On Thursday, players and coaches from the University of Houston joined forces with the local community to hold a donation drive in Austin, Texas, for Houston's Hurricane Harvey flood victims. With help from Texas, Baylor, SMU, North Texas, Texas State and UTSA equipment trucks, along with alums in the area, food and supplies will head to Houston and start rolling in on Friday. The Cougars' football team plans to return to campus Thursday night.
The donations arrived throughout the afternoon:
Baylor, SMU and North Texas equipment trucks have arrived at Houston's donation drive in Austin, Texas. The donations are being taken from 1pm to 4pm CT for victims of hurricane Harvey.
Preston Pehrson was just hired two weeks ago at Houston from Navy as director of player personnel. His family just moved down from Annapolis and has yet to find a permanent home. He and his wife almost rented a house that now has nearly three feet of water inside.
Houston head coach Major Applewhite has arrived with three buses filled with the defensive players at the north location of their donation drive.
John Lay is a University of Texas alum and Austin native here at Houston's donation drive contributing non-perishable food and other supplies. Lay said he and his family are fortunate enough to not be impacted by the hurricane so they felt the need to contribute as much as they can.
The Houston football donation drive is three minutes away from officially starting and people are already lined up to donate. Pretty impressive to see in person.
The Houston football players have arrived and are about to start helping to load the equipment trucks with donations.
Houston defensive lineman Ed Oliver chose to stay home at Houston out of high school for his community and said he never thought he'd have this kind of opportunity to help the city of Houston. Oliver said he can't wait to get back to Houston and there was no way they would come back empty handed.
Houston's Zach Vaughan is here at he donation drive helping. His father just had knee surgery and was immobile, but fortunately did not need evacuation from the hurricane. Vaughan said spending time away from his family has taken a toll emotionally and everyone is ready to get back home to help the mourning process.
Houston linebacker Nomo Frugee said he has been away from his two kids for nearly seven days now. His two-year-old daughter and her mother had to take shelter under a bridge at one point and have been moved to a church in Houston. Frugee said he can't wait to get back home to just hold his children and hug them and kiss them.
Philip Schultz is a Houston baseball alum living in Austin. He said when he found out about the donation drive, he "couldn't get here fast enough." Schultz has been in Austin for three years now and said that Texas is strong and is rallying together to help rebuild Houston.
Austin resident Jennifer Reck said her family mainly grew up Baylor fans, but found out about Houston's donation drive through twitter. She felt the need to help any way she can, and that giving something physically in donation form is the first step for her to help the Houston residents.
Richard Keller is a lifelong Texas Longhorns fan who said the University of Houston's donation drive is bigger than Houston. Keller said that Texas is a unique place that will always come to the help of those in need and that it doesn't matter if you're a Houston fan, Longhorns fan, then whispered, "or an Oklahoma fan," everyone is coming together to help the victims.
Doug Goforth, a Houston football season ticket holder, just pulled up on a Buddy moped packed full of supplies. He heard about the donation drive, drove to Walmart, packed his moped up and dropped the supplies off.
Dan and Allison Connally evacuated Houston and are now staying in Austin for the next few days. Even though they were displaced by the hurricane, they still felt the need to donate and help at Houston's donation drive today.
As the Houston donation drive comes to an end, the Austin diaper bank donated 200,000 diapers. Some were packed on the equipment trucks, some are being shipped back to Houston.
The Houston Cougars getting off their team buses, arriving back home after a week in Austin because of Hurricane Harvey.
