gulf with close to 13 million people under flood conditions. "new day" starts right now. welcome to those in the united states and around the world, this is "new day." it is monday, august 28th, 6:00 here in new york. we do begin with the history of the worst kind. unprecedented and catastrophic flooding inundating america's fourth largest city. right now rescuers are still on the clock in the houston area trying to save hundreds of people stranded in floodwaters. officials are asking anyone with a boat to please get out there, help rescue the thousands who are stuck in rising waters. this is obviously an emergency, but remember, this could get worse. the national weather service says tropical storm harvey could dump an additional 15 to 25 inches of rain just this week. the longer that that the water

stays, the worse the health problems will get. >> the americorps began releasing water from two flood-control dams in houston this morning to prevent an even greater disaster. many people are questioning why houston was not evacuated before the storm. federal officials will hold a briefing in the next hour to update all of us on their response to this unfolding disaster. as president trump says he plans let's begin with cnn's alex mark cart live in houston. >> reporter: across the city, roads have turned to rivers, catastrophic flooding, as you mentioned. there's an suv is that is almost completely submerged. a truck right behind that that has also gotten stuck, just to give you a sense of the rainfall, 20 to 25 inches

falling so far on this area with reports of 30 inches in harris county, the most populous county here in houston with much more to come. this is an all-hands-on-deck rescue effort. an additional thousand national guard troops has. the authorities have been telling people to shelter in place, if flooding starts in their homes. they are telling them not to go up in the attics because they skould get stuck there. they're saying get onto the roofs so the helicopters q see yo you. what it means is there will be much more water flooding into the buffalo lie yoo. authorities asking residents along that bayou to evacuate.

when you hear the head of fema say they're going to be in texas for years to come, you can begin to understand that when you see this incredible amount of water. >> everything that water touches will need to be rebuilt. alex, you're a pro, be safe. fwhg that standing water is going to get more and more dangerous. the flooding that's going on in houston evoking images of katrina. thousands of rescued residents seeking refuge in the city's convention center. they're trying to make due and will need more and more as time goes. you have city buses, dump trucks dropping off evacuees being plucked from these swamped neighborhoods. you've got cnn's rosa flores live in houston. rosa, how is it going where you are? >> a lot of intense and stressful moments here, chris, as streets turn to rivers, as

bayous turn to rivers. this is an urban site in houston except it is completely flooded with water. normally you'd see a hill that goes down to the banks of buffalo bayou, that flows out to the gulf of mexico. right now a raging river. testing the infrastructure of this city and also testing the decisions made by politicians here because early on there was disagreement between the democratic mayor and the republican governor in the state of texas regarding evacuations. local leaders asking people to shelter in place, the governor mentioning that maybe people should evacuate. but the mayor defending his position. take a listen. >> the decision we made, it was a smart one, in the best interest of houstonians.

it was the right decision in terms of their safety and always we must put the interest of the city of houston and houstonians first. that's exactly what we did. absolutely no regrets. we're acting according to the plan that we laid out. >> reporter: as we take another live look at at the ridsing waters, we learned 2500 people are in the convention center seeking shelter. i've talked to several of them. harrowing stories we're hearing from them, some mothers telling me they had to walk with their children up in the air with water up to their chest to try to get to higher ground. of course, we're also hearing about the stories from first responders, putting their lives on the line to try to rescue some of these people. >> rosa, my goodness, the videos of these rescues have been so incredible to watch. thank you very much for the

report from them. the storm surge has disseminated places like rockport. people being told to stay away from their homes because of the destruction and the lack of intrastructure. cnn's nick valencia with en credible pictures there. >> reporter: three days after this community took a direct hit from hurricane harvey, this is still the situation here. search and rescue operations will continue later this morning. we talked to the texas state task force. they were conducting those operations over the weekend. they say there are no reports of people missing. as a matter of fact, their operations were limited to rescuing family pets that were left behind after the evacuations. for those the that are still left behind, you have about a half a dozen buses off camera that will continue they're evacuations later this morning. those that are left behind here, they're living in darkness. look at this. this is magnified, block after block after block. there's no electricity here, no

