One person has been confirmed dead in a house fire that started as Hurricane Harvey passed through Texas City.
Rockport’s Mayor Charles J Wax made this known to newsmen. It is the first confirmed fatality in the storm.
Meanwhile, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) has warned that Texas will be hit by “catastrophic and life-threatening flooding”, as Hurricane Harvey moves inland. The category four storm – the biggest to hit the US mainland in 13 years – battered areas of the Texas coast for hours before its winds were downgraded to category one.
Some residents are feared to be trapped in collapsed buildings and there have been widespread power outages. Torrential rains are expected for days.
NHC also warned.up to 40in (101cm) of rain could fall in some areas of the middle and upper Texas coast, the hurricane center
Several places are already reported to have received well over 10in. According to reports, earlier, Harvey made a double landfall: north-east of the city of Corpus Christi initially late on Friday local time, then just north of Rockport a few hours later.
When the storm struck close to Corpus Christi it had winds of up to 130mph (215km/h), but by 09:00 local time (14:00 GMT), maximum sustained winds had dropped to 75mph.
If they drop further, Harvey, which is moving at extremely low-speed, will be classified as a tropical storm.
Utility companies say more than 200,000 customers are without electricity. After freeing up federal aid for the worst-affected areas, President Donald Trump praised emergency services in a tweet, saying: “You are doing a great job – the world is watching! Be safe.”
Rockport, normally home to about 10,000 people, appears to have been the hardest hit town.
The roof of a housing centre for elderly people there collapsed, trapping people, 10 of whom were later taken to a county jail for treatment, according to local TV station KIII.
Emergency services said a school, a hotel and other buildings haVE also suffered structural damage.
