CBS News Contributor and former Face the Nation Host Bob Schieffer praises Texans' urge to help others and says his home state will overcome the staggering destruction Hurricane Harvey brought.
Houston, Texas—Thousands of homes near Lake Houston were flooded after Hurricane Harvey struck in late August. Harvey was the first major hurricane to make landfall in the U.S. in more than a decade and the wettest on record, displacing more than 30,000 people and causing at least 47 deaths.
Preliminary estimates suggest the storm could be the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history, with a price tag of up to $190 billion.
Harvey’s drenching rains are moving east after days over the Houston area. Which means that in America’s fourth-largest city, floodwaters have begun to creep down—offering a first look at the storm’s real legacy of destruction.
Harvey’s drenching rains are moving east after days over the Houston area. Which means that in America’s fourth-largest city, floodwaters have begun to creep down—offering a first look at the storm’s real legacy of destruction.
According to FEMA data, only 20 percent of the people in the hardest-hit areas have flood insurance. Homeowners whose houses were flooded may be able to get grants from FEMA, but those grants are only available to people whose homes are completely unlivable, and they typically cover only a fraction of repair costs. Homeowners can apply for a federal loan to cover the cost of rebuilding, which effectively means taking out a second mortgage on their homes. Tens of thousands may decide to relocate altogether. But right now, all of those decisions are impossibly remote, and for the families venturing out of Houston’s shelters, there’s one consuming imperative: assess the damage.
Drones captured breathtaking images of the devastating floods caused by Hurricane Harvey in Houston, where more than 20 inches of rain have fallen between Aug. 24 and Aug. 28. Aerial footage provides a stark contrast between Houston highways in June of this year, when sunshine beamed down on clear roads, and the drowned roadways shown on Aug. 28. Tropical Storm Harvey continued to batter the area with rain and flooding. The storm also had a great impact on parts of Louisiana.