United States: When it's colder in Texas than in Alaska
The Texas capital, Austin, has also found itself under an unusual blanket of snow since Sunday, February 14, 2021. AFP - Montinique Monroe
Text by: RFI Follow
4 min
A cold snap suddenly hit the United States on Sunday night, from Maine to Texas, passing through parts of the Midwest.
In Houston, the fourth American city, electricity is lacking for several million inhabitants.
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An "
unprecedented
" cold wave
sweeps the United States at the start of the week, with an arctic wind which is causing temperatures to collapse even in southern states like Texas, the US weather services warned on Monday. .
The states in the north of the country were prepared for it, but in those in the south, used to summer heat waves and hurricanes, temperatures that drop to -10 ° C are very rare.
More accustomed to heat records than ice, Texas is particularly affected by this historic cold spell.
A thick blanket of snow thus enveloped the streets, trees and cars of the state capital, Austin.
Some places even saw the temperature drop to as low as -18 degrees Celsius over the weekend while a large city like Houston hit -9 degrees.
So it was, this Monday, colder in Texas than in Alaska.
There, children in skis are playing in the snow, parents cannot drive to work, reports our correspondent in Houston,
Thomas Harms.
15 ° Fahrenheit, or -9.4 degrees Celsius: this is the temperature reached in Houston at 7:50 pm locally, Monday, February 15.
© screenshot weather.com
Almost 3 million Texans without electricity
“
It's incredible this weather here, it happens once every 30 years.
From time to time it snows a little, but never like this.
I work in downtown Houston so there is no way for me to go there.
This is something Texans are not used to…
”
Like Michelle, Bill and Noah, this Monday more than 2.8 million Texans found themselves without electricity, from 2 am everywhere from Dallas to the Mexican border.
This is the case of Florent, a Frenchman living in the fourth largest city in the United States for several years.
He still has the network to communicate.
“
We've had no electricity for an hour [at 1:27 UT].
Some friends haven't had them for nearly 12 hours.
It's really not obvious.
»Then he switches off his phone to conserve his battery ...
In Houston, two emergency shelters for homeless people quickly reached their maximum capacity of 500 people ... and also found themselves without electricity.
Energy suppliers have implemented rotating outages to relieve their grid, but the authorities warn that we should not wait for electricity to come back before the night arrives, or even later, when it is sunny. -10 ° C outside.
Canceled flights, cascading accidents, state of emergency
Texas has made a declaration of a state of emergency for climatic reasons in its 254 counties, approved Sunday evening by President Joe Biden.
“
Every part of the state is going to experience freezing weather conditions in the coming days and I urge Texans to remain vigilant in the face of the very harsh weather that is coming,
” Texas Governor Greg Abbott warned in a press conference Saturday.
In fact, temperatures will continue to drop until Tuesday morning and meteorologists announce a new cold spell on Wednesday.
Almost 4,000 flights were canceled for Monday alone across the country.
According to
USA Today
, 120 road traffic accidents were recorded for the day Sunday.
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