Episode 70: Phil Grimaldi of Houston on Hurricane Harvey

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·11m 48s·analyzed·Aug 28, 2017

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.019

TL;DR

Pinball Profile interviews Houston's Phil Grimaldi during Hurricane Harvey to discuss disaster relief and community response.

Summary

Jeff Teolis interviews Phil Grimaldi of Houston during Hurricane Harvey to discuss the disaster's impact on the community and how pinball players can help. Phil describes the unprecedented flooding in Houston, explains the city's unique flood management infrastructure, and outlines immediate needs including clothing, diapers, and support for vulnerable populations. The conversation concludes with Phil announcing plans to make the Houston Arcade Expo tournament in October a fundraiser for Harvey victims.

Key Claims

Water levels in Phil's Houston area (Midtown) are higher than since Hurricane Allison in 2001
high confidence · Phil Grimaldi describing current conditions: 'we've seen water levels here that we haven't seen since Allison, which was in 2001'
No evacuation order was issued by Houston city officials for Hurricane Harvey
high confidence · Phil explains: 'there was not an evacuation order from the city who would be responsible for making that call. That means that most people didn't evacuate.'
Houston's streets are intentionally designed to flood as part of the city's flood management plan
high confidence · Phil states: 'Houston is unique in that the streets are actually designed to flood. They're part of the flood plan.'
Houston has experienced flooding every year during Phil's three-year residency, with Harvey being significantly worse
high confidence · Phil: 'this has actually flooded every single year that I've been here. This is by far the worst.'
Houston Arcade Expo in October 2017 will be converted into a fundraiser for Hurricane Harvey victims
high confidence · Phil announces: 'I will be the tournament director of the Houston Arcade Expo in October. So if anybody would like to contribute by playing pinball, I would encourage you to fly down to Houston, and we'll be making the tournament a fundraiser to help victims of Harvey this year.'

Notable Quotes

“From my perspective, you know, I breathe a sigh of relief that I haven't had it as bad as other people, but it's incredibly stressful for sure.”
Phil Grimaldi @ early segment — Captures the mixed emotions during the disaster—personal relief amid community-wide suffering
“You just got to watch the water rise and fall, rise and fall and hear the rain beat against the roof and hope that it doesn't raise another inch because if it does, you know, your first floor is flooded and it's very stressful.”
Phil Grimaldi @ early segment — Vividly describes the psychological toll of the disaster's uncertainty and waiting
“Houston is unique in that the streets are actually designed to flood. They're part of the flood plan.”
Phil Grimaldi @ middle segment — Explains a key infrastructure distinction unique to Houston that affected evacuation decisions
“I mean, our freeways are massive, but they can barely even handle rush hour traffic. You can imagine what it's like trying to evacuate the whole city.”
Phil Grimaldi @ middle segment — Illustrates the logistical impossibility of evacuating a major metropolitan area
“I will be the tournament director of the Houston Arcade Expo in October. So if anybody would like to contribute by playing pinball, I would encourage you to fly down to Houston, and we'll be making the tournament a fundraiser to help victims of Harvey this year.”
Phil Grimaldi @ closing segment — Announces concrete community action to convert a pinball event into disaster relief fundraiser
“When you're kind of just sitting here and watching the water rise and fall, there's really nothing else to do, and it does mean a lot hearing the concern coming from everybody.”
Phil Grimaldi @ closing segment — Emphasizes the value of community support during a crisis of powerlessness

Entities

Phil Grimaldiperson Jeff TeolispersonHoustonlocationHurricane HarveyeventHouston Arcade ExpoeventSpace City PinballorganizationTexas Pinball LeagueorganizationBat City OpeneventAmerican Red Crossorganization

Signals

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community_signal: Pinball Profile podcast pivoting to disaster relief coverage and community support; Houston Arcade Expo being converted to fundraiser for Harvey victims
high · Phil announces: 'I will be the tournament director of the Houston Arcade Expo in October...we'll be making the tournament a fundraiser to help victims of Harvey this year'
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event_signal: Houston Arcade Expo transformed from standard tournament into Harvey disaster relief fundraiser event
high · Direct announcement of tournament conversion to benefit victims; Jeff expresses support: 'I think that's a great idea too'
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community_signal: Houston/Texas pinball community demonstrating organizational capacity and mutual aid response to natural disaster
high · Phil coordinating Texas Pinball League across three cities (Houston, Dallas, Austin); organizing major event fundraiser; coordinating clothing and supply donations to shelters
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community_signal: Phil Grimaldi emerging as community organizer and leader in Houston pinball scene despite only three years residency
high · Jeff acknowledges: 'you have a good beat on what's happening there in your community for a guy who's only been there for such a short time'; Phil organizing tournament director role and multi-city league

