FRANCONIA, Va. — A day after seeking refuge at shopping malls and movie theaters, hoping the lights would be back on when they returned, 3 million residents faced a grim reality Sunday: stifling homes, spoiled food and a looming commute filled with knocked-out traffic lights.
Two days after storms tore across the eastern U.S., power outages were forcing people to get creative to stay cool in dangerously hot weather. Temperatures were forecast to top 100 degrees in many storm-stricken areas, and utility officials said the power will likely be out for several days.
“If we don’t get power tonight, we’ll have to throw everything away,” Susan Fritz, a mother of three, said of her refrigerator and freezer.
Fritz came to a library in Bethesda, Md., so her son could do schoolwork. She charged her phone and iPad at her local gym.
The storm was blamed for 14 deaths, most from trees falling on homes and cars. Meanwhile, Coast Guard officials said they have suspended the search for a man who went missing early Saturday while boating off of Marlyand during the storm.
The bulk of the damage was in West Virginia, Washington and the capital’s Virginia and Maryland suburbs. At least seven of the dead were killed in Virginia, including a 90-year-old woman asleep in her bed when a tree slammed into her home. Two young cousins in New Jersey were killed when a tree fell on their tent while camping. Two were killed in Maryland, one in Ohio, one in Kentucky and one in Washington.
From Atlanta to Richmond, temperatures were expected to reach triple digits. With no air conditioning, officials urged residents to check on their elderly relatives and neighbors. It was tough to find a free pump at gas stations that did have power, and lines of cars snaked around fast-food drive-thrus.
States worked to make sure power stayed on at water-treatment plants so that people had clean water. Chain saws buzzed throughout neighborhoods as crews scrambled to untangle downed trees and power lines. Neighbors banded together.
“Food, ice — we’re all sharing,” said 51-year-old Elizabeth Knight, who lives in the blue-collar Richmond suburb of Lakeside.
The Friday-evening storms, a meteorological phenomenon known as a derecho, moved quickly across the region with little warning. The straight-line winds were as destructive as any hurricane — but when a tropical system strikes, officials usually have several days to get extra personnel in place. Not so this time.
“Unlike a polite hurricane that gives you three days of warning, this storm gave us all the impact of a hurricane without any of the warning,” Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
