Clean-up process begins after tornado tears through Houston area

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City officials in Pasadena, Baytown, and Deer Park are all planning damage surveys. The same goes for the National Weather Service.

HOUSTON — The storms are gone but there’s a path of destruction that will take weeks to clean up after homes and businesses were shredded when a tornado swept across the Houston area Tuesday.

School is canceled for roughly 25,000 students with Deer Park and Pasadena ISDs both closed. Pasadena ISD is reporting damage to at least four schools. Representatives will be out in the next few hours checking all their schools for student safety.

READ: School districts closed Wednesday due to weather damage

They’re not the only ones who will be out looking at the damage. City officials in Pasadena, Baytown, and Deer Park are all planning damage surveys.

The same goes for the National Weather Service. They will have teams out looking to determine the official size and path of the tornado.  

READ: Here’s the path a tornado took through the Houston area

READ: ‘Tornado Emergency’ issued in Houston area for first time

Below is a look at some of the tornado damage from Air 11.

The KHOU 11 Weather Team was tracking the likely path of the tornado as it moved across the southeast region.

Shelter for tornado victims in Pasadena

The Red Cross opened a shelter inside the Baker Ripley building located at 720 Fairmont Parkway Tuesday night.

Doors opened at 9 p.m. and since then dozens of displaced families are getting assistance, including about 25 to 50 people who were bused here Tuesday night after the tornado destroyed an apartment complex in Houston.

This shelter is crucial right now because so many folks need help including those living in Pasadena. The storm left behind a trail of destruction in this area ripping apart homes and cars and toppling trees and power lines.

Folks living in the area spent the night sorting through the debris, grateful to have made it out alive.

“We couldn’t even see which way it was coming from. We couldn’t see anything. It just went white. Everything went white, explosions were happening. It was terrifying, it really was,” Jack Kruse, resident, said. “It was the most scary thing in my life, but thank God we are here, sound and alive.”

Volunteers will also be providing cleaning kits. In addition, the Pasadena Salvation Army is also providing food and help.

Power outages in Houston

Some of the power lines are still down Wednesday morning leaving many families in the dark. At one point Tuesday, more than 100,000 homes and businesses were without power.

Many of those customers have now had their power restored.

For a live look at the Entergy outage map.

When it comes to CenterPoint, there are about 30,000 customers still without power as of 5 a.m. Most of those families are around Pasadena and Deer Park.

CenterPoint said they’re deploying 24 crews to those areas to get the lights back on.