Texas, USA - July 08, 2024

Hurricane Beryl has made landfall in Texas with wind gusts of up to 87mph (140 km/h) as authorities warn of life-threatening storm surges.

The category one storm is expected to bring destructive winds and up to 15in (38cm) of rain. In one heavily drenched Houston-area suburb, police officers began conducting water rescues on Monday morning.

The state governor’s office has repeatedly urged residents not to underestimate the storm while oil ports have closed and flight schedules face disruption.

Beryl caused at least 10 deaths in the Caribbean before being downgraded to a tropical storm as it hit Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.

It was later upgraded again, and more than a million Texans were placed under a hurricane warning as it approached.

The city of Galveston, south-east of Houston, has issued a voluntary evacuation order for some areas.

More than 150,000 customers in the Lone Star State were without power just after 07:00 CST (13:00 BST), according to tracking site poweroutage.us. However, over one million customers have been affected by outages, according to CenterPoint, a local energy provider.

At the Bush Intercontinental Airport, the largest in Houston, 973 flights have been cancelled, according to flightaware.com.

The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) reported maximum sustained wind speeds in the early hours of Monday morning of 80mph (130 km/h).

[Credit: Twitter/NickT1107]