(Newsweek) – Hundreds of thousands of Texans are without power for a fourth day after a devastating thunderstorm tore through Houston.
More than 225,000 people were still without power as of Monday morning, according to poweroutages.us, after the storm brought torrential rain, flooding and winds of up to 100 mph.
Seven people have been killed by the storm so far, including four people in the city of Houston.
The thunderstorm saw nearly 900,000 people left without power at its height on Thursday after strong winds downed power lines across Houston.
Flights were also grounded at Houston’s two major airports, while the Houston Independent School District, the largest public school system in Texas, canceled classes.
Local electric company CenterPoint Energy said it was working to repair damaged power lines over the weekend, adding that it had done so for more than a half-million customers within 48 hours of the storm. But by Monday, 227,715 customers were still without power, with the company warning that some would not have power until the end of the day on Wednesday.
The outages were so widespread that even the company’s own online outage tracker was overwhelmed and stopped working reliably.
This all comes amid a heatwave in the state, with temperatures climbing to around 90 F, which officials have warned is “driving increased electric use.”
“We understand the higher temperatures we are experiencing across Houston and surrounding communities make getting the lights and air conditioning back on even more important,” Lynnae Wilson, CenterPoint’s senior vice president of electric business, said in a statement.
On Sunday, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas asked Texans to reduce their energy use by “turning up your thermostat a degree or two, if comfortable, and postponing running major appliances or pool pumps” between 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. local time on Monday.
High temperatures are expected to linger, with heat indexes likely approaching 100 F by midweek, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Marc Chenard.
“We expect the impact of the heat to gradually increase … we will start to see that heat risk increase Tuesday into Wednesday through Friday,” Chenard said.
It will be a difficult day for those without power. By no means is this excessively hot for Houston. But given that it’s only May and we have had little to no acclimation to summer heat, this will feel as bad as anything. Please check on those without power today. pic.twitter.com/8oDCofOJMk
— Matt Lanza 🤌🏼 (@mattlanza) May 19, 2024
The Houston Health Department said it would distribute 400 free portable air conditioners to seniors, people with disabilities and caregivers of children with disabilities in the area to contend with the heat.
Five cooling centers have also been opened—four in Houston and one in Kingwood.
The heatwave follows a week of severe weather warnings for Texas.
On Tuesday, more than 15 million people from Texas to Florida were under threat of severe storms and tornadoes, according to the Storm Prediction Center. Read more here…
