Flood Risk on the Bend

This update is later than I usually like, but I have been trying to work through some of the elevations we are seeing on the western side of the County versus what we have seen at San Felipe in Richmond. That will be covered more in my recap of this flood event in the next few days, but here is today’s summary…

The Brazos River in Hempstead peaked yesterday around 2:30 PM near Gage Elevation 47.32 and has fallen about 2.5 feet since the peak. San Felipe has slowly continued to rise this morning, but overall it appears to be cresting near Gage Elevation 119.7.

The Richmond Gage is currently at Gage Elevation 45.55 feet. The 1:11 PM forecast was increased slightly to Gage Elevation 45.8 feet occurring tomorrow morning. Similar to other events and other forecasts, we could continue to see the Richmond Forecast change slightly, but overall, the NWS believes the Brazos River in Richmond is near its peak.

At the current elevations, the low lying areas on the western side of Fort Bend County have become inundated with flood water with water entering what is referred to has the Frydek Bottom in Austin County. Based on some of the preliminary information, the current elevations in portions of western Fort Bend County is around 3 to 4 feet below the 2015 Flood Event and about 7 to 10 feet below the 2017 Hurricane Harvey Flood Event.

While the Brazos River is up, we continue to watch for any potential rain. Overall our rain chances for the next 7 days has remained unchanged. The next 7 days is forecasted to be sunny to partly cloudy skies with low chances for rain. The only exception is that we could see some additional rain on Friday as another system blows through. The good news is that the estimated rainfall totals for Fort Bend County has been reduced to around 6 inches on Friday. We will all need to continue to watch for any changes in this forecast, especially while the Brazos River is elevated.

Please continue to follow the official forecasts by the West Gulf River Forecast Center (WGRFC), the NWS Houston-Galveston Office, and notices from the Fort Bend County Office of Emergency Management for more information.