This week’s storm in Houston was unique in that although a thunderstorm was predicted, this event caused Hurricane scale destruction without the kind of 3 – 5 day warning hurricanes usually give.
Electrical power will be out, possibly for weeks in some areas, as summer heat sets in.
The National Weather Service in Houston warned that with temperatures hitting around 90 degrees (32.2 C) this weekend, people should know the symptoms of heat exhaustion. ”Don’t overdo yourself during the cleanup process,” it said in a post on the social platform X.
The balmy weather is a concern in a region where more than a half-million homes and businesses remained without electricity Saturday morning — down from nearly 1 million, according to PowerOutage.us.
Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said Friday that it could take weeks for power to be restored in some areas.
With multiple transmission towers down, Hidalgo urged patience. Another 21,000 customers were without power in Louisiana, where strong winds and a suspected tornado hit, down from a peak of 215,000.
Emergency officials in neighboring Montgomery County described the damage to transmission lines as “catastrophic.”
High-voltage transmission towers that were torn apart and downed power lines pose a twofold challenge for the utility company because the damage affected transmission and distribution systems, according to Alexandria von Meier, a power and energy expert who called that a rare thing. Damage to just the distribution system is more typical, von Meier said.How quickly repairs are made will depend on a variety of factors, including the time it takes to assess the damage, equipment replacement, roadwork access issues and workforce availability. Centerpoint Energy deployed 1,000 employees on Friday and had requested 5,000 more line workers and vegetation professionals.