Tropical Storm Edouard knocks out power across Southeast Texas counties as it continues heading inland
By Emily Foxhall and Stephen Simpson, The Texas Tribune
August 31, 2026
HOUSTON — Over 70,000 homes and businesses are without power in Texas as Tropical Storm Edouard moves inland over the Gulf Coast, according to PowerOutage.com. Nighttime flooding remains a threat as the storm moves deeper into the state.
Most of those outages — more than 47,000 — were in Jefferson County which sits on the Gulf Coast and is home to Beaumont and Port Arthur. That number of Jefferson outages had climbed dramatically and quickly after the storm washed ashore. Another 13,000 customers are estimated to be without power in nearby Orange County, and nearly 15,000 customers have been without power in Hardin County.
Wind gusts from the tropical storm can affect how quickly crews can make repairs, and it’s currently unknown when power will be restored to most customers in southeast Texas.
“While high winds, flooding, and other conditions can make restoration more challenging, our teams will continue to work to reach all areas affected by the storm as soon as it is safe to do so,” Frank Shannon, vice president of reliability for Entergy Texas, one of the main power providers for the region, said in a news release.
Tropical Storm Edouard’s main threat is rainfall, with the Neches River at Saltwater Barrier nearing flood stage over the past couple of hours and the Beaumont/Port Arthur Southeast Texas Regional Airport recording two inches of rain Tuesday afternoon.
The tropical storm made landfall Tuesday afternoon just east of the Texas-Louisiana border, bringing increasing threats of heavy rain and expected flash flooding to southeast Texas.
Radar indicated the storm made landfall near Johnson Bayou, Louisiana, at 2:20 p.m., according to the National Hurricane Center.
Tropical storm warnings were in effect along coastal areas from Bolivar Peninsula east to Louisiana, with expected sustained winds of 20 to 30 miles per hour inland and gusts of up to 40 mph.
The current National Weather Service forecast says the storm could drop three to six inches of rain Tuesday into Wednesday as it moves inland in a northwest direction, with the highest potential rainfall falling over a swath stretching from the Bolivar area, through the eastern Houston region to Huntsville.
Some isolated spots could receive a whopping 10 to 15 inches of rain, forecasters said. And some could see rainfall rates of 3 to 4 inches an hour. The National Hurricane Center said the rain is likely to produce flash flooding, especially in low-lying and urban areas, and river flooding is possible.
“Where those heavier rainfall totals occur, flash flooding will be possible,” Jimmy Fowler, warning coordination meteorologist with the National Weather Service Houston/Galveston office, said in a webinar on Tuesday.
The likelihood of parts of the southern piney woods region in East Texas receiving more than 10 inches of rain had increased to 10% to 25%, according to the local National Weather Service office.
The storm’s maximum sustained winds were estimated around 60 mph with stronger gusts as it reached land. A wind gust of 71 mph and sustained wind of 57 mph were recorded near Texas, according to the National Hurricane Center. Forecasters predicted the storm would weaken rapidly as it moved inland.
Because of Edouard’s relatively small size, tropical storm-level winds were only expected 25 miles from the center.
The state has deployed rescue aircraft, boats and high water vehicles and the state’s emergency operations center has been activated, along with 1,500 state personnel, Gov. Greg Abbott said at a news conference on Monday. He urged people to prepare and stay vigilant.
“We have seen too often vehicles being swept away,” Abbott said. “It is so incredibly important for anybody in any region of the state, but especially in Harris County, to avoid driving into what appears to be waters on the roadway.”
Houston leaders said Tuesday they were closing dozens of flood-prone roadways and expected the worst impacts east of Interstate 45. The city also lowered Lake Houston by a foot below full to absorb possible floodwater, city leaders said.
City officials urged people to stay off the roads if they could, especially at night.
“Please keep in mind this is a tropical air mass that’s moving in here — very humid, very moist,” said Brian Mason, the city’s emergency management coordinator. “We could have very high rainfall rates.”
Harris County officials urged residents in a social media post to get to a safe location by 2 or 3 p.m.
Some Houston-area school districts had announced closures Tuesday due to potential flooding, including Channelview, Galena Park and Humble.
The storm struck the Texas coast less than two months after days of heavy rains hit the southwest portion of the state, from San Antonio west to the U.S.-Mexico border, causing widespread flooding in places such as Uvalde, Crystal City, Kerrville, which suffered massive flash flooding in July 2025 that left at least 119 people in the surrounding county dead.
Major federal funds have still not been approved to help people and local governments rebuild from this year’s flooding.
Officials were also watching the potential for Edouard’s’s winds to ignite fires. Amid hot, dry conditions, the state has battled major fires this month, including the Ross Fire, which had burned more than 90,000 acres as of Monday and was already one of the largest wildfires recorded in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
Edouard didn’t start to show potential Texas impacts until Sunday morning, giving the state less time than usual to prepare, said Orlando Alanis, assistant agency director for the Texas Division of Emergency Management. Typically, the state has five to seven days of lead time to get ready for hurricanes, he said.
Federal forecasters elevated it from a tropical depression to a tropical storm Monday evening. They were watching for potential strengthening and hurricane conditions overnight and into Tuesday before it made landfall.
“This is our first big storm of the season,” Alanis said. “And I’ll tell you, Texas is prepared.”
Megan Menchaca contributed to this story.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.