HOUSTON – Wednesday marks 23 years since the formation of Tropical Storm Allison, a storm which would go on to heavily impact the Houston area.
While overshadowed in recent years by the incredible rainfall dumped by Harvey, Allison was a devastating storm and was also the first tropical storm that never became a hurricane to have its name retired.
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Tropical Storm Allison started as a disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico in June 2001. In just days, the storm dumped 80% of the area’s average rainfall.
Two million people were affected. Most of the deaths occurred from people walking or drowning in high water.
The National Weather Service issued a Flash Flood Warning three hours before the first fatality, and five hours before the first drowning.
When Allison was finally finished, 41 people were killed across the country, 95,000 cars were flooded and 73,000 homes were damaged. More than 30,000 people were left stranded in shelters and $5 billion in damage was done to property. Greens Bayou saw 27 inches of rain and other places experienced even more flooding.
Locally, 18 people drowned and three people were electrocuted.
An analysis was later done on the path of Allison as it became a storm to remember.
The storm actually began as a tropical wave off Africa on May 21, 2001. Within five days, it had traveled west and over northern South America before continuing west across Central America and into the eastern Pacific on June 1. By June 4, it had moved into the Bay of Campeche and toward Galveston where, by the afternoon of June 5, it officially became Tropical Storm Allison.
As the storm moved inland and quickly lost wind strength and tropical storm status, heavy rainfall records were set within the five days the storm lingered in Southeast Texas. The storm moved north across Houston on June 6, and the next day, Allison stalled near Lufkin as a depression. It took a southwesterly turn on June 8 and by June 9, things began to get even more difficult.
Allison was dropping more than five inches of rain an hour. Incredibly, the storm had more life and from June 9 to June 17, it traveled east/northeast through eight more states killing dozens and causing millions more in damages, becoming the costliest tropical storm in U.S. history.
In all, Allison lasted 27 days and traveled thousands of miles and became a storm for the record books.