Ultimately, Hurricane Harvey will be but a blip in oil and gas lore, but for those of us in and around Houston, where such a large percent of the oil and gas sector resides, it’s personal. Even if you were spared the decimating rise of floodwaters into your home, it was heart wrenching to watch the devastation around you on the 24/7 no-commercial news cycle on television with little opportunity to immediately respond. When you’re at the epicenter of a crisis, nothing else matters—not IPs, not IR roadshows or banker meetings, and not even magazine deadlines and company-sponsored industry conferences.

Granted, the popular little fishing and vacation town of Rockport, Texas, some 200 miles from Houston, took the brunt of Harvey’s winds and storm surge, leaving much of it looking like a bomb exploded over it. But attention soon turned to the nation’s fourth-largest city as the storm stalled and dumped an unprecedented (i.e. never before in history has this ever happened) 50-plus inches of rain across the region in four days.

From my perspective, the first day the rain bands swept across Houston, a hurricane-spawned tornado chewed up trees, cars and roofs a mile south of my home. The next day, I listened to nearby helicopters and watched news footage of teens trapped by rapid floodwaters 2 miles north of me as they desperately clung to trees.

Why didn’t the 6.5 million residents in the nine-county Houston metropolitan area evacuate en masse? Harvey left little time to prepare. Unlike an African-born system that tracks across the Atlantic for a couple of weeks, Harvey was a Caribbean squall that dissipated over the Yucatan Peninsula and reformed with a vengeance over the Gulf. In days, it grew into the strongest storm to hit the U.S. in half a century.

At the peak, when the storm was approaching or making landfall, some 325,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) of Gulf of Mexico production was shut in, about 20% of the total, and another 300,000 to 500,000 barrels of oil and 3 billion cubic feet of gas per day from the Eagle Ford, per Texas Railroad Commission estimates. Most volumes had returned to production a week later.

Even as ConocoPhillips Co. was reporting on Eagle Ford shut-ins, its headquarters, along with neighbor BP Plc’s U.S. headquarters, were inundated with floodwaters. Houston’s Energy Corridor where they are located is at the crux of the two large reservoirs designed to protect Houston. As the reservoirs reached max capacity at the height of the deluge, officials opened the floodgates, literally.

The biggest impact, though, was felt by the refining sector, which shuttered approximately 4.4 MMbbl/d of capacity at the peak, according to Morgan Stanley, or 21% of total U.S. capacity, due to the winds, storm surge and floodwaters from Corpus Christi to Lake Charles, La. Some 54 crude-carrying vessels were anchored offshore at one point, waiting for port access. Incoming crude and out-going processed fuels pipelines were shut in, causing gasoline price spikes across the nation and impacting crude futures globally.

Yet at press time, two-thirds of that offline refining capacity is back to full operation, with the rest expected to be online by the time this issue is published. The lasting effect on the infrastructure and supply is but a fading memory.

The real lasting effect is with the people. During the torrent, everyday heroes rushed in the save those needing saving, regardless of race, religion or socio-economic class. We were all in this together. (Kudos, Cajun Navy—nothing better than a bubba in an airboat for a suburban swamp rescue!)

After the rescue boats and the helicopters pulled out, hordes of local volunteers rushed in to help strangers “muck out” their saturated homes. Driving down neighborhood streets with mountains of debris lining the curbs—representing tens of thousands of drastically altered lives—is sobering, but the massive and unconditional effort to help those in need is equally uplifting.

In response to the financial devastation across the community, industry leaders have stepped up with monetary support. To name a few: ExxonMobil Corp. donated $9.5 million including employee donations; Jefferies LLC together with clients contributed $5 million; Chevron Corp. and Hess Corp. each donated $1 million; Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co. with clients raised some $273,000; Linn Energy Inc. posted $100,000 with another $100,000 to match employees’ contributions; and Crestwood Equity Partners LP put in $125,000.

There are many more examples of corporate and employee-level generosity that are far too numerous to mention. One media outlet reported $23 million in announced donations by industry, a likely conservative number.

To all of those who helped Houston and Southeast Texas through this Harvey crisis, by your labors or by your giving, thank you. You are the lasting effect.

Speaking of Harvey, our DUG Eagle Ford Conference and Exhibition is back on track after having been delayed due to the ill-timed tempest. We’re resuming production Nov. 15-17 in San Antonio, God willing and the creeks don’t rise.

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