Galveston Island really "dodged a bullet" on Saturday, meaning damage to the island from storms and tornadoes could have been much worse than it was, Galveston County Judge Mark Henry said on Tuesday.
There were downed power lines in various places in the county, especially in the Bolivar area, that had to be located and repaired, with some of the worst damage done when an EF-1 tornado (with winds up to 110 miles per hour) touched down briefly in the Dickinson area.
"The National Weather Service has confirmed we had an EF-1 touch down in Dickinson for a couple hundred yards and an EF-0 in Bacliff.
An EF-0 tornado, according to the Enhanced Fujita scale, features winds between 65 and 85 miles an hour.
"The entire Bolivar Peninsula was out of power for about 48 hours but Entergy Texas got them 100% restored as of Monday," Judge Henry said.
"And we don't have any reports of significant injuries or significant property damage, so I think that we dodged a bullet, and Brazoria County got it far worse than we did."
Another, considerably weaker, tornado touched down along Galveston Bay in the Bacliff area on Saturday afternoon with some damage reported.
Entergy Texas crews were out shortly after the storms working to restore electricity because of the damage to power lines, and many times those crews had to once again repair poles and lines that were destroyed in Hurricane Beryl just a few months ago.
Some of the worst damage was done by straight-line winds, Judge Henry told Newsradio 740 KTRH,