running water. for those trying to come back, local officials are stressing, stay away, there's nothing to come back to. chris. >> nick, the problem is, having been in these situations before, the storm is gone but the problem is very real and present in terms of danger. 13 million people are under flood warnings and watches in texas and louisiana. this flooding is going to get worse. you're going to get more rain, two additional feet in places. cnn meteorologist chad myers has the latest forecast. one of the great frustrations is keeping people keyed in to the emerging issues. just because the storm is, quote, gone, doesn't mean the problems are gone. they're going to get worse. >> especially when you put water up river that still has to move. it's stopped raining essentially in houston this morning. look at all this water, even where where you see white, 20

inches of rain has already fallen or more. we're seeing spots up to 40 on the ground. where is that water going to go? it's going to try to get in the gulf of mexico. it's not going to get there. this flooding is going to last for a month in some spots. the rain has moved towards beaumont and new orleans. everybody was freaked out this weekend that the storm was going to get back in the gulf of mexico. it didn't look like it on friday, but now it does. it's going to get back into the gulf, gain more strength and move off to the east. the heaviest rain is beaumont, port arthur, lake charles, to the east of houston, that's good for houston, bad for this area under the white. this is going to be a heavy, heavy rain day. good news, not for houston. >> chad, thank you very much, we'll check back with you. joining us is vernon lobe the managing editor of the "houston cronicle." the newspaper's cover reads this

morning "swamped by harvey." vernon, how are you this morning? >> fine, thank you. hanging in there. >> can you compare harvey with the other storms you've seen over the years in houston? >> we've had two epic floods for the past two years and there are nothing to compare to what we've seen over the past few days. i think the national weather service, people have said it best, a guy named patrick called it catastrophic, unprecedented or epic, take your pick. it is truly epic. >> should the mayor of houston have ordered an evacuation. there are all these questions this morning about whether he made the right call. what do you think? >> i think he did make the right call. you just can't prepare for this much rain. i almost don't want to think about what it would be like if you had millions of people sort of moving around the region trying to find some sort of

shelter. you've got to remember, you'd have to evacuate pretty far in houston to get out of this. of course, this debate will ensue and the city i'm sure could do more in terms of flood preparations, but there's really no way to prepare for anything like this. >> that's what the mayor said, putting 6.5 million people on the road would have been a nightmare in its own right. what about this seeming political battle happening now between the democratic mayor and republican governor. there are reports they haven't spoken, calls have gone unanswered. what's happening behind the scenes? >> look, texas is a very divided state. you've got liberal cities and a conservative state government. i think too much is being made right now of some remarks that governor abbott made a couple

days ago in a press conference. i think they're going to come together. they have no choice at this point. it's not just liberal houston that's under water. the whole coast has been devastated up from corpus. i would expect to see abbott and houston mayor turner come together today very strongly, everybody. there's really no choice. it's really serious and dire here for millions of people in houston. >> where are you hunkered down? >> i'm at my house right now in a neighborhood called montrose. i got home last night previously by car -- it's funny. there are some roads you drive on and it almost seems like nothing happened. if you take a slightly alternative route you're up to your waist or even sometimes chest in water. it depends on what road you're on. really the only way for me to get into work this morning is to basically walk. i live about four miles from the "newsroom." >> are you going to go into

work? >> oh, yes, absolutely. we've got the entire newspaper activated. every person who works for us is reporting, etd itting, taking pictures, doing something. most of them, we're telling them to work from wherever they are. it's not worth them trying to come in, and they couldn't come in any way. houston is huge. many employees couldn't come in the they wanted to. i live four miles, relatively close, from the newsroom. we had people coming in yesterday and it was hard finding food for them. ever everything was closed. we'll get people in. wherever people happen to be. >> vernon loeb, we're grateful for your news coverage and you continue to stay at it during these conditions. thanks so much for joining us with the update. >> of course, thank you.

let's get perspective of the actual need on the ground right now. we're in houston with stephanie arc anglo, the spokesperson for the american red cross. the right kind of name to have this morning, stephanie, we need our angels out there in full gear. we know the red cross is all over on the ground. what can you tell us about the emerging needs right now. >> this is a heartbreaking and chald lenging situation for everyone in and around houston. the red cross is doing everything we possibly can to make sure we have the supplies and the people available to be in these shelters and make sure everyone has a place to say. it's been incredibly challenging for us to get where we ned to go, but we're doing everything we possibly can to help everyone in need.

