Sand Mines on West Fork of the San Jacinto form an almost continuous line from I-45 to US59. They have stripped approximately 20 square miles of ground cover.

Forests come down to the river’s edge. Grasses and cattails abound, protecting the banks.

Dense forest anchors the land. Grasses, forced to compete for sunlight, thrive along the river’s edge, protecting banks.

All images so far were taken on the East Fork of the San Jacinto River above where it merges with Caney Creek. Image courtesy of Google Earth.

Red lines on left measure width of East Fork on 3/3/16, before the Tax Day Storm. They are in a separate layer. Switching the background image to 10/28/17 shows that the river is virtually unchanged, thanks in large part to the lush riparian vegetation.

Townhomes on Marina Drive in Forest Cove. Concrete, steel and wooden walls on the West Fork were less effective at preventing erosion than blades of grass on the East Fork.

Two weeks after Harvey. Just north of US 59 bridge.

West Fork Sand mine complex. Note one of many dike breaches in various mines that allowed sand and sediment to pour downstream. All helicopter images taken two weeks after Harvey on 9/14/17.

Mining a point bar after Harvey. Miners are supposed to work within their dikes to avoid disrupting vegetation along the river. Photo taken 9/14/17.

Note more repairs to dikes.

River is migrating toward pit in background at the rate of 12 feet per year, in part, due to lack of vegetation protecting banks. See next two images before for overhead views.

This is what the area above looked like in a 1995 USGS aerial photo on Google Earth. Compare the location of the red line in this image with the location in the next image. The GPS coordinates of the line are identical. But the river has migrated.

 In just 23 years, the West Fork migrated 258 feet toward the dike on the right and now threatens it. The river has eaten away at the dike an average of 12.4 feet per year. The dike is now only 38 feet wide.

A bright white trail of sand leads all the way from the mines to the mouth bar which helped back water up into the highly populated Humble/Kingwood area. Fresh sand is several feet deep. Note absence of grasses. Many of the trees will also soon die.

Nearing the US59 bridge

Confluence of West Fork and Spring Creek, which also contributed sand to this event.

West Fork of the San Jacinto over the US 59 Bridge before the Tax Day flood in 2016. River was 330 feet wide. Image courtesy of Google Earth.

GPS coordinates of the red line have not changed; the river has. After Harvey (in a little more than two years), the West Fork widened to 489 feet and shifted north by 113 feet. In part, this was due to excessive sediment that killed vegetation along the banks and accelerated erosion. Dead trees swept downriver were trapped by the bridge pilings, forming a dam that helped flood Humble businesses south of this photo. The southbound lanes of the bridge had to be replaced by TexDoT at a cost of approximately $20 million because of erosion. 

Mountains of sand may kill the remaining trees in this area, exposing it to even more erosion during the next storm.

Sand, in part, from the mines, has almost totally blocked the West Fork where it meets Lake Houston. Before/after measurements show that as much as ten feet was deposited in this area during Harvey (approximately five feet below water and five above). This forms a dam behind the dam, that backs water up into the Humble/Kingwood corridor during storms. Unless this sediment is removed, a storm smaller than Harvey could create Harvey-scale flooding.

Trees dying in Kingwood’s East End Park because of massive sediment build up around their trunks.