An Insider's Look at How Harvey Impacts Air Travel
And, with Tropical Storm Harvey forecast to make landfall again Wednesday morning, it wasn't clear when Texas would get a break from the rain.
Still, hopes were high that Houston's airports would reopen, if not by Wednesday, by Thursday.
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"A lot of what goes on at an airport, even at the terminals, is at or below ground level where the luggage is processed and all of that sort of thing," cautioned pilot and airline industry blogger Patrick Smith.
"And really," he told KCBS, "in a lot of ways I think this comes down to just simple human logistics. You can't have thousands of people flying in and out because the operation just isn't running."
"It's not about the airplanes, it's about the airport and the people who work at the airport," said Smith.
Several carries received special permission from the Federal Aviation Administration to evacuate 1,000 passengers who had become stranded at the airport.