>> ed laf venn darrow sending us void i don't, everyone becoming a rescuer. even though you have manpower coming in, logistics are a big problem. i know they're organizing the emergency shelter system. what are you seeing in terms of the ability to get people to safety? >> from our purposes, we now how difficult it is. we know everyone is out there trying to do that. the red cross is working and doing everything we can. working and finding new and creative ways to get our workers, our supplies out there. incredibly challenging situation as you can imagine. we've seen everyone calling this catastrophic. that's exactly what it is. so what we're doing is our very, very best. we have supplies, have everything ready and we are doing everything possible to make sure we can get all the supplies in. >> now, the cnn audience is a very active one. they want to help.

as we all know, the mistake is to believe that the situation is over when the storm is gone. what do you want people to know in terms of what is needed, what will be needed and how to help? >> absolutely. right now the best way to help people would be to make a financial donation to the american red cross to provide immediate disaster relief. you can help people affected by hurricane harvey by calling 1-800-red cross or texting harvey to 90999 to make a $10 donation. >> we will keep people in the loop. there's nothing worse than standing water for all their homes and of course the health disasters that come along with it. stephanie, stay safe, and please tell everybody what we need to know about the situation. >> this catastrophe is posing a major test for president trump. what will he see and do when he visits the state tomorrow. more of our continuing coverage of harvey next.

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the president and the white house. in this response, the federal government is certainly going to be responding for months and even years as all of this developments. we do know the white house is so far still planning for the president to go to texas tomorrow. it's not clear whether that will be san antonio, possibly austin. certainly a concern here that any presidential visit would require public safety personnel and they don't want to detract from the effort of first responders. the president over the weekend also participated in video conferences about this storm. he tweeted several times about the storm. but the president's focus has not been singular on harvey. over the weekend obviously it started out with the controversial pardon of sheriff joe arpaio. the president also tweeted, among other things, about the mexico and the fact that he

still says mexico will pay for his controversial border wall. the president indicated a lot of other things, including, i might add, talking about a book by the very controversial sheriff joe clarke. so we're waiting to find out what this administration is going to do about the location for the president. there's also going to be later this morning, a video news conference here in washington by fema and by the department of homeland security to discuss the response to harvey. alisyn, back to you. >> we will be covering all of it. thanks for the preview. let's bring in our panel, cnn political columnists. how do you think the president has done so far? >> setting himself for real problems by doing these distractive side trips into the world of david clarke's book and

some of this and some of that and the wall with mexico. >> that doesn't affect the federal relief efforts. >> i think what's going to happen is we saw this after katrina, after super storm sandy, things are going to go wrong. that's why you call it a disaster. people's homes aren't going to be fixed in the right way and in the right time frame. the long chain between washington and the situation on the ground are going to get disrupted. what people want to know is their president was focused on that, the entire time, to the exclusion of everything else. so this is not the right way to start that process. of course, questions are going to be. some of what goes wrong, the inevitable problems will be laid at the foot of the president. >> to the extent these things are going to be a function of what happens over time. to be honest, the federal

government doesn't have much to do with it. almost all the coordination is on the local level, somewhat on the state level. is this a situation that's fair to judge? i don't know why we keep talking about them as tweets, as if that makes them any less important. it's got to stop. these are all official things from the president. this is what's on his mind. he's all over the place. that's the reality. >> what it does, it creates a time stamped record so when people ask, look, what were you doing while the fourth biggest city in the country -- >> doesn't matter if it's a tweet or a memo or a telex or phone call. >> carrier pigeon. >> we say it's a tweet, that it's less important if he's saying arpaio was doing his job because it's in a tweet. that's bs. >> it is striking that he's not using that platform somewhat more conventionally i guess you could say, to send regards to

