Heavy rain closed roads and downed power lines across Hidalgo County this morning.

A flash flood warning was in effect until 10:15 a.m.

Thunderstorms that began around 7 a.m. dumped over 5 inches of rain on the area around northern McAllen, according to the National Weather Service in Brownsville. The rain, along with pea-sized hail and winds up to 30 miles per hour, caused pooling on roads and highways. Click here for road closures in the city of McAllen.

"(The thunderstorm) was basically just parked right over McAllen," said Jim Campbell, data acquisition program manager at the National Weather Service. "It was stationary."

The 83 Eastbound and Westbound Frontage Roads between 23rd Street and Ware Road in McAllen was the first to close, said Amy Rodriguez, Department of Transportation public information officer. More than 20 McAllen roads are closed, along with Conway Avenue from US 83 to 4th Street in Mission.

Many Valley towns have power outages, caused by the wind, lightning and falling trees.

The City of McAllen is asking residents to conserve drinking water, because the South Water Plant on Expressway 83 and Frontage near 23rd Street is without power. The plant is operating at 10 percent.

In McAllen, 4,415 customers are without power, said Lauro Solis, manager of community affairs for AEP. There are 3,362 customers in Pharr without power, 3,119 in Edinburg and 1,380 in Weslaco.

Hidalgo County Emergency coordinator Tony Pena has advised all residents to stay home and off the roads.

“We have some streets with deep water on them and people persist on driving through these things,” he said.

“If you have to drive through the deep water neighborhoods please drive slowly.”

Cars driving through flooded streets displace water, pushing it into homes along the road, Pena said.

A number of neighborhoods south of Expressway 83 are inundated with water. The decision as to whether to evacuate residents will be made later in the day, Pena said.

"It’s starting to recede but we have localized flooding pretty much all over the county," he said.

The rain also made trouble for South Texas College. The school announced that there will be no classes today at its Pecan Campus and Nursing and Allied Health Center because of power outages and road flooding.

Mission was in better shape. A Mission police dispatcher said that by 10:20 a.m. they had stopped receiving flood-related calls. Nearly all the morning's problems had occurred in the low-lying Rio Street neighborhood, where street and home flooding is frequent during heavy rains, the dispatcher said.

Starr County did not have any rain-related problems this morning.

A flash flood warning means that flooding is imminent or occurring. Small creeks and streams could also overflow.

Heavy rainstorms are forecast through the week, with 1 to 3 inches of rain expected and locally higher amounts possible.

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