Flash Flood — Jefferson, Texas

2017-08-27 to 2017-08-30 · near Griffing, Jefferson, Texas

Event narrative

Widespread and long duration rainfall produced a storm total rainfall over 40 inches across a large portion of the county. The highest rainfall totals in Jefferson County were 60.58 inches 1.5 mile southwest of Nederland and 60.54 inches 1.3 mile north of Groves. This resulted in over 64,000 homes being flooded. The hardest hit areas were Port Arthur, Groves, Bevil Oaks, Hamphire, Fannet, China, and northeast Beaumont. Several refineries in the county also received floodwaters and were offline for an extended period. City and county infrastructure was also damaged with water pumps and treatment plants being inundated. Record crests were observed along Pine Island and the lower Neches. 5 deaths were reported by flooding.

Wider weather episode

Harvey moved across the Gulf of Mexico into the central Texas Coast during the last week of August. After the initial landfall, the cyclone moved back into the gulf a couple days later and then made another landfall in Southwest Louisiana during the morning of the 30th. The first rains from the system moved across the region during the afternoon of the 25th and finally ended during the morning of September 1. One to 5 feet of rain fell across Southeast Texas during the week which in some cases was slightly more than a normal yearly rainfall total. Widespread flooding occurred and a new rainfall record was set regarding the total for a tropical cyclone in the United States.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (29.7808, -93.9376)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 719342. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.