first responders, express gratitude in a more sort of traditional format, not typically the sentiments you expect to hear from a president under these circumstances. what every president and presidential administration finds is the most important part of the disaster response is the substance. if at some point greg abbott or sylvester turner were to say we didn't have resources from washington, that would be a big deal. neither has said anything like that. for the president, i don't want to say so far so good because houston is under water. but certainly you haven't seen anything so far that looks like katrina. >> karoun, as the storm was crashing into houston and rockport, the president was pardoning sheriff joe arpaio, this lightning rod of a figure. some of that obviously was

eclipsed by the storm disaster. what's the fallout from this? >> he's been criticized be many critics for saying this is proof that he doesn't have respect for the judicial process, the constitution, et cetera. but it was a play for his base. the question is going to be, though, what errol and alex were just talking about, when looking back at the optics of all of this, because the optics do matter for the president, somewhat the time lean of events he's pursuing. is it going to look like he was using the impending hurricane as cover to make this move late on a friday night at a time when everyone is worried about preparation for the disaster response. i think that will help instruct whether the criticism which he's facing which is comprehensive and significant is wider and gets into the parts of his base that would scare him a little bit, from doing things like this again, repeating these sort of things in the future. that's all going to depend what the long-term response of this

is because, yes, the optics of the president matter right now. but as we were all saying, this is still an ongoing crisis. if it takes months -- it will take months to respond to it. if the resources don't continue to be there, if there are routine fights on capitol hill about, oh, we have to worry about the federal budget which is why we can't send money to help this natural disaster in our own back yard, that's when things are get more and more sticky and people will start to look more and more at this twitter stream and other things, and that's when what has been localized criticism, i guess, on things like joe arpaio could spread and become much more of a problem for him politically. >> hopefully you don't see congress playing politics with relief money over time the way they did with sandy. lest we remember hopefully texas gets treated better than texas gop representatives treated new york. there's no question, errol, you do things on friday night because you want to keep them as low as possible.

this is not conjecture. gorka shrinking off on friday is not a coincidence, arpaio coming out on friday is not a coincidence. who did he help himself -- arpaio was not just a contempt of order, it was about how he was administering justice in his jurisdiction, how he was targeting people. this isn't about him standing strong against the man. he was conducting a practice that was seen as illegal. >> the long and disgraceful history of joe arpaio is a subject for another time. people should know that 160 suicides in maricopa county lockup on his watch, $140 million paid out to families on account of that. friday night news dump is not what it used to be. there's 24-hour news now. >> we catch it. >> a lot of news was made. there was a lot of coverage over the weekend. but also, i think it's important

as a signal that he's going to be the president of his base. the thing about a dog whistle is that the dog hears it a lot more than everybody else. in this case the base will be absolutely delighted that joe arpaio got this favor from the president. everyone else might be horrified but there's a lot of other things to worry about. it's pure politics. he bypassed the justice department, didn't go through the normal process. even if you want to extend clemency, normally you check in with the lawyers at the justice department. >> there are lawyers that evaluate exactly this, whether or not this is the right case for a pardon, how, and what. he didn't do any of this. >> that's the signal being september other than the pat on the back to his base. >> obviously there are a lot of other things to worry about, that's what secretary of state tillerson and mattis are tasked with. they said interesting things over the weekend, appear to be distancing themselves from the administration.

so listen to this. >> i don't believe anyone doubts the american people's values or the commitment of the american government or the government's agencies to advancing those values and defending those values. >> and the president's values? >> the president speaks for himself. >> hold the line my fine young sailors, seamen, marines. hold the line until our country gets back to understanding, respecting each other, being friendly to one another. >> what do we think all that was meant -- >> this is pretty remarkable stuff. i think especially the comment from rex tillerson. you can add to that list gary kohn saying what he said in the interview with the "financial times." when you see people this prominent -- i put mattis in a different category. it tells you something about his weakness overall. >> panel, thank you very much.

we will obviously will talking about all this throughout the show. >> all right. while we are showing you everything that's happening right now in houston and parts of texas and beyond, remember, the biggest message is it's not over. more rain is coming. that standing water can be a killer. we'll have a congressman on who represents the area next. and ways that you want to help. we know you are, we know you're asking us. go to cnn.com/impact. you'll see all the ways to help now. don't forget to keep checking for weeks.

