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CNN Saturday Morning News

Water Levels Stabilize in Texas

Aired July 06, 2002 - 09:20   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MEADE: The weather forecast for central and south Texas calls for showers, but that could be good news. The region certainly doesn't need more heavy rains anyway, after surging flood waters ripped some houses off of their foundations. What a sight!

Let's talk now to CNN's Ed Lavandera. He's joining us now from New Braunfels, Texas.

Ed, good morning. Obviously we can see the water behind you, still very high. How's it looking there?

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it looks really bad at this point, but what we're being told by officials here in New Braunfels is that this is as bad as it's going to get. Water levels might fluctuate a little bit between over the course of the day here, but water levels should be about as bad as it gets right here.

This is the Guadalupe River. It's supposed to be a nice little river that flows down by that tree line. This is an area where people are known to just jump in inner tubes and spend the Fourth of the July weekend just kind of meandering down the river here. But obviously that's not going to be happening this year.

That current out there, I don't know if it captures it on the video images, but that current is incredibly strong out there. You can get a good sense over here by these homes that are just kind of teetering on the edge here of flooding out. Well, one of them here to the right is flooding up. But you can see that that stream of water and just the current that's being forced between these homes here.

Behind these houses, their back yards are completely flooded out. We're being told that along this stretch of the Guadalupe River, about 200 homes have been flooded out at this point. We go to our second camera, just around the corner here, and just shows you just how much damage has been done to this area.

There's a lot of water. We're being told that water continues to spill over the Canyon Lake Dam, which is about 20, 25 miles northwest of New Braunfels.

And all of this water has to go somewhere. So what's happening is, it's coming out of the lake and heading downstream, so towns like here in New Braunfels, the homes that are along the river here, are in danger, obviously, and a lot of the people here have been evacuated over the course of the last week. And a lot of other towns downstream, Seguin (ph) and Victoria, about 100 miles down, downstream from this.

All of this water headed toward the Gulf of Mexico. It's got to go somewhere. And so but we're being told that the water levels are rising up a little bit, but out of the lake, but a lot of this water's starting to come down, and we're being told this is about as bad as it's going to get here.

So a lot of people here waiting to see what's going to happen over the course of today, and see what kind of damage they'll be returning home to later today -- Robin.

MEADE: You just can't imagine seeing your own house in that same circumstance. Feel so sorry for those folks.

There's also folks who are concerned about cracks in the Medina Dam. Can you update us on that?

LAVANDERA: Well, that's another situation we're watching closely as well today. The Medina Dam is just northwest of the San Antonio area. New Braunfels is about halfway between Austin and San Antonio. So the Medina Dam is further south.

And a lot of people, there will be more flooding along that river today as well as the water continues to spill over that dam. But there had been some reports that there were some cracks in the dam. I'm being told by the sheriff in that county that the cracks have been there for a long time, it's an old dam, it's nothing to be afraid of. And the dam will be fine.

But there are a lot of people paying close attention to that, although that doesn't mean that there won't be any more flooding. They -- people there have been evacuated again for a second day in a row, and there will be more flooding in that area. The video image from there quite amazing as the water spills out over that dam and rushes downstream. So a lot of people watching that closely as well.

Thousands of people in central Texas have been evacuated. Remember, this is a very popular area for Fourth of July weekend. Lot of cameras, and people just coming to hang out and enjoy themselves. The hills, Texas hill country's known for this type of activity in the Fourth of July weekend, and so a lot of people's plans have been drowned out, and, well, and also a lot of homes damaged, and several lives lost here over the course of the last week as well -- Robin.

MEADE: Ed Lavandera, thank you for that update there.

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