In May 1949, 11 inches of rain fell on Fort Worth in nine hours, turning the Trinity River into a 14-block-wide body of water and crippling our community of 350,000 people. This month marks the 76th anniversary of that event — the worst natural disaster in Fort Worth history.
The flood left 13,000 people homeless and 10 people dead. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, along with the local sponsor Tarrant Regional Water District, responded by constructing a 27-mile levee system and floodgates intended to contain the river through Fort Worth in a major rain event. Almost 75 years later, the system remains intact, but conditions have changed.
Fort Worth has experienced substantial growth. Just recently, Cowtown’s population officially exceeded 1 million residents. More rooftops, development, and impervious concrete have reduced the amount of land available to soak up rainfall. At the same time, extreme weather conditions stand to increase the regularity and intensity of significant rainstorms…