A swath of East Texas remained under a flash flood watch early Friday as the remnants of Tropical Depression Imelda drifted north after killing at least two people.
Rainfall intensity began to weaken late Thursday, the National Weather Service said, ending a day of about 1,700 combined rescues and evacuations in Harris County alone.
Some of the county’s 4.7 million residents, which includes Houston, might not see waters recede until the weekend, officials said. Authorities planned to work to clear freeways of abandoned vehicles overnight, Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo said.
In Jefferson County, a 19-year-old man drowned and was electrocuted while trying to move his horse during a lightning storm, Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Crystal Holmes said. A man also died after being rescued from a submerged van, Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez tweeted.
More than 40 inches of rain drenched Jefferson County in the past three days, the National Weather Service office in Houston said, making Imelda the seventh wettest tropical cyclone in U.S. history.