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the army corps of engineers is starting a controlled release at two galveston dams ahead of schedule. emergency crews are working around the clock to rescue the thousands of people still stranded in high water. cnn's alex marquardt is live in the suburbs of houston with the latest. what's happening there, alex? >> good morning, alisyn. we are seeing a brief lull in the rain. make no mistake, much more is coming and is about to get worse. this is a scene playing out all across this city. this is an on-ramp for the interstate 610, right back there about 100 feet away is an suv almost completely submerged. that's about four feet of water. to give you a sense of how much rain has fallen. yesterday at the houston airport they broke the record for rainfall, 16 inches. that's double the previous record set in 1945. there is an all-hands-on-deck rescue effort under way, local

authorities, coast guard, national guard. the coast guard saying they carried out some 250 rescues, rescuing more than 1,000 people. the big development this morning, as you mentioned, the army corps of engineers doing what's called a controlled release of those two dams in galveston county. until now no mandatory evacuation order. they are asking people to evacuate from along the buffalo bayou where so much of that water will be going to. >> a one-two punch. more water coming in, there's lethality there. once it stands, it becomes a toxic soup, continuing problems there as well. stay safe. let's get perspective from republican congressman blake fahrenthold of texas representing the corpus christi area. congressman, i'm sorry to have to talk to you under these

circumstances. we're trying to get the word out about the need and the concerns. you understand the situation as well as anyone. thank you for being with us. what do we need to know right now? what are your major concerns at this hour? >> well, right now it's getting rebuilt. down here in corpus christi where the brunt of the storm hit with the wind, we've got some of our area cities like port aransas and rockport are devastated. we have areas who have no water, no power, no grocery store, nor drugstore, no place to go. we're counting on fema to get in with food and water relief and the red cross to provide shelters. we're looking, and this area is huge, from where i am in corpus christi to where the storm originally struck to houston is a solid four-hour drive. it's a very, very large area that's affected. >> and the fema guys, they break

it down into two phases. the heath ality phase and the normality phase. during the lethality phase, what do you know about the people still stranded and on going rescue efforts? >> well, in houston with the rain, that's where the big effort is focused now. we're starting in corpus christi, thank god, to get back to normality. our thoughts and prayers are with everyone in houston. i've grown up on the texas gulf coast and have never seen a storm like this with such wide ranging effect. usually these hurricanes blow through and are gone in a day, maybe two. this one is a gift that keeps on giving in the worst possible way. >> they're saying it will be weeks at a minimum. as you're saying, so much infrastructure and for people their homes and livelihoods have to be rebuilt. what is your direction right now for those who want to help? >> work with the red cross or

some of the various relief agencies. i know you guys have a place on your web page that you can go with groups that are there to provide services and help. our church groups down here are mobilizing as we're getting a little bit more back to normal here in corpus christi. we're sending water and food up to rockport and some of the areas that are much more harder hit than corpus christi. these communities that were devastated were a stone's throw -- bedroom communities for corpus christi or right across the bay, port aransas, a fishing town where many folks lived and had second homes, the national guard is not even letting folks in to port aransas, the devastation is so great. >> they don't even know what they'll be dealing with. congressman, consider us an outlet for your communities and

those around the country to coordinate help. anything you want people to know, reach out to us and spread the word. be safe -- >> i certainly appreciate. you're doing a great job. please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. >> you will be there. congressman, take care. president trump facing the first natural disaster of his presidency. how does his approach compare to his predecessor? cnn president historian douglas brinkley joins us next. experience unparalleled luxury at the lexus golden opportunity sales event before it ends. choose from the is turbo, es 350 or nx turbo for $299 a month for 36 months if you lease now. experience amazing at your lexus dealer. patients they ask me all of the time. i tell them the thickness of your enamel

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catastrophic flooding in texas posing a major problem for president trump as his predecessors learned firsthand, disasters can define a presidency. let's discuss with bruce university history professor douglas brinkley. great to have you here. we're almost at 72 hours.

