Brazos River crest could match 1957 record

A jeep flies down a flooded street in the Rio Vista neighborhood Tuesday, May 31, 2016 in Richmond. A jeep flies down a flooded street in the Rio Vista neighborhood Tuesday, May 31, 2016 in Richmond. Photo: Michael Ciaglo, Houston Chronicle Photo: Michael Ciaglo, Houston Chronicle Image 1 of / 150 Caption Close Brazos River crest could match 1957 record 1 / 150 Back to Gallery

John Laib drove his pregnant fiancee through floodwaters on Monday to reach the hospital where his 10-pound daughter was born.

On Tuesday, he had to use a boat to return to his home near Sienna Plantation and get the baby's bassinet. He had heard the floodwaters might keep him away for weeks.

Laib and his family were among thousands of residents in Fort Bend County and environs affected by record flooding on the Brazos River, with more heavy rains expected in the next five days.

More flooding along the river is likely. Rain is in the forecast this week, and the huge Brazos River crest could match a 1957 record.

Widespread showers are forecast to start Thursday morning and continue into the weekend. Flash flooding is possible.

In addition, Lamar Consolidated Independent School District announced on Twitter that it was canceling Wednesday classes for Austin, Frost and Jackson elementary schools. All other schools and offices will be open on Wednesday.

Emergency management teams in Fort Bend and other suburban counties raced Tuesday to brace against the worst and struggled to help get residents out of harm's way.

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The Brazos River reached above 54 feet at 7:15 p.m. Tuesday in Richmond, the county seat located in central Fort Bend. This was almost four feet above a record set in 1994, according to the National Weather Service.

While emergency officials kept an eye on the rising waters, they continued evacuations for areas farther down the river in Fort Bend, like the Brazos Bend State Park and nearby communities, where the water would make its way in a day or two.

Farther still, residents in Brazoria County, too, packed up and left their homes, with the high river levels expected to reach them late this week just as more rain would begin to fall.

To the northwest and up-river, in Simonton, water levels were believed to be going down after several days of the Brazos at its peak, a precursor of what was to come, said Lach Mullen, of the Fort Bend County office of emergency management.

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"That is a little concerning for us," Mullen said. "If it's just started to recede there and it's just starting to rise here, we've got a long road ahead of us."

Just as other communities had already been cut off and flooded, areas along the river as it wound past Richmond toward Laib's home would risk of losing access to and from their communities for days, Mullen said.

"That story continues as you follow the river south," Mullen said.

Seeing images of the water rising near a park in Richmond, 72-year-old Bill Hancock came by Tuesday afternoon to check on a resident he'd met there the week before.

Water had already blocked off the entryway to the man's home. The man, who didn't want his name used, said he was planning to get out as soon as he could lock up the back door, where he was installing a new latch.

Satisfied the 69-year-old resident would be safe, Hancock left, but many more people milled about taking photos. Minutes later, a few more friends came by, shouting hello.

"Everybody's coming," the man said from his doorway, amused. "I'm trying to go!"

Many families in rural areas of Brazoria County near the Brazos River were evacuating, but not everyone.

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Mike Wittwer, 63, intended to ride out the flood in his trailer with his 31-year-old son and his 18-year-old grandson. He lives at the end of an unpaved road in the section of the Riverside Estates subdivision closest to the river. Although he admitted to some uncertainty, Wittwer believed his trailer was high enough off the ground to stay.

"We've never been through one like this one is supposed to be," Wittwer said.

Wittwer had sent his daughter and three granddaughters to stay with friends in Pasadena until it is safe to return. His other daughter, Sonja Teets, 41, lives 100 yards away with her husband, Wesley, and two teenage sons.

"We're staying," Teets said.

To prepare, Teets' husband and neighbor had used a backhoe to make a dirt wall nearly 3 feet high around the small house. Both Teets' and Wittwer's families stored water and food to last at least two weeks and had propane and candles on hand to use if they lost power.

The Teets harvested their garden and were canning tomatoes and making hot sauce to add to their stores.

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"We piled in food and everything," Sonja Teets said. "We're good."

Still, the area's first casualty of the rising river could be seen nearby, where the water had claimed a mobile home.

The west fork of the San Jacinto River, meanwhile, was expected to remain in major flood stage near Humble through Wednesday morning. The river flooded areas in Atascocita and Kingwood that usually don't get high water, said Houston City Councilman Dave Martin, whose district includes neighborhoods around Lake Houston. With the surge of water from the San Jacinto, Lake Houston was at capacity Tuesday. City officials asked recreational boaters to stay away because of debris and the problems their vessels' wakes could cause for properties on the water's edge.

"We can't take any more water in that lake," Martin said.

Upstream in Montgomery County, residents were cleaning up after days of extraordinary rain, with as many as 16 inches falling between Thursday and Saturday in some places. Officials said they had received roughly 300 reports of damaged or destroyed homes, but the toll was expected to increase with assessments still underway.

A few neighborhoods, including the Timber Ridge/Timber Lakes subdivision just south of The Woodlands, flooded for the second time within five weeks.

"It's a shame to see what's happened to these people," said Montgomery County Judge Craig Doyal, who made his second request for federal aid since mid-April. "Some of them were in the process of repairing of their homes from earlier flood damage. It's unbelievable."

The county had dried enough by Tuesday that only one emergency shelter remained open, the First United Methodist Church in Conroe, but there were concerns of more damage to come from the heavy rainfall predicted.

"With the ground saturated and creeks as full as they are, it won't take much to cause problems," Doyal said. "We're keeping an eye to the skies to see what happens next."

Reporter Matthew Tresaugue contributed to this report