Nearly 1.2 million Houston area residents were left without power on Monday, Mayor Sylvester Turner said, as demand for electricity was rising amid record cold temperatures across Texas.
Turner urged those who still have electricity to conserve energy by reducing thermostats so that the power grid is not overloaded. Utilities, including Centerpoint in the Houston area, have turned off the power in some areas to reduce usage.
“In order to prevent a total blackout across the state, which can take several days, if not a week or two to restore, the system has to be very surgical in getting people out of the system to reduce the demand on that limited supply,” Turner said. “Otherwise, it can be considerably worse and this situation can be prolonged.”
The weather station at Intercontinental Bush Airport recorded an air temperature of 17 degrees on Monday morning, the lowest reading since 1989.
Centerpoint said residents without power should not wait for the service to be restored before Tuesday, leaving families to choose between the bad options: crouching with layers of blankets or crossing icy roads to the homes of friends and relatives with electricity.
Michele Whitebread of Spring Branch said she is not looking forward to driving several miles to her parents’ home, but plans to do so with her husband and five children on Monday afternoon, after losing power at 5 am . Staying quiet and wrapping up would have been an option, she said, had it not been for her youngest daughter, Maggie, who was born just four weeks ago.
“My parents have power and we don’t,” said Whitebread. “The house cannot get much colder with the newborn.”
A fire alarm failure woke Jared Berry at his home in northwest Harris County at about 2 am, when he lost power. His wife’s humidifier was also broken.
Hours later, after wearing a thermal underwear, he used a meat thermometer to see the cold from his home. The device stopped at 58 degrees.
“We were able to boil water and make a cup of coffee in our French press,” said Berry.
There was no running water available for Jamie Rangel in his West Houston apartment, along Interstate 10 and close to Silbur Road. His power ended at the same time too.
“It’s just me. I have a lot of bottled water to drink,” said Rangel, expressing a lack of concern.
He plans to cut down on cold sandwiches until the power returns.
Ryan Sullivan spent his morning nestled in a comforter while the temperature dropped continuously inside his Spring Branch home. He would have liked to have planned better.
“Honestly – we don’t prepare well for that. I should have bought some groceries to cook without a stove, ”said Sullivan. “I wasn’t thinking about losing energy for the rest of the day.”
When the internal temperature reached 45 degrees, he thought about using a marshmallow recorder to cook food for his girlfriend and roommate.
Arwen Mallet’s two sons have come and gone to play in the snow. The joy is waning, she explained.
“I am trying to discourage them from leaving the house because it is very difficult to heat them up afterwards,” said Mallet.
Her family home lost power at around 3 am, near the Memorial City Mall, just north of Interstate 10.
Each hour that passes without energy is more worrying than the last one.
“You start to feel a little more insecure about it,” she continued.
In the Northside neighborhood, Deidre Thomas plans to crouch and wrap himself up. She will not go to her office – which still has power – as her colleagues are doing.
“It’s not ideal, but I find it more frightening to hit the road to go somewhere than just standing still,” she said.
In Galveston, Danny Hanley and his wife, Karen, spent the morning without power in their elevated beach house – hardly an ideal shelter for sub-zero temperatures.
“They don’t isolate these houses very well,” Hanley.
To keep warm, he put on more layers of clothing and ventured out to take a look at his elderly neighbors.
“People are a little scared,” he said. “They asked, ‘When does the energy come back?’ I didn’t know what to say to them. “