800-year flood,” Hebert said at a news conference.

Many municipalities in the Greater Houston area instituted curfews, including Missouri City. While Sugar Land did not put a curfew into place, Mayor Joe Zimmerman said the city’s police force was maintaining a heightened presence throughout the city. He did not specify the number of officers dispatched or what shifts they were being required to work.

Zimmerman said the gates of the area’s levees had had to be closed in order to prevent water from moving back into the Brazos River. With the gates closed, pumps are required to drain water from streets, and this process takes much longer than letting water drain to the river. 

“The pumping system has much less capacity than a gravity flow system,” Zimmerman said. “Pumps can only pump out about half an inch an hour.” 

Zimmerman said the city’s levees did not fail during the storm. 

“Everything is functioning as it’s supposed to,” he said. “We continue to get good responses from our levee improvement district operators. Our levees are functioning just the way they were designed.”

On Wednesday, Aug. 30, the city of Sugar Land released a video of Zimmerman explaining the drainage process and describing clean up efforts. 

“Things are returning to normal in the city,” he said.