Tropical Storm Harvey peaked as a Category 4 hurricane and was the biggest hurricane to hit Texas in half a century. Days after the hurricane hit Houston, flood waters are still rising thanks to record rain that has flooded neighborhoods and pushed tens of thousands of people out of their homes. According to state officials, nearly 49,000 homes have been damaged by the flood, CNBC reported.

TheBlaze researcher Jason Buttrill returned Wednesday to talk about his experience volunteering in Houston on “The Glenn Beck Radio Program.”

Teams of volunteers were organized into boat crews complete with gear for search-and-rescue operations. Jason’s group was working in Katy, Texas, one of the hardest hit areas. He talked about the tense environment and what it was like to be surrounded by emergency responders.

“What kept going through my head was like watching Independence Day or you know, an alien invasion movie because there were tons of people coming out, there [were] only rescue vehicles and like police and stuff like that going in,” he said of the surreal experience.

Glenn Beck theorized that officials’ disagreement over an evacuation plan worked out for the best since people driving out of the area likely would have been stranded if they’d tried to evacuate.

“That may have turned out to be a great blessing because you would have had probably a million people trapped in their cars on these highways and nowhere to go,” he said.

To see more from Glenn, visit his channel on TheBlaze and listen live to “The Glenn Beck Radio Program” with Glenn Beck, Pat Gray, Stu Burguiere and Jeffy Fisher weekdays 9 a.m.–noon ET on TheBlaze Radio Network.