Cat 1 Hurricane Nicholas Makes Landfall On Texas Coast, Multiple Nuclear Power Plants In Path
Hurricane Nicholas made landfall early Tuesday morning on the Matagorda Peninsula just south of Houston, Texas. Nicholas hit the area as a Category 1 but has since been downgraded to a tropical storm with maximum sustained winds of 70 mph. Oil refiners, chemical makers, grain exporters, and even multiple nuclear power plants are in its path.
Ahead of Nicholas’ arrival, two major oil export terminals either suspended or restricted vessel traffic. Port authorities in Corpus Christi halted inbound sailing; Ports in Houston and other surrounding areas restricted vessel traffic. Preparations for the storm included oil companies evacuating offshore oil/gas platforms and hunkering down land-based operations.
What’s on our radar this morning is the storm passing over the nuclear power station southwest of Bay City, Texas, about 90 miles southwest of Houston. The 12,200-acre site is home to South Texas Project Electric Generating Station. The storm is forecasted to arrive in oil and gas heavy Houston around 1800 local time.
At the moment, about 340,000 customers are without power in Southeast Texas.
Storm impacts and energy outages could be problematic for COVID hotspots.
Nicholas emerged on our radar last Friday as a tropical wave over Honduras, the western Caribbean Sea, and has since organized and strengthened into a hurricane and now downgraded to a tropical storm.
The National Hurricane Center (NHC) expects storm surges of 2 to 5 feet and up to 18 inches of rain in some areas over southeast Texas. Some of these areas are crammed with industrial facilities, and even coastal neighborhoods could be prone to flooding. One area to watch for flooding is Houston:
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