Hurricane Beryl made landfall near the city of Matagorda in Texas early Monday morning as a Category 1 hurricane, pounding the region with torrential rain, life-threatening storm surge flooding and ferocious winds that knocked out power to more than 1.5 million customers and left at least one person dead.
Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that a tree fell onto a home in the Kings River Village area, trapping a man under the debris.
Gonzalez said the man was reportedly sitting inside the home with his family riding out Hurricane Beryl when a large tree fell onto the home. His wife and children were unharmed.
“Life-threatening storm surge and heavy rainfall is ongoing across portions of Texas,” the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in their 5 a.m. CT update. “Damaging winds ongoing along the coast, with strong winds moving inland.”
Beryl’s peak sustained winds have dropped slightly from 80 mph at landfall to 75 mph as the storm swirled about 30 miles southwest of Houston, as of the 8 a.m. CT update.
The cyclone’s powerful hurricane-force winds are leading to skyrocketing power outages. Over 1.5 million electrical customers in Texas have lost power, according to Centerpoint Energy’s outage page, and the numbers continue to rise.
Gusts have hit 94 mph in Freeport, 86 mph in Matagorda City, 81 mph in Palacios and at an elevated station in Houston, 78 mph in Galveston, 84 mph at Houston Hobby Airport and and 60 mph at Houston Intercontinental Airport.
“I’m ready for Beryl to chill out,” FOX Weather Meteorologist Britta Merwin said while sheltering with a FOX Weather crew in an SUV near Surfside Beach.
“It’s insane how long we’ve been in these strong winds because we’re on the ‘dirty side’ and right side of the circulation. … We have not had a break. It’s been over an hour and half of winds that are gusting easily between 80 and 90 mph, and our car just continues to shake.”
Numerous Hurricane Warnings, Storm Surge Warnings and Tropical Storm Warnings were posted ahead of the storm’s arrival and are still in effect for the Texas Gulf Coast. A threat of tornadoes also prompted a Tornado Watch for the region.
