This photo made available by NASA shows Hurricane Harvey over Texas on Saturday, as seen from the International Space Station. (Jack Fischer/AP)Even if Harvey had been a milder storm, spinning lazily across the Gulf of Mexico, there would have been reasons for alarm early last week. Essentially parked near the coastal town of Victoria, Harvey has dumped trillions of gallons of water across Southeast Texas. The rating change might have given people a false sense of security that the worst of the storm was over. With a more common tropical storm, the damage in any one place would be mitigated by the fact that the storms move quickly, spreading the rain over a larger area.

Source: Washington Post August 27, 2017 22:10 UTC