By Terry Hagerty and Eric Betts
Bastrop Advertiser staff

Heavy rains overnight Wednesday damaged roads and infrastructure, flooded several houses and led to emergency responders making four separate rescues from rising or fast-moving floodwaters.

Bill Laird, district chief with the Bastrop Fire Department, said they provided a river rescue boat and two firefighters to assist the Bluebonnet Volunteer Fire Department in rescuing two people as floodwaters surrounded their Cedar Creek home.

“The people were on a front porch and there was about six feet of water between them and the road,” Laird said, referring to a home off of Texas 21 West.  He said the two Bastrop firefighters assisting Bluebonnet were George Martinez and Jeremy O’Guin.

STARFlight used their helicopter to perform at least one rescue of people from the top of their cars in flooded areas.

Fisher praised the work of first responders on the day.

“Especially given that it was before daylight, everybody did a great job,” he said.

Preliminary reports Wednesday indicated that 34 roads in the county had what emergency management coordinator Mike Fisher called “significant damage,” including several locations where the roads had collapsed. Fisher said six county roads remained closed after the storm due to damage, leaving several homes inaccessible where a closed road was the only route. However, Fisher said no one was trapped beyond the roads, and temporary repairs were already underway to provide access.

In Tahitian Village, a 20-foot-long portion of pavement on Kaanapali Lane collapsed into a creek bed from the force of rushing water early Wednesday morning.

Laird said a woman, who was driving in the dark, saw the wide hole in the road just in time, stopping inches short of an approximate eight-foot drop into the creek. He said the collapsed blacktop was wide enough for her whole car to have gone in. Fisher said the ground beneath Tahitian Drive had been washed out at one point, leaving water and sewer lines exposed and putting the street at a risk of collapsing.

Of those 34 damage reports, Fisher said 14 came from precinct 4 near Elgin, where wind and runoff from the storm was more intense. As of Wednesday afternoon, parts of precinct four still had water over roads, meaning they couldn’t be checked for damage. Fisher said he was not yet aware of the extent of damage to state highways and farm to market roads, but that TxDOT was inspecting them Wednesday. FM 812 east of Boyd Road going into Red Rock was closed Wednesday afternoon. Water rushing over the roadways had earlier shut down Texas 71 and Texas 21 in places, leaving those commuting to Austin Wednesday morning stuck in traffic or turning around to head home.

In the city of Elgin, a wastewater treatment plant and six wastewater lift stations were knocked out of service due to high water. There was a level of discharge from the treatment plant due to the flooding, which officials had notified TCEQ about. The city of Elgin also had one patrol car damaged due to water intake.

Approximately 22 homes in the county reported suffering minor flood damage of up to a couple of inches Wednesday. Bastrop ISD also canceled classes Wednesday, in part due to the damage to the roads making bus routes inaccessible.

Another concern for county officials was the effect of the rainfall in the area affected by the Bastrop County Complex Fire. The lack of vegetation allowed the heavy rain to erode the soil and remaining ash, creating runoff and stopping up culverts in some areas.

“This was the thing we were hoping would not happen until we got the revegetation done,” Fisher said.