HURRICANE HARVEY DEVASTATES TEXAS, CUTS POWER TO NEARLY 300K TEXAS CUSTOMERS!

Texas officials have begun to survey the damage Hurricane Harvey has spawned on the region with one mayor stating the massive storm has left “widespread devastation” in his community.

Rockport Mayor Charles “C.J.” Wax told the Weather Channel on Saturday that the storm hit his community “right on the nose” and left “widespread devastation.”

Wax said emergency response for the city of about 10,000 people has been hampered by the loss of cellphone service and other forms of communication.

The storm, which has been downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane early Saturday, dumped more than a foot of rain in some areas, spawned heavy winds, tornadoes, fires and widespread power outages across southern Texas.

The storm has knocked out power to nearly 300,000 customers along the Texas coast, according to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. Emergency personnel in the communities northeast of Corpus Christi where Harvey made landfall are reporting loss of cellphone service and other forms of communication.

Behind the giant storm, the largest to hit Texas in more than a decade, production on oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico remained halted, coastal refineries were idle and thousands of cruise ship customers waited offshore until their vessels were able to dock safely.