After the dayslong rash of rain ended in the Texas Hill Country, forecasters are now watching a network of major rivers in the region that will rush south over the weekend.
Devil’s River in southwest Texas is expected to reach a major flooding stage Saturday morning, according to National Weather Service forecasts, and could rise up to 22 feet. The Rio Grande is expected to reach that same level Sunday morning.
In the coming days, water levels are expected to rise at southern parts of the Nueces River and the Frio River, reaching major flood stages, according to National Weather Service forecasts. Additionally, Nueces County, by the Gulf, is not expected to reach major flooding stages until Tuesday.
Gov. Greg Abbott on Friday warned residents to remain on high alert, as very little rainfall could quickly become dangerous.
“The worst of the rain is behind us,” Abbott said. “But … very importantly … for a while, as in for days, the rivers are going to continue to rise because of the flow of water downstream. Residents and leaders need to understand the rivers will still rise and still pose life-threatening danger to anybody near those rivers.”
According to weather forecasts, the Frio River will likely crest when it reaches Derby, about 59 miles south of Uvalde. The Nueces River could crest for a longer period of time, forecasters said, as it accumulated more water from the heavy rainfall earlier in the week.
The rain that battered northern Uvalde, western Kerr and Edward counties has let up. Minimal rain is expected to fall in the central Texas region this weekend and residents will likely instead see high hea0t indexes, forecasters said.
“We’ve got a pretty good handle on how those rivers are going to be behaving over the next few days,” said Harrison Tran, a forecaster with the National Weather Service’s San Antonio and Austin office. “Sometimes the rate of rise can be quick, but it’s not a flash flood in the sense that it’s not immediate. The heavy rain falls, and then within a few hours, the rivers and streams respond. This is more of a gradual rise over the course of several hours or days.”
State officials warn rivers could still rise
Even as the rain lets up, officials on Friday said they still expect floodwaters moving downstream to cause rivers to rise and threaten surrounding communities.
“We want everyone just for the next 24 to 48 hours to be fully aware of the danger that water can provide to your life right now,” Gov. Greg Abbott said at a press conference in Uvalde on Friday.
The Nueces River, which snakes around Uvalde, is currently one of the greatest threats, Abbott said. The state has already deployed thousands of first responders and vehicles, as well as boats and aircraft, leading to rescues of about 270 people. Local officials in the Uvalde and Zavala regions have rescued an additional 300 people in the area.
“It’s still a very dynamic situation where we had days of 10 or 15 inches of rain. Another day of one or two inches of rain could produce equally catastrophic impacts,“ W. Nim Kidd, the chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, said. “So we are not out of this fight yet.”
Abbott also declared a major disaster declaration on Friday, opening the door to federal aid to help rebuild after the floods. The disaster declaration will include at least 28 counties hit hardest by the floods.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.