Transcript

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0:00

It's time for another Pinball Profile. I'm your host Jeff Teolis. You can find our group on Facebook. We're also on Twitter at Pinball Profile. You can email us pinballprofile at gmail.com. Normally I like to joke around, have some fun with some guests. Not really in the joking mood after this weekend. We already heard the horrible news about John Trudeau and his arrest. I don't really want to comment on that. I think if you want to hear a good synopsis of that, go to Nate Shivers and Coast to Coast Pinball. He did a fantastic job covering a very, very difficult topic. And for me, all I think about is the children involved. So it's something I really don't feel like I want to discuss, but something that is happening right now. And I would like to discuss because pinball community is pretty tight group. We have a lot of friends. We go to things like Pinberg and PAP and we see people from all over North America and the world. So when something's happening in one corner of the world that affects some of these people in the community, I want to make sure everyone's okay. I contacted Phil Grimaldi of Houston with Hurricane Harvey going on right now and he's been posting on his Facebook. Phil joins us right now. How are you, Phil? I'm doing well. How are you, Jeff? I'm good. And, you know, I think of you and all your buddies at Space City Pinball and the areas around Texas that are certainly a big concern. Looking at the forecast, looks like the rain is still going to be coming for a few days. I cannot believe some of the pictures I've seen. Tell us what it's like where you are right now. Well, I'm in the Midtown area, which is just south of downtown. The area that I'm in is not particularly prone to flooding, but we've seen water levels here that we haven't seen since Allison, which was in 2001. I've been incredibly fortunate relative to some of the other folks in the city. And as you just mentioned, you know, you can just turn on the news and see just absolutely heartbreaking flooding going on in the city. So it's strange. From my perspective, you know, I breathe a sigh of relief that I haven't had it as bad as other people, but it's incredibly stressful for sure. So it's been, like I said, the water levels have been higher than they've ever been. and I've just been kind of watching it and there's really not much you can do. It's sort of a helpless situation you put yourself in. You just got to watch the water rise and fall, rise and fall and hear the rain beat against the roof and hope that it doesn't raise another inch because if it does, you know, your first floor is flooded and it's very stressful. It's crazy. I don't know how else to describe it. It's absolutely crazy. I can't imagine. I saw on Saturday, I think, just looking at a Google Maps of directions or something for Houston, just seeing every single road closed and thinking, did a lot of people evacuate? Are they stuck there now? Are they like yourself, just fingers crossed, praying the rain stops and stays at a level and hopefully it'll erode away? What happened in Houston? How many people evacuated I couldn tell you how many people evacuated I can tell you that there was not an evacuation order from the city who would be responsible for making that call That means that most people didn't evacuate. I do know of some people who did. We had a guy that was working for us as an intern visiting from Serbia, and he bailed. He went out to L.A., and I didn't think it was going to be that bad. I thought he might have been overreacting. I think you made the right call now. But Houston is unique in that the streets are actually designed to flood. They're part of the flood plan. So when it rains like this, the streets do fill up. So a lot of the images you're seeing are certainly very jarring to see. When you see all the streets filled up with water and they look like a river, they're actually designed to do that. They serve as a way for the water to make its way out of the city. But obviously, once it goes above the streets then and then into people's houses, that's not what it's designed to do. In terms of evacuation, it makes it a little bit tricky. So if you want to evacuate, you've got to evacuate before the rains come down, because once the streets flood, you can't get out of there.

