Credits: CNN News
Half a million homes and businesses in the Houston area may remain without power until next week as they endure sweltering summer heat, while residents struggle to access fresh food, air conditioning, and safe drinking water.
Over 1 million power customers in southeast Texas, primarily between Galveston and north of Houston, are still without power following Hurricane Beryl’s landfall on Monday. The hurricane has claimed at least 10 lives in Texas and one in Louisiana.
The power outages have crippled infrastructure across the region, including hospitals, assisted living facilities, and water treatment plants. This has led to mounting frustration among residents who feel that Houston’s main utility, CenterPoint Energy, was ill-prepared for the storm.
Despite CenterPoint’s efforts to make repairs, a company executive stated that roughly 500,000 customers will not have power restored until sometime next week.
Hurricane Beryl’s devastation extends beyond Texas. In Vermont, over 100 people were rescued, and a body was recovered from floodwaters after the storm caused severe flooding on Wednesday.
In Texas, residents are grappling with substantial home repairs due to the hurricane and the catastrophic flooding it caused along the coast. Texas Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd reported that floodwaters were still receding from some coastal communities and roadways as of Thursday. Houston-area resident Frankie Thibideaux described her home in Missouri City as moldy and uninhabitable after being swamped with water for days, forcing her to relocate to a hotel.
“We can’t live in a place like that,” she said. “I won’t even let my dog live like those people are.”
The dire conditions have had life-threatening consequences. A 71-year-old woman died near Crystal Beach after her oxygen machine ran out of battery power and her generator shut down. Additionally, at least two people have died from carbon monoxide poisoning in Harris County, where fire departments have responded to over 200 carbon monoxide poisoning calls from people using generators.
Scores of homes are also without drinking water as storm damage and power outages have left 135 wastewater treatment plants offline, according to Kidd. Boil water notices are in effect across eight counties in the Houston and Galveston areas, with water being distributed to impacted communities.
Adding to the residents’ distress are the 90-degree temperatures that have baked the area all week and are expected to continue into next week. The heat index could reach 106 degrees in some areas on Friday, posing a life-threatening risk to those without adequate cooling.
As tensions run high and residents become desperate for relief, Fort Bend County Sheriff Eric Fagan has called for calm following a report that a man pulled a gun on a CenterPoint Energy worker. The sheriff’s office emphasized that such behavior “will not tolerate.”