[02/14/2021 Ken & Deb] It was a Valentine's Day surprise. And not the good kind. The result of an unstable Polar Vortex and two converging winter storms, the state of Texas was covered in ice (very little snow) for almost the entirety of the week of 15 February 2021. Temperatures dipped into the single digits, roads became impassable, and the power grid largely shut down. For Texas, this was a five-hundred year storm. It was a record cold snap. Nobody was prepared.
Other than heat, water and electricity became the concerns. Pipes were freezing everywhere (houses in south Texas are not insulated very well) so running water was hard to come by. And even if you could get out (4WD does not work very well on ice-covered streets) to buy water, potential shoppers found that the stores were largely closed. The temperature inside Faith stayed a balmy 66 degrees, but its outside water supply lines are just hoses that lay on the ground so they froze. Once Faith's onboard water tanks were empty, there was no way to refill them. I went later in the week to see if I could find some bottled water and saw people buying Perrier mineral water in order to bathe!
| | I did not find the Polar Vortex a great inconvenience. I stayed inside Faith with my "bunny slippers." When the electricity would go out, I had a generator to create power, I ran electric heaters to supplement the propane heat. And I used the week away from church work to write a few chapters of my autobiography (and to work several dozen crossword puzzles). But it was tough on Gadget -- she found it very difficult (if not uncomfortable) to potty on ice-covered ground. Thank goodness for picnic tables! |
