Storms batter Houston, leaving at least 4 dead

Four people were killed and nearly 1 million customers along the Gulf Coast were without power Friday after intense thunderstorms swept through Texas the night before, bringing heavy rain, destructive winds and dangerous flooding to portions of the state that had already been inundated this month.

The storm blew out windows, caved in the wall of a building and downed power lines across Houston as powerful winds tore through the downtown area. Of the people who died, at least two were killed by falling trees, and one was killed in an accident involving a crane that toppled over in strong winds, according to Samuel Peña, the city’s fire chief.

The National Weather Service said survey teams had determined that a tornado touched down near Cypress, Texas, just northwest of Houston on Thursday night.

Teams were surveying other areas around Houston, including downtown, to see if the damage there had been caused by a tornado or strong winds, said Hayley Adams, a weather service meteorologist in Houston.

As officials began to clean up the damage, Houston Mayor John Whitmire said at a news conference Friday morning that investigators were trying to determine whether a fifth death was related to the weather.

Whitmire said it could take several weeks for power to be restored to some customers.

Wind gusts in downtown Houston reached speeds of up to 100 mph, rivaling wind speeds recorded during Hurricane Ike, which caused widespread damage across a wide swath of Texas, including in Houston, in 2008.

“It was fierce; it was intense; it was quick,” Whitmire said of the latest storm, “and most Houstonians didn’t have time to place themselves out of harm’s way.”

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in a statement Friday that the Public Utility Commission of Texas was working with energy providers to restore power as quickly as possible.

Houston’s public school district said all schools would be closed Friday. Emergency responders warned people to stay home, saying that many roads were still impassable and that most traffic lights were out across the city. Firefighters still had to remove a live power line from a major highway.

Surveying the damage in downtown Houston with Larry J. Satterwhite, Houston’s acting police chief, and other city officials, Whitmire urged people to avoid the area Friday night.

As of 2 p.m., about 630,000 customers were without power across Texas, most of them in the Houston area, according to Poweroutage.us, which aggregates data from utility companies across the country. CenterPoint Energy, the provider in southeastern Texas, said it had received reports of downed power lines and advised customers that its call centers were overwhelmed. Another 55,000 were without power in Louisiana.

Forecasters warned that the weekend would also bring “sweltering heat” to southern Texas. Temperatures were expected to reach the upper 70s in the Houston area Friday, but those without power, and air conditioning, would experience 90-degree temperatures through the weekend and into next week.

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