Page 8 - Interstate 45 News Today

That is the message from texas officials now. i want to go to ed. he joins us live from galveston. it is just pouring, ed. >> reporter: john, it has been like this, raining like this for several hours here this morning and even over the course of the last 15 hours. these are floodwaters that have essentially emerged here in the last couple hours. just to show you how quickly the situation is deteriorating here on galveston island, this is a main thoroughfare that takes you through. this is broad...

You are. that road behind you, you can tell, completely flooded? >> reporter: yes. were out here on galveston island just off of the main thoroughfa thoroughfare, broadway after nue -- avenue. so much rainfall on galveston island this morning, there are a number of neighborhoods, not all of the island by any means, but a number of neighborhoods that are looking like this. these floodwaters rising very quickly. i spoke with a couple people trying to manage their way and get through these areas he...

Interstate here to get on the service road, just a stream. like you could have thought it was rush hour traffic, just a line of boats making their way back into these neighborhoods. you know, the sun is setting here. and all of those volunteers essentially coming off the water now. that kind of water is simply too dangerous to do. as we were driving through or floating through this neighborhood in one of the flat bottom boats. we were careening over mailboxes and cars that were just below the su...

The best news we can share. it is very difficult, i cant stress enough. we have been herer in one area south of hughouston along interstate 45 but its very difficult. we cant get in the car and manage to drive across town or other neighborhood. the roadways are simply impassable in many of the areas. keep passing along. if you have loved one in there, pass along that information. it will trickle its way down it sounds like. how quickly that happens is hard to say. let me get out of the way here ...

Lavendera whob drove up with jason morris and joe della rosa. the crew was shooting a search answe and rescue mission when they heard a cryi woman crying out fr help for her family. >> how long were you trapped in there? >> all night. >> youve been with your parent? >> mm-hm. >> how have they been holding up? >> pretty good. pretty good. i think pretty good for the circumstances. it is bad. everything is floating. and its bad. >> once they made it back to land we certainly cant call it dry land....

Really busy. lots of people would be going through here to go to work, to take the kids to appointments, whatever. because look, right there interstate 45, this is what takes you to houston. northbound, southbound goes to galveston. hurricane evacuation route. interstate 45 northbound is covered in water. you cant get to houston. when you walk through here you get a sense of how deep the water is and how widespread this is when we are some 27 miles from houston. and you see the pictures coming o...

>> martha: tonight, texas residents desperately trying to escape the rising floodwaters there. foxs trace gallagher is in the middle of it 40 miles north with an update with us tonight from the ground. hi, trace. >> martha: hi, martha. i can tell you houston got a bit less rain today. they would say the outer areas when get less, but weve seen no signs letting this up. you can see later this morning, this parking lot was dry. the cars were also dry. now, theyve got water halfway up. the intersta...

Ed, give us the latest. >> reporter: night has fallen here along interstate 45 and the roadway remains closed. i anticipate it will happen throughout the night. this is looking northbound along the interstate back toward the city of houston. emergency vehicles still out here. thfleet of volunteers who had brought their flat bottom boats or any kind of boat that could get out waters have left for the most part. my indication was many of them were told getting out there at night was just simply no...

Down because of the floodwaters. we were able to get on a boat and make our way into some subdivisions back behind the tree line where hundreds if not thousands of people have been evacuated throughout the day. main mainly rescued bay fleet of volunteers who showed up in the interstaet and turned this roadway into a boat launch. sending boats into the neighborhoods. turning off two, three, four people at a time to rescue them from their homes. it is an unbelievable site to see that rescue effort...

>> reporter: hi, jim. we are in this convoy in dickinson, texas, along interstate 45 with the national guard unit out of dallas, calmed the wolf pack. they are headed into some of these neighborhoods that have been hardest hit by the floodwaters here on the south side of houston. so this is kind of like north galveston county and southern harris county. and we are about to venture into these neighborhoods. not exactly sure exactly what neighborhoods were going to be hitting, or a combination of ...