RAYMONDVILLE, Texas | Tropical Storm Hermine gave a wet and windy punch to Texas on Tuesday but left only minor scrapes in the storm-weary Rio Grande Valley, which is proving resilient this hurricane season after taking a third tropical system on the chin.
Hermine lost steam after crossing into Texas with tropical storm strength. A peeled-back motel roof in the coastal farming town of Raymondville and scattered power outages were about the worst leftover from the gusty, drenching storm that came and went quickly after creeping up on Texas and Mexico in the warm Gulf waters over the long holiday weekend.
“I think we’re lucky. It could’ve been worse,” said Art Nelson, sizing up the hulking aluminum shed that collapsed on a farming plow at his John Deere store in Raymondville.
Mexico didn’t get off as easy. Hermine knocked out power for several hours in Matamoros and damaged about 20 homes, whose inhabitants were among 3,500 people who evacuated to shelters.
About 1,000 families were still in shelters Tuesday morning. Authorities in Mexico said there were no reports of serious injuries or death, which was welcome news after 12 people in Mexico died in flooding caused by Hurricane Alex earlier this summer.
Texas also had no reports of serious injuries, and evacuation orders weren’t necessary even in the most low-lying regions. It was another sigh of relief for the flood-prone Rio Grande Valley, which got lashed by Alex at the start of the summer and soaked by another tropical system in July.
So damp is the area that only last week did Hidalgo County finally put away its last water-pumping machine. But much of the 5 inches to a foot of rain from Hermine fell harmlessly in the Gulf, and flooding was limited to only minor nuisances.
The storm made landfall early Tuesday in northeastern Mexico with winds of up to 65 mph. Forecasters expect Hermine’s remnants to spread as far north as Oklahoma and Kansas. Flash-flood advisories remained in effect for counties in path of the slowly dissolving storm.
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