If you lived in the south in late June or early July of 1989, you probably remember Tropical Storm Allison slamming into the coast roughly this week, 30 years ago.
Most people don’t take tropical storms as seriously as a hurricane, but Allison made them rethink this when she dumped an incredible amount of rain in a short amount of time, destroying businesses and causing millions in damage.
Meteorologists initially started tracking it in mid-June and qualified as a tropical depression in the Gulf of Mexico on the 24th. Allison wasn’t classified as a tropical storm until the 26th when it was just off the coast of Texas.
Allison made landfall in Freeport, Texas on the 27th, weakening it to a tropical depression. It was classified as ‘Extra-Tropical’ on the 28th as it continued to move up the coast and into the US.
At the beginning of July, Allison decided to ruin thousands of July 4th plans when it sat stationary over Kentucky, Illinois, and Indiana, dumping water and storm conditions on the states. By July 7th Allison had dissipated over Arkansas.
Peak winds of Allison reached only 50mph, small when you consider how hard-hitting a hurricane in the same area can be. But the main reason Allison was damaging wasn’t just winds, but water.
Some areas of East Texas reported more than 30 inches of water during the course of Allison’s landfall, causing over 6,00 homes to suffer damage and forcing hundreds of residents to evacuate. 3 deaths were reported in the state because of drowning directly due to Allison’s flooding, which was worse than originally reported.
Along the Trinity Bay, a northeast portion of Galveston Bay in Texas, the ride reached a staggering high, rising 7 feet over normal levels. The surrounding areas were underwater for days until it could dry out and drain.
The estimated damage in Texas alone from Allison was somewhere between $200 and $400 million.
Louisiana was also hit hard by Allison’s landfall. One area experienced a reported 30 inches of rain from June 26th to July 1st, a massive amount of water to collect. Thousands of homes were damaged and people attempted to evacuate, but many were trapped. In Shreveport, riverboats were able to sail over the top of a bridge that was completely underwater.
11 in total died across several states, most of them due to drowning. Allison was an incredibly damaging tropical storm that did not act as those storms usually do, causing predictions to be wrong. Tropical Storm Allison still ranks as one of the most damaging storms to never make it to hurricane status.
