When most people think about missing school, they get filled with a joy that is known to many from a young age,.Snow days are something to look forward to even in the dry state of Texas.
However, the campus closure of the TWU Houston site was anything but sweet and nostalgic. Hurricane Harvey left first-time hurricane survivors in awe of the flooding that left many without a home and left Houston a literal swamp.
On Aug. 26, 2017 Hurricane Harvey, at the time a category 4 hurricane, made landfall in Rockport, Texas making it the first hurricane above a category 3 to hit the U.S. since hurricane Wilma in 2005.
Morming in the Atlantic ocean, Harvey travelled roughly 31,000 miles before reaching the southeast Texas coast, bringing with it as much as 52 inches of rainfall, winds that reached a peak of 130 miles per hour and widespread damages that have not been seen since Hurricane Katrina. All of this resulted in widespread catastrophic flooding, energy and fuel outages, damages that resulted in damages assessed to be anywhere from $70-200 billion dollars, as well as 71 reported deaths.
That hit home for us Pioneers was the fact that Harvey affected and displaced many TWU Pioneers that call Houston home and the TWU Institute of Health Sciences-Houston Center their campus.
However, like Texans do, Houstonians and other Texans afflicted by Harvey came together to show emotional, financial and physical support. Our heartfelt concern went out for our fellow Pioneers, and many TWU students and staff contributed to TWU’s disaster relief fund; several organizations on campus also organized donation collections and drove down to Houston when the weather permitted to deliver the much needed supplies. Aside from this, the TWU faculty did a great job at working closely with the Weather Service and assessing risk in regards to pioneer’s safety; ‘the faculty [was] amazing” TWU student Carlee Sitar exclaimed.
Our President and Chancellor Dr. Carine Feyten even made a trip down to the TWU Houston campus to deliver her heartfelt condolences and support to those afflicted by the severe weather caused by Hurricane Harvey. All in all, TWU did a great job at keeping everybody up to date with the situation as well as keeping the best interest of the students in mind. In a time when many were panicking, the TWU administration managed to keep their cool, and it paid off.
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