Thousands of residents in north-west Indiana began their 11th day without electricity on Saturday, after early August storms toppled trees and power lines with the subtlety of a wrecking ball. The blackout has brought food lines, closed businesses, dead phones, no schools, spoiled food, dirty clothes, dry gas pumps, and a general reminder that modern life runs on electrons.
The Northern Indiana Public Service Company (Nipsco), the region's major utility, reported 33,124 customers still powerless on Saturday. Residents of Gary were told they might not see restoration until Tuesday - a full two weeks after the August 11 start of a stormy saga that included potent storms, flooding, and several deaths.
Nipsco boasted it had restored power to 341,376 customers out of 374,500 who lost service. "Substantial progress has been made," the company said, while ominously adding that customers "may continue to encounter circumstances that temporarily increase numbers of outages." Gary resident Bridget Sanders called that statement "ridiculous" and "unacceptable," telling CBS News affiliate in Chicago: "We are being left behind... the last ones on the totem pole."
Meanwhile, residents have filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against Nipsco, accusing it of failing to trim the trees that took down the power lines. "This situation was predictable. It was obvious and it was preventable," said attorney Otto Shragal of the Allen Law Group. Nipsco denied the allegations, insisting it maintains a vegetation management program. "Nipsco's vegetation management spend has more than doubled since 2016," the company said, which apparently is supposed to be comforting.
About 300 power poles were damaged. In Gary's Aetna neighborhood, downed trees still line the streets. Cynthia Hunter told CBS: "We have every window in our house open... As far as charging phones or anything else electronic, we take it to the car and charge it. We spent the night in the car, the truck, a couple of nights just for air. It's hard, guys. It's really, really hard."
Renita Theus, 41, told the New York Times: "Every day I'm crying. It's hot in the house. I toss and turn and can't sleep. I walked to the dollar store and they're all out of candles and batteries." Her car is trapped under a fallen tree. "I feel bad for newborn babies and people on ventilators," she said. "I think if this was a richer area, it would be different."
Gary, where one-third of residents live in poverty, was among the hardest hit. The storms swept across Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, and Kentucky, bringing winds over 80mph (130km/h), severe flooding, and tornadoes. The National Weather Service recorded straight-line winds at 99mph (160km/h) in Gary. Among the dead was a four-year-old child killed when a tree fell on his home in Geneva Township, and a person in a suspected weather-related house explosion in Portage.
Tasha Harris, from neighboring Griffith, described the ordeal: "We gotta go back-and-forth and get ice. Fill it with a cooler. Going back-and-forth to get something to eat... It's too much."
Indiana Governor Mike Braun has requested an expedited major disaster declaration for individual and public assistance for 54 counties from FEMA. His request noted at least three confirmed tornadoes, flash flooding, and extreme derecho winds, with rainfall of 6-9 inches (15.2-22.9cm) in many areas, and a high of 11.23 inches (28.5cm). "If granted, this declaration will mean significantly more resources to accelerate Indiana's recovery," Braun wrote on X. The Trump administration granted an emergency declaration, and a state relief fund is offering emergency aid grants up to $5,000.
In the meantime, residents are charging phones in cars and sleeping in trucks, because apparently, in the 21st century, that's what progress looks like.