Hurricane Harvey made landfall as a Category 4 storm in Texas late Friday, bringing with it 130-mph winds and unleashing flash floods, storm surges and up to three feet of rain.
Harvey is the first major hurricane — classified as Category 3 or above — to hit the USA since Hurricane Wilma in 2005.
"This is going to be a very major disaster," said Gov. Greg Abbott, who declared a State of Disaster for 30 counties and requested 700 National Guard members to be activated. Abbott announced late Friday that federal authorities granted his request for emergency disaster relief associated with the expected damage from Harvey.
He warned of record-setting flooding in multiple regions of the state and urged people to get out of harm's way. “You don’t want to put yourself in a situation where you could be subject to a search and rescue.”
Some forecasts are calling for as much as a mind-boggling 60 inches (that's five feet) of rain from Harvey.
As many as 1.25 million Texans could lose power from the storm, according to forecast models at Texas A&M University.
With some 700,000 people living in the hurricane warning zone — roughly half of them around Corpus Christi — traffic backups tied up heavily traveled roads such as Interstate 37 as people move toward San Antonio and other inland locations.
Fueled by the warm Gulf waters, Harvey jumped within hours from a Category 2 to Category 4 hurricane on Friday.