Wristbands for Research: Using Wearable Sensors to Collect Exposure Data after Hurricane Harvey

Over the course of four days in August 2017, Hurricane Harvey dropped up to 61 inches of rain on parts of Greater Houston, an area larger than New Jersey. During the storm, dams reached peak levels, necessitating drawdowns that swamped downstream neighborhoods well beyond the 100-year floodplain. Across southeastern Texas more than 300,000 homes and 500,000 vehicles were reported flooded. The floodwaters that swirled through many of Houston’s streets contained arsenic, lead, and dangerously high levels of Escherichia coli, among other agents.34 Over a 13-county area, 46 chemical plants and refinery sites released a reported 4.6 million pounds of so-called “excess emissions” above and beyond normal operations—some due to necessary shutdown or startup procedures and others due to unforeseen leaks or explosions. Forty-three Superfund sites lay in the hurricane’s path; one of these was the San Jacinto River Waste Pits (SJRWP) site, which sustained damage that released dioxins into the surrounding area. A damaged tank at the Valero oil refinery leaked more than 235,000 pounds of benzene, toluene, and other volatile organic compounds. A short way outside of Houston, there were multiple explosions and finally a controlled burn at an Arkema facility that stored organic peroxides. Months after the storm, evidence emerged that the environmental impact of the storm far exceeded early reports. Many people waded through these contaminated floodwaters to reach shelter. While they waited in schools, churches, and civic centers, their flooded dwellings soaked in the collection of pathogens and toxics. Then came the laborious gutting and cleaning up of homes. Texas temporarily suspended its state regulations on household hazardous waste to allow quicker cleanup, and all the waste collected—carpets, furniture, electronics, household chemicals, and more—was piled at an abandoned landfill to be sorted out later.1112 One county official in Port Arthur, about 90 miles east of Houston, called the heaps of debris “a deadly conglomerate, an incubator for bacterial growth, parasite multiplication, fungi generation, protozoan and rickettesial replication, rodent and other small animal infestation and flies breeding.” Two months after Hurricane Harvey raged, two Texas A&M University graduate students, Kahler Stone and Gaston Casillas, went to Manchester, a neighborhood in East Houston, to ask