Tropical Storm Beta weakened overnight but was still expected to soak the Texas coast on Monday and later threaten the Texas and Louisiana coasts with a potentially deadly storm surge, the National Hurricane Center said.
The center of the 23rd named storm of this year’s Atlantic hurricane season was about 70 miles (110 km) southeast of Port O’Connor, Texas, or about 120 miles (190 km) south-southwest of the critical oil port of Galveston, Texas, the hurricane center said in its 7 a.m. CDT (1200 GMT) update.
Some streets in Galveston’s commercial district were closed to flooding and heavy surf ripped away a portion of a fishing pier in the coastal city.
The storm was moving westward toward shore at 6 mph (9 kph), a slow pace that increased the danger of flooding, and forecast to make landfall on the central Texas coast later on Monday.
The storm brought gusty winds and rains to Houston on Monday, and strong seas prompted the U.S. Coast Guard to close the ports of Houston, Galveston, Freeport and Texas City.
Forecasters issued a storm surge warning for hundreds of miles of coastline, meaning there was a danger of deadly flooding from rising water moving inland. Galveston Bay was well within the danger zone, though New Orleans was outside the watch or warning areas.
Even so, heavy rainfall was likely through much of Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi over the next five days, with some areas due to get upwards of 10 inches (25 cm) of rain, or perhaps as much as 15 inches (38 cm) in isolated spots, the hurricane center said.
Slow-moving storms that deluge coasts are becoming a regular occurrence, a development that scientists attribute to climate change.
This month marks only the second time in history that the sheer number of storms has forced forecasters to turn to the Greek alphabet for names, having exhausted their alphabetical list of names selected before the season began. The first year that storms exceeded given names was 2005, when there were a record 27 named storms.
Beta is the third named storm in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico in less than a month, following Laura and Sally.
Forecasters were also tracking Hurricane Teddy in the Atlantic Ocean as it moved east of Bermuda on a northerly path toward Nova Scotia.
Strong winds could be expected in parts of Maine and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia on Tuesday and Wednesday.
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