Opinion: The heat wave nearly broke our power grid and some of our readers are sharing their stories
By Tom Boggioni
This article was originally published by The Examiner on July 12, 2014.
If there’s one thing we’ve learned from this summer’s heat wave, it’s that there’s nothing quite like an extreme heat wave. For seven long days and more than 100 oppressive hours, the heat was so oppressive that New Orleans was running for days on end with no electricity or running water.
But even after we had beaten the heat and had power restored, our power grid did not work for all of the time, leaving us without any water or electricity, and we had to turn off our generators at times for safety reasons.
One reader, who asked for anonymity, shares his remarkable story of losing both power and water.
My wife and I were on vacation in New Orleans, and after having just returned from the Gulf Coast (having gotten sunstroke and all) while on a cruise, we had decided to stay in New Orleans for the full duration of our vacation.
While the rest of the family went to the beach, about an hour outside of our hotel, we were sitting in my mother’s car, which we had bought for the weekend, drinking a bottle of wine and talking about where we’d go during the day.
I was drinking on my iPhone, plugged into the wall, and my wife was drinking at the kitchen sink and talking to my mother on her iPhone. Between the three of us, we had drunk more than one cup of wine, so we were in an exceptionally relaxed state.
We got tired of staring at each other and starting to talk, and at that point, I pulled the car around to a stop and took out my iPhone to look at my phone.
My mother was on her way