what have you seen thus far in president trump's response, the federal government's response versus let's start with katrina and president trump. >> remind you in hurricane katrina we lost nearly 3,000 american lives. the death toll is very small right now and we want to make sure it doesn't start swelling up in the coming days. we have to put both disasters in a little different light in that regard. george w. bush did what no president should do, he did the flyover of the zone. right now donald trump is in danger of seeming to be doing -- being the twitter president, particularly his dump of tweets on friday, and then yesterday promoting sheriff clarke's memoir. what american people want to see in a president this time, their heart is bleeding. they want to feel empathy. you and cnn have been telling people where to send money, how

to help. barack obama yesterday said send money to the red cross. it's very important he gets to the state of texas on tuesday and not only says the right things, hugs people, shows that he has empathy and a heart. >> it's tricky, right, professor? he doesn't want to be a distraction. president trump laid that out and rightly so early on. when he gets on the ground, he commandeers a lot of resources. a lot of people are on the ground right now trying to save people and start making a little turn trying to get headway. he shouldn't be judged in his absence when he's just trying to allow people to do their job. katrina was different. it was a reflection of a failure of epic proportions that had been going on for decades. that's what would happen. those people were forgotten in those outer wards, and that's what we learned when we were covering it. this is a very different situation. it seems like the big tests will be in the weeks to come, right?

as that water stands, the needs grow, how does the trump administration respond? >> i certainly agree with that. keep in mind what lyndon johnson in 1965, went right into the ninth ward of new orleans when hurricane betsy hit, went in a boat and went out and helped people out of houses. he looked at those people that had no homes, their life had been ruined and said, i'm your president, i'm here, i care about you, i love you. it doesn't always have to be the distance game, that you have to stay away from people. that gets overrated a little bit, also. barack obama himself learned that when we had the bp spill. he was very slow getting to the gulf south, so i think donald trump does have to ex-ud moral courage, some heart this week. but overall you're right. it's all about what a president does in the long run if the federal government is responsive to the needs of a stricken renal

zblon you've also talked about how this 72-hour window is critical. this is the time when things need to be in place and start happening. we learned this lesson in katrina, where there's a cascading effect and more deaths down the road. what are you seeing applied or not applied. >> what's important is that hughes fonians are saving houstonians. there is no magic federal cavalry coming to help those whose houses are under water. i wrote about the cajun navy, where people came in and rescued people. that's been the great part about the houston story. people coming out with their boats and helping people and getting them to shelters. when places have no electricity, you'd be amazed all the bad things that happen. many people live on ventilators

or respirators. they need medications they don't have. they're lost and confused. hopefully this first responder efforts will continue today. >> the inability to stay dry itself breeds so many different health problems that we're still yet to hear about. douglas brinkley, as always, appreciate the historical perspective. you heard the professor talking about, this is about regular folks becoming heroes, that is the reality in houston right now. local authorities are saying, if you have a boat, if you have capability, help us. it's a rare situation and people are risetion up and stepping up for the cause. we're going to talk to a man who spent his day going door-to-door spent his day going door-to-door saving lives next.

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allergytry new xyzal®.ou have symptoms like these for relief is as effective at hour 24 as hour one. so be wise all take new xyzal®. when hurricane harvey started flooding neighborhoods, the call went out, if you can help, please do so. will bradley answered that call, heading out there and finding dozens of elderly stranded in the floods. he joins us now. first, i'm glad to see you're well and safe and i want to thank you for stepping up and doing what everybody needs to do in a situation like this. how are you doing? what have you seen? >> thank you. i'm tired. it's been a long two days. felt like i slept about three hours each night. two nights ago, saturday evening is kind of when the rain started

here. i think everybody thought the worst was over, all the hype was for nothing. we prepared and on saturday the sun even came out for a little bit. we thought the hurricane kind of skipped us and the rains missed us. but that was completely wrong. and saturday night at about 3:00 a.m. or early sunday morning, that is, the rain started coming in, and i woke up about 4:00 in the morning, the rain woke me up, and i want and cleared the drains in my back yard as water was starting to rise. finally got back in bed about 5:30, 6:00 and that's when the e-mails started coming in from our neighborhood that people were trapped in their homes, there was a sense of panic and i had a kayak. so i got up out of my bed at 6:00 and went and tried to help this woman who said water was in her home, she needed help, desperate. all she had was her address.

my wife e-mailed her back and asked for her number so i could call her. i headed over to her house, and it was total devastation. what you've got to realize, in houston we have buffalo bayou, the majority of houston, when it floods, flows right into buffalo buy you. the back of our neighborhood is right on the bayou. they were panicked, there was water in their house, they didn't know what to do. they decided to go to a neighbor's house and assess the situation, as did a lot of people. they thought the waters would recede. they said, well, let's just wait for the waters to go down. and it just kept getting worse

all day. as time went on, the water just kept rising, and more and more of these bands of rain would come through, and there was a sense of panic in our neighborhood. by the time people started waking up and realizing what was going on in the back of the neighborhood along this bayou, it was need to see the neighborhood come together and people started bringing rafts and kayaks and blow-up air ma mattresses to help get people out. one story that comes to mind, there was a 93-year-old woman, we went and knocked on her door and begged and pleaded for her to come out. she said no, i'm staying here. she locked us out. wouldn't let us in her house. it took two hours of neighbors pleading for her to come out, that it wasn't safe. she lived right on the bayou. she had two feet of water in her house. two hours later we got her out. i also met another couple that i

got there just in the nick of time, right after we met with that 93-year-old woman. they were out of their house and flagged me down, they were trying to leave their house. they had waist-deep water in their house. the woman was 87 years old. the husband flagged me down for help. she was trying to cross out of her home. what you don't realize is the current between these houses was unbelievable. it was enough for me to almost fall down just through the currents. they were trying to cross this to just get to a neighbor's house that was also flooded but was two stories high. >> i was able to get them upstairs in their neighbor's home, but definitely couldn't put her in a kayak which would be too unstable and too unsafe. so i went back to their home and got all of their belongings, moved them upstairs to the neighbor's home, and then we went and got a john boat.

it took about four hours to get a boat that was capable to come and move them out along with some other people. it was a scary situation. the whole time i was using this john boat, the rain just kept coming, there was flash flooding, along with the bayou rising, i really feared for their lives. we were able to get them out, thankfully and get them to a hotel, and they're safe and dry. there's still people out there that refuse to leave, that thought the waters would recede. i'm very scared for them. there's a general sense of panic and fear about what's going to happen with the buffalo bayou as a addics reservoir releases. everyone is on standby to see what happens with that. >> there's no question that the

fear is going to last as long as the water does. that's why the angels like you and the helpful people are so important. are you planning to head back out there and see if you get people out of their homes? >> we had some neighbors come over last night that were fearful of what's going to happen with the reservoir releasing more water into the bayou. again, that should start coming through our neighborhood ability 7:00 a.m. we're going to go reassess the situation once it gets light outside and see what the waters do. twro days, three days after people are thinking about evacuating. and we're pretty far into the neighborhood. i thought we'd never even be saying the word evacuate. that's how fearful people are. i hope we got everybody out that needed to be out yesterday, at least in our neighborhood.

but if people are hunkered down and the waters keep rising, i'm sure we'll continue to get calls for people to help. >> you're lucky you got calm right now. we know in some areas there's no cell service. obviously you're getting a signal out for this interview. so stay safe, keep us apprised of what's going on so we can try to get the word out about the help needed. i've been with people like you, i've seen the beautiful acts of courage and determination you can make. just remember, every house that you go into, you have to figure out how you're going to get out of it. it sound simple to people until they've been in the situation that you've been in and you know how tricky it can be, once you get inside those homes and the door closes behind you, you've got to find a point of egress. be safe. thank you for what you've done for your community. >> thank you. >> be safe, will. alisyn. >> thank goodness for good

samaritans like will. what a story. meanwhile we have the breaking news for you, so let's get right to it. >> this is cnn breaking news. >> that's our breaking news, unprecedented and catastrophic flooding devastating america's fourth largest city. the flood disaster is expected to get worse today. and in the coming days. rescuers are working to save hundreds of people, maybe thousands, stranded in the high water. roads and highways are impas impassab impassable. officials are asking anyone with a boat to help with these rescues. forecasters say an additional 1r5 to 25 inches of rain may fall this week. >> there's been a major development that just shows how dicy the situation is. the army corps of engineers is now working to pre haven't greater risk by releasing water from two flood-controlled dams. in just minutes federal