Texas Continues to Clean Up From Dolly

Hurricane Dolly made such a mess of the Rio Grande Valley of Texas that officials estimated Monday it will take at least another week to recover.

About half of the residents of Raymondville and some 60 percent of outlying areas remained without power Sunday, five days after Dolly bulldozed through with wind gusts of 90 to 95 mph, The San Antonio Express-News reports.

We’ve been going since about 9 o’clock Monday morning, and we anticipate we’ll be going another week to 10 days, said Frank Torres, the emergency management coordinator for Willacy County.

The newspaper says the valley’s cotton crop has already been declared a total loss and at least half of the citrus and a good deal of the sugar cane won’t make it to maturity because of Dolly.

American Electric Power, the main supplier to the Valley, reported that 65,000 customers were without power as of Sunday, including all of South Padre Island.