Heavy rain and booming thunderstorms hit the greater Houston area overnight into Wednesday morning, and thousands of homes across Texas are still feeling the effects.
CenterPoint Energy reported more than 18,000 outages across Houston and the surrounding area as of 8 a.m. CT on Wednesday morning, with the greatest collection of outages occuring north of Houston in the Humble, and Greenspoint areas. CenterPoint shared a note to customers on social media at 5 a.m. CT on Monday, noting “our enhanced workforce of frontline workers and contractors are continuing to work overnight to restore power as thunderstorms are forecasted to continue through the morning hours.”
CenterPoint reports 99 percent of its customers have power as of Wednesday morning despite the nearly 20,000 outages.
The outages Wednesday morning are largely the result of severe wet weather in Houston and the surrounding area, a common theme across the last week. The National Weather Service reported Tuesday night the chance of strong wind gusts of up to 40-to-60 miles per hour overnight, with rainfall totals that could near three inches across the city. But the worst of this week’s weather now appears to be in the rearview mirror.
Per Space City Weather’s Eric Berger, the thunderstorms overnight are expected to be the “final serious disturbance for awhile,” with only “light to moderate” rain expected to fall during morning commutes across Houston. Clearning skies are expected Wednesday afternoon, and Thursday should be a sunny day in Houston before a warming period through the weekend. Street flooding is still possible in Houston on Wednesday, though that risk should subside by late Wednesday afternoon as temperatures continue to rise.