Houston city leaders say 'all hands on deck' ahead of Tropical Storm Edouard's landfall in SE Texas
HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Houston Mayor John Whitmire said it's "all hands on deck" as the city braces for Tropical Storm Edouard's impacts on Tuesday.
Houston Mayor John Whitmire and other city officials held a press conference and provided brief updates on how the city has prepared.
"It appears that the real impact of the storm will be east of IH-45; most school districts in that area have closed," Whitmire said. "The city is open for business, HISD is open for business, but we are monitoring things hourly. If there's any change, we will be very transparent."
Edouard has the potential to bring strong wind gusts and heavy rainfall to parts of Southeast Texas, and a Flood Watch is in effect generally along and east of I-45 until 7 p.m. for the counties most at-risk of encountering those flooding tropical rains.
Among the preparations, leaders said barricades were placed along multiple locations that have flooding issues, and Lake Houston was lowered by one foot to retain any runoff water in the Kingwood area.
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In addition, Whitmire said the city is ready to assist surrounding communities impacted by the storm.
"We stand ready also to assist communities near Houston; Beaumont, Dayton, Liberty County, anyone (who) needs assistance," Whitmire said.
CenterPoint Energy said it has more than 2,700 frontline workers on standby to respond to any outages.
Despite most of the impacts taking place on the east side, leaders are urging people to stay off the roads Tuesday evening.
