historic. it s epic, what happened. but, you know what, it happened in texas. and texas can handle anything. thank you all, folks. thank you. thank you. more shelters are opening, the houston convention center took in 9,000 people when it planned to take in half of that. the nrg center has opened last night. some of the infrastructure is coming back line. the airport expected to reopen today. and bush enter continental opening thursday. joining us from galveston, nbc s sarah dal joseph off is there. you re saying demands for shelters are increasing. reporter: that s exactly right. when one goes down another comes up. a light rain falling here in galveston. but it s nothing compared to yesterday where they received more than eight inches, eight inches of rain. now, they re working to get some
dam live in richmond texas. we should mention some good news. the nrg center has opened up their doors. they say 10,000 residents could fit in the new the shelter that s some good news amidst a lot of bad. they need all the space they can get. as harvey makes landfall again it is set to pick up speed and move out of the area a bit faster. let s bring in meteorologist karen mcguinness. yes we ve got the basin, the big water shed that is harris county and the surrounding county. here is the houston area. i point in out because in was the target for the last four or five days. but now we re shifting some of that a little bit further towards the east and to the north. in the beaumont/part arthur area. but just to refresh everybody s idea of just how much rainfall occurred they can see all the
understand one enormous shelter open up late last night. that was the toyota and nrg center that has opened up recently. the capacity is 18,000 people. it s incredible to witness what s happening here on the ground in harris county, the areas surrounding houston but i ve got to point this out to you and to everyone watching this morning. we ve been on the ground here at the brazos river for hours. there s a fence. that was completely exposed when we arrived here six hours ago and now it s about halfway inundated with water. you can see some of the households behind me too that have been impacted by this flood water. the rain has stopped here but the threat is not over because the water that has dumped into this region. over 15 trillion gallons of water, enough to fill up the great lakes another foot is still racing down the rivers and
land. in galveston, texas, thank you. let s get back to houston where nbc reporter julia bagg is standing by at the nrg center. julia, you ve been with us the past couple days as we ve been having special coverage of hurricane harvey. you ve been at the shelters as well. hour the evacuees faring at the nrg center considering that it just opened late last night? reporter: that s right, things up and running in a hurry here. just in the last 5 1/2 hours or so, they went from zero to 900 evacuees here in the shelter right now. this, a much bigger center than that convention center in downtown houston, able to hold up to 10,000. able to accommodate people much more comfortably now. we can tell you that that they as a resulted off with 30 volunteers 5 1/2 hours ago. they now have more than 700 volunteers, people coming in from all around houston. i just talked to a man who
they will be calling shelters like this home for the foreseeable future. are they still processing people, phillip? i know they were expecting 5,000, they had to take 9,000 and they have opened other shelters. if people show up, are they taking them in? they re not turning anybody down. if they come here, they will be processed. they have the option of heading over to the toyota center where the houston rockets play. that s right next door. that s another place they opened up to give a little more room because they had only been set up for 5,000 as you mentioned and they doubled the capacity as well as nrg center next to nrg stadium where the texans play. that is another shelter that has opened up. so they are preparing for just another influx of evacuees. phillip mena, thank you for that. harvey hovering over western louisiana bringing heavy winds and more rain to an already drenched region just as new orleans is marking 12 years since hurricane katrina.