INDIANAPOLIS — Some aid for Texans impacted by Hurricane Beryl will come from Indiana.
Katie Marcinko just graduated from high school, but she will be traveling to Texas to help victims recover from the storm.
Marcinko was just 13 years old when she started volunteering with the Red Cross. Her mother is also involved in the organization.
She said she's a little nervous about the mission, but is happy to do her part as the people in Texas deal with this disaster.
Nine Hoosier volunteers are already in Texas. Marcinko and another volunteer leave on Wednesday.
The Red Cross sent 400 disaster workers from across the country to Texas before Beryl hit.
If you'd like to help, Marcinko said financial donations are the quickest and best way to get aid to those in need. You can make a donation at RedCross.org.
Beryl's impact in Texas
The return of soaring heat in Houston on Tuesday deepened the misery for millions of people still without power after Hurricane Beryl crashed into Texas and left residents in search of places to cool off and fuel up as the extended outages strained one of the nation’s largest cities.
Frustration mounted that Houston appeared to buckle under a storm less powerful than previous ones. State officials faced questions over whether Houston’s power utility had sufficiently prepared, including one who said he would withhold judgement until after the lights are back on.
Hospitals also started to feel the pinch: Nearly 36 hours after Beryl made landfall, Texas’ lieutenant governor said a sports and event complex would be used to temporarily hold up to 250 patients who are awaiting discharge but cannot be released to homes with no power.
People coped as best they could.
“We can handle it, but not the kids,” said Walter Perez, 49, as he arrived early Tuesday at celebrity pastor Joel Osteen’s megachurch in Houston, which served as a cooling center and distributed 40-bottle packs of water.
Perez said his family — including his wife, a 3-year-old son, a 3-week-old daughter and his father-in-law — retreated from their apartment after a night he described as “bad, bad, bad, bad.”
Highs in the Houston on Tuesday climbed back into the 90s (above 32.2 Celsius) and humidity that could make it feel even hotter. The National Weather Service described the conditions as potentially dangerous given the lack of power and air conditioning.
Beryl, which made landfall early Monday as a Category 1 hurricane, has been blamed for at least seven U.S. deaths — one in Louisiana and six in Texas — and at least 11 in the Caribbean.
Nearly 2 million homes and businesses around Houston lacked electricity Tuesday, down from a peak of over 2.7 million on Monday, according to PowerOutage.us. For many, it was a miserable repeat after storms in May killed eight people and left nearly 1 million without power amid flooded streets.