As Harvey spins towards Louisiana, death toll hits at least 18

Many people are still trapped by rising floodwaters as rescue efforts continue. Harvey is set to make landfall again on Wednesday.

Homes are surrounded by floodwaters from Tropical Storm Harvey on August 29, 2017, in Spring, Texas.
AP

Homes are surrounded by floodwaters from Tropical Storm Harvey on August 29, 2017, in Spring, Texas.

The death toll from Tropical Storm Harvey has reached 18, and authorities expect more bodies will be found as record-breaking rains continue to flood the Gulf Coast of the United States. 

Having made landfall as Hurricane Harvey late on August 24, local officials believe Harvey has left at least 30 bodies in its trail of destruction.

Many people are still trapped by rising floodwaters, and the efforts to rescue them are becoming increasingly desperate.

The storm turning slowly in the Gulf of Mexico has brought catastrophic flooding to Texas.

Photos with pleas for help in finding the missing from Tropical Storm Harvey are being posted and re-tweeted by the thousands as desperate family members seek loved ones who they fear might be dead, but may only have a dead phone.

No official number of missing has been released Tuesday night, but dozens of missing-person photos are circulating on social media. Some are getting results, though not always positive ones.

The family of Ruben Jordan, a 58-year-old retired football and track coach from a Houston-area high school, spread pleas on Twitter and Facebook for 48 hours before they were told he was found dead Tuesday.

AP

Robert Pacheco tries to recover items from his trailer that way damaged in the wake of Harvey on August 29, 2017, in Rockport, Texas.

Houston curfew

The city of Houston, which has been particularly badly hit, imposed an overnight curfew beginning at midnight on Tuesday for an indefinite period amid incidents of looting, armed robberies and people impersonating police officers, city officials said.

The curfew will run from midnight until 5:00 pm. It originally was due to begin at 10:00 pm but the city pushed the start back two hours to allow volunteers to continue working, Mayor Sylvester Turner said in a statement. 

The city is also bringing additional police from other regions.

"You cannot drive, nor be in any public place. We have had problems with armed robberies, with people with guns and firearms," said Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo.

Turner earlier said the city was opening several additional emergency shelters to alleviate crowding at the convention centre, which has 10,000 people. Some of those will be moved to a nearby concert hall and basketball arena.

One shelter will open on the city's west side, near where more than 3,000 homes have been flooded. Another centre in Humble, Texas, will house people from the city's northern suburbs, the mayor added.

President Donald Trump visited Texas on Tuesday to survey damage from the first major natural disaster to test his leadership in a crisis.

TRT World’s Jon Brain reports from Texas.

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Residents near chemical plant evacuated

All residents within 2.4 km of a chemical plant in Crosby, southeast Texas were evacuated on Tuesday as a "precautionary measure" because of the rising risk of an explosion, the local fire marshal's office said in a Twitter message.

Crosby is about 40 km northeast of Houston.

According to a Twitter message from the Harris County Fire Marshal Office:

Earlier on Tuesday, the owner of the plant, Arkema SA, said in a statement the situation at its Crosby plant "has become serious" and evacuated all of its staff from the facility.

"While we do not believe there is any imminent danger, the potential for a chemical reaction leading to a fire and/or explosion within the site confines is real," the company said.

Arkema said the plant has been hit by more than 102 cm of rain, was heavily flooded and without electricity since Sunday. Back-up generators have largely been swamped.

Maintaining refrigeration for chemicals that must be stored at low temperature is key, the company said. After losing generators, workers transferred products from the warehouses into diesel-powered refrigerated containers.

But the floodwaters also compromised the back-up containers, and the company is monitoring temperature levels remotely, it said.

Flooding expected Wednesday

Louisiana’s governor offered to take in Harvey victims from Texas, Televangelist Joel Osteen opened his Houston megachurch, a 16,000-seat former arena, after critics blasted him on social media for not acting to help families displaced by the storm.

Meteorologists said the sprawling city would soon get a chance to dry out.

Tropical Storm Harvey is set to make landfall again on Wednesday near the Texas-Louisiana border, adding more precipitation after a record rainfall that has caused catastrophic flooding and paralysed Houston.

When Harvey returns to land Wednesday, “it’s the end of the beginning,” National Hurricane Center meteorologist Dennis Feltgen said.

Harvey will spend much of Wednesday dropping rain on Louisiana before moving on to Arkansas, Tennessee and parts of Missouri, which could also see flooding.

It is projected to weaken as it moves inland to the northeast and be over Mississippi by Thursday, the National Weather Service said.

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