McALLEN - Hurricane Dolly slammed into the Rio Grande Valley as a Category 2 storm about 1:30 p.m. Wednesday.

But while the slowly advancing storm was expected to move out of the area by 1 a.m. this morning, state and local officials said the real damage would only be apparent when the trailing rains stop falling in the days that follow.

"The next thing is search and rescue, making sure everyone gets back home," Hidalgo County Emergency Management Coordinator Tony Peña said. "It's people getting back to their houses and making sure they're still there and safe and not under water."

Forecasters at the National Weather Service predicted the hurricane itself could dump up to 20 inches of rain with flooding of several feet in some areas, posing a threat to low-lying areas and colonias with poor drainage.

But fears that portions of the area's levees could fail and spill water over the Rio Grande's banks eased Wednesday afternoon as the storm made landfall 35 miles north of the river.

"The levees are holding up just fine," Cameron County Emergency Management Coordinator Johnny Cavazos said in the late afternoon. "There is no indication right now that they are going to crest."

In Hidalgo County, emergency management officials spent much of Wednesday waiting for something to simply happen.

By evening, though, reports of storm damage were rolled in.

"We're getting a bunch of calls," Hidalgo County Sheriff Lupe Treviño said about 5 p.m. "I am bringing out reserve and backup." deputies."

LANDFALL

To the east, though, Dolly delivered her worst.

It toppled signs, blew away buildings and knocked out power to most of Cameron and Willacy counties.

The hurricane's eye hit South Padre Island near the Cameron-Willacy county line as a Category 2 storm just before 1:30 p.m. But it was quickly downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane as it progressed on land.

High winds blew portions of the roof off at the Bahia Mar hotel and The Palmetto Inn, a popular Mexican restaurant.

The first confirmed injury was at a nearby condominium complex, where a 17-year-old either fell or was blown off a seventh-floor balcony as he observed the oncoming storm, said Dan Quandt, spokesman for the city's emergency management operations. The teen survived the fall and was immediately treated at the South Padre Island fire station pending transportation to a hospital.

Despite similar chaotic conditions across the border, Mexican soldiers struggled to convince people to abandon their homes in flood-prone colonias and evacuate to shelters, Matamoros spokeswoman Leticia Montalvo said.

"These are people who did not want to leave, and now they are in trouble," she said.

Still, more than 13,500 people had packed shelters in Matamoros, Rio Bravo and Reynosa, Tamps., by Wednesday afternoon, she said.

In inland Cameron County, large pieces of roofing tin, palm fronds and other debris swirled in circles on nearly empty roadways. More than 95,000 customers across the region had lost power.

Still, workers at a Taco Palenque restaurant in central Brownsville planned to keep their drive-thru open and their lights on for anyone brave enough to weather the storm. Customers continued to stream in throughout the afternoon.

"We just wanted to help the city," restaurant manager Antonia Costales said in Spanish. "We have been here for many years, and we know there are people who need food during times like these."

MOVING WEST

As of 5 p.m. Wednesday, forecasters projected Dolly would enter Hidalgo County - through its northern region - between 8 and 10 p.m. with tropical storm force winds.

Local emergency management officials manned area hubs preparing for the worst of the storm.

Today, cities expected to begin fixing power lines, pulling trees out of the roads, pumping out flooded neighborhoods and dealing with clogs in the drainage system, said Carlos Sanchez, McAllen's public works director.

Clearing off the streets to allow access for other crews will be the most pressing issue, he said. After that, "the priority is going to be driven by citizens calling in for assistance."

The Hidalgo County Sheriff's Department planned to  help provide security in neighborhoods hit by flooding, as it did earlier this year in Alton neighborhoods devastated by storms.

"If areas are flooded so bad that people cannot live under those conditions, we'll give them extra security so they can get their valuables out and help them evacuate if need be," he said.

In Starr County, where June storms in 2007 dropped 15 inches of rain and flooded the area around Rio Grande City, county leaders hoped for a different scenario with Dolly.

Meteorologists expected the county to receive only a glancing blow from the storm. But this year, the ground is dry and ready to absorb the rainfall, Rio Grande City manager Juan Zuniga said.

"But with these kinds of things you can never tell and it's better to be prepared," he said.

REFUGE

Indeed, thousands preparing for a worst-case scenario flooded storm shelters set up at schools across the Valley.

Willy Sanchez, 15, sat in a doorway at Santiago Garcia Elementary School in Edcouch, where a disaster shelter opened Tuesday afternoon. There, he hoped to wait out the storm and hoped Dolly would spare his home near Weslaco.

"The windows are going to be breaking at our house," he said. "Both of my parents were worried because of the little ones."

In all, more than 2,000 people had sought refuge at Hidalgo County's nine storm centers by Wednesday evening, county spokeswoman Cari Lambrecht said.

Early on, officials had feared they would not be able to support the incoming masses, though.

An American Red Cross decision last year not to send support staff to local shelters during a storm because of its likelihood to flood abandoned many local centers with thin staffs and no food.

"The numbers are growing, and the people, they're going to start getting a little angry," Lambrecht said at 1 p.m.

Still, despite calls from Gov. Rick Perry's office and Texas' U.S. senators, Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn, officials from the relief agency refused to man the shelters until Dolly passed.

Texas National Guard troops and Hidalgo County sheriff's deputies had stepped in by evening to fill in the gaps and food had been delivered to the shelters by mid-afternoon.

THE DAY AHEAD

Wednesday evening, the National Weather Service office in Brownsville, laid out the following timeline for Dolly's projected progress today:

* 1 a.m. - Maximum sustained winds drop to 51 mph, tropical storm strength.

* 1 a.m. to 1 p.m. - Dolly moves through Zapata County and into northern Mexico. Storm projected to downgrade to tropical depression around 1 p.m.

Dolly is the first hurricane to hit the United States since fast-forming Humberto came ashore in East Texas in September.

It is the 26th hurricane known to make landfall in the United States in July since record-keeping started in 1851, according to federal researchers.

For the Valley, it is the first to hit since Hurricane Allen in August 1980.

The busiest part of the Atlantic hurricane season is usually in August and September. So far this year, there have been four named storms, two of which became hurricanes. Federal forecasters predict a total of 12 to 16 named storms and six to nine hurricanes this season.

Though Hurricane Allen fell in 1980, the Valley hasn't been devastated by one since Hurricane Beulah dumped 36 inches of rain, spawned more than 100 tornados and killed 58 in September 1967.

_____

Monitor staff writers Sara Perkins, Ryan Holeywell, James Osborne, Paige Lauren Deiner and Jared Taylor and the staffs of the Associated Press, The Brownsville Herald, the Island Breeze and the Valley Morning Star contributed to this report.

_____

Jeremy Roebuck covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 683-4437.