The Winter Storm Busted My Water Pipes But It’s Nothing Compared To The Rest Of TX

For the first time in history, Texas's entire State has been placed under a winter storm warning prompting a Federal Emergency Declaration.

A week ago, an Arctic freeze swept through the country's central and southern parts, including Texas, bringing dangerously low temperatures not seen in decades and triggering a winter storm warning.

The current historic freeze is responsible for rolling blackouts affecting millions of residents across the state, some with no heat or water as pipes have frozen over. 

Even though power was restored to 2 million homes in Texas by Thursday morning, nearly half of the state was still under boil water advisory.

While El Pasoans did not experience massive blackouts, we were still susceptible to frozen pipes.

I had two pipes freeze up, tear, and burst on late Monday night, calling on about ten plumbers, all of which I did not expect an answer from, so I left messages.

By the next morning, only one had responded - John Garcia from Clean Water of El Paso. By noon Garcia had sent out one of his crew guys, Carlos Gandarilla, to get me back up and running.

Just like the rest of Texas, I, too, know what it’s like to go without water for almost two weeks after the last major frozen winter storm that had me taking shelter at a friend's spare room back in 2011.

During that frigid winter storm, El Paso essentially shut down, brought on rolling blackouts, accidents, and a shortage of plumber’s and materials to deal with the number of busted pipelines across the city.

While this year's freeze was much tamer for El Pasoans than the rest of Texas, I am genuinely grateful that outstanding businesses