A Texas Game Warden hugs his son and says his goodbyes before heading toward Hurricane Harvey

This Texas Game Warden is one of many officials saying goodbye to their family, as they prepare to face Hurricane Harvey.

Hospitals have also spent around 18 hours evacuating medically-fragile newborns out of the path of the storm.

The storm has just upgraded to a Category 3 storm, according to the National Hurricane Center.
The outer bands of Hurricane Harvey have begun swiping the Texas coast as 35 inches of rain and “catastrophic” storm-surge flooding is predicted following landfall late Friday or early Saturday, the National Hurricane Center said.

The combination of heavy rain, “life-threatening” storm surges, flooding and strong winds could leave wide swaths of South Texas “uninhabitable for weeks or months,” the National Weather Service in Houston said. Officials say they have not seen this type of language since Hurricane Katrina, which left more than 1,800 people dead in 2005.

Winds of at least 111 mph are expected by the time it makes landfall around Corpus Christi, forecasters said.
A hurricane warning is in effect for about 1.5 million people, with another 16 million under a tropical storm warning, the weather service said.

Residents were urged to evacuate. A mass exodus from the coast caused extensive traffic jams along the state’s highways, while other people boarded up windows and stocked up on food and water ahead of the storm, the effects of which are expected to last for days.