Hurricane Beryl-hit Houston residents ‘living in hell’ without power as US city sizzles
- ‘Dealing with the heat at home, it’s terrible. Honestly, we’re suffering,’ says a customer, who is among one million still without electricity
Josh Vance stands in the air-conditioned entrance of Sunnyside Community Centre in Houston, Texas, one of the designated “cooling centres” open to the public after Hurricane Beryl knocked out power during a potent heatwave.
“Dealing with the heat at home, it’s terrible. Honestly, we’re suffering,” he said.
Vance is among one million customers still without electricity, four days after the storm blew through the city.
Though the state’s prominent oil and gas industry weathered the storm, Beryl still flooded neighbourhoods and roads, uprooted trees and damaged power poles and transmission lines.
By the time the hurricane dissipated, seven people in Texas were dead and two million customers – most of them in Houston – were without power, with half still waiting for it to be restored by Friday, according to poweroutage.us.
While grid operators work to reconnect power, hundreds gather in cooling centres or wait in their cars to pick up ice, water and fresh food.