HOUSTON, April 19 (Reuters) - Scores of schools were closedand cleanup was underway in Houston on Tuesday, a day afterrecord rains hits the fourth most populous U.S. city, causingfloods that left five dead and led to more than 1,000 waterrescues.
The National Weather Service has put a flash flood watch ineffect for large parts of the Houston area and into southwesternLouisiana on Tuesday. As much as 18 inches (45 cm) fell in someareas of Harris County, which contains Houston, and the weatherservice said heaviest daily rain records were set on Monday atthe two main airports in the city.
More storms have been forecast for already saturated partsof Texas on Tuesday. About 9,000 customers were without power inthe Houston area on Tuesday morning, a sharp decrease from morethan 100,000 a day earlier, CenterPoint Energy said.
Flood waters that blocked roads to downtown and other mainareas of the city have largely receded, with officials sayingmost people should be able to make it back to work.
"The city is back to normal operations but be carefuldriving in. Now we plan to help people recover from the floodingwaters," Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said in a tweet.
As of 8 a.m. CDT (1300 GMT), there were more than 100 flightcancellations on Tuesday at Houston George Bush IntercontinentalAirport, according to tracking service FlightAware.com. Morethan 1,000 flights were canceled at major Texas airports onMonday due to the storms.
Rains in other parts of the state were expected to causerivers to crest later in the week, bringing floods to downstreamareas, the weather service said. (Reporting by Jon Herskovitz and Erwin Seba Editing by W Simon)