4:03

I'm sure you've seen plenty of video footage of people driving cars through high water and then just getting immediately stuck. So once the streets flood, you're sort of stuck in place. You can't really evacuate. And a mass evacuation of Houston is incredibly challenging, if not impossible. And there's been several botched attempts of evacuating the city with Hurricane Ike, for example, because, you know, you've got 6 million people in the city all trying to get out at the same time. I mean, our freeways are massive, but they can barely even handle rush hour traffic. You can imagine what it's like trying to evacuate the whole city. And then worse, the freeways fill up with water. As I mentioned before, they're part of the flood plan. So if you've got people that are stuck on the freeway and then the rains start coming down and the freeways flood, I mean, it's just, I think it would have been worse than it is now if that would have happened. The traffic, you're right, is crazy there. It's already the fourth biggest city in the U.S. and people waited the last minute. That only causes more difficulty with traffic and it's just, it's not a good situation. So what about power? Is the power on? Do you shut it down when the waters flood up? What do you do for essential needs? So I've had to learn as I go with this sort of thing. I've only been in Houston for three years, so this has actually flooded every single year that I've been here. This is by far the worst. And so I've had to do a lot of reading on what to do and hurricane prep and flooding. And this is also my first year as a homeowner, so kind of learning as I go. I've been monitoring the water levels. I mean, the power has stayed on, thankfully, throughout all of this in my area. I know other areas have lost power temporarily, but we haven't had a lot of high winds, which was a saving grace for us I think because that kept the power on And as the water comes up I think there is some danger of the water getting contaminated and I think they issue a boil order at some point if the water's bad, but we haven't had any boil orders, so we've been able to continue using tap water, although we've stocked up on bottled water just in case that goes out. But as far as what to do if water starts coming up, You know, I've been watching the water levels in my backyard, and if it gets above, there's a certain point on the AC unit that if it gets above that point, then, you know, it'll start sucking in water and destroy the AC unit. So I've just been kind of watching that and getting ready to, you know, turn off the breaker if it gets too high. So that's kind of all you can do is just sit there and wait and then take action if it gets to a certain point. Phones are working. That's good. I've seen you on social media, so you're still in contact with people. I've posted a few places where you can certainly help from afar, like SaveTheChildren.org, American Red Cross, TheRedCross.org, and Salvation Army, which is HelpSalvationArmy.org. These are some of the things you can do, certainly from a financial standpoint. But what are some of the physical things? What are some of the things that are needed right now for the people of Houston? I know a lot of people that have been evacuated from their homes are being put in shelters right now. I know they need clothing is one thing that's needed. People that are rescued from high water, they're basically stuck with a bunch of wet clothes. They need clothing. I know that diapers are in demand right now. And probably baby food, too, for that matter. Yeah, exactly. So the Houston Food Bank and the Texas Diaper Bank are two organizations that could use support right now. We definitely went through all of our clothing and pulled together how many clothes we had available that we could spare and loaded those up. And somebody came by yesterday and grabbed them and took them to shelters. I don't know from afar how well that would work, but you can donate to those organizations.

8:11

There's a lot of work that needs done there. And then, of course, like any major city and any major city in a warm region, we have a very large homeless population. And I can only imagine how badly hit the homeless population has been. Coalition for the Homeless would be one organization for helping them. As I was getting ready and preparing for the storm I saw just large groups of homeless people kind of taking shelter under little parking shelters to just provide cover from the top I mean I don even know what we even do in that situation It just it a tragedy It is Phil And that why we all thinking of everybody in that area right now yourself included. Anything we can do to help, obviously, financially, physically, through prayer, whatever it may be, we're all thinking about you. And, you know, we're recording this right now at lunchtime on Monday, and I hope this passes in the next day or two. I know you got a little bit of relief last night. It was pretty scary there for a while. Luckily, the water did go down with even some light rain too. So I don't know what to say other than fingers are crossed and anything we can do to help, you know, we're there for you guys and we just hope everyone makes it out there safe. Well, we really appreciate the thoughts and prayers coming from everybody outside Texas. It does mean a lot. And when you're kind of just sitting here and watching the water rise and fall, There's really nothing else to do, and it does mean a lot hearing the concern coming from everybody. So thank you. I will say that I will be the tournament director of the Houston Arcade Expo in October. So if anybody would like to contribute by playing pinball, I would encourage you to fly down to Houston, and we'll be making the tournament a fundraiser to help victims of Harvey this year. So if you'd like to play pinball and help out, that's one way you can do it. You know what, that is a great idea too. And I think I saw Marcus post something too that I shared on our Facebook page. And I know, I wish the best of you for that event. And I wish I could be talking to you about the Texas Pinball League that you and Colin and Marcus kind of put together with Dallas and Austin and Houston. I think that's very, very exciting. You're a fantastic player. You're a great guy too. And I love that you really have a good beat on what's happening there in your community. for a guy who's only been there for such a short time. And I hope we make it through this, and I'm sure we will. I look forward to talking to you at a better time, Phil, for sure. Yeah, one of these days I'd like to get on a podcast for winning a tournament or something, but this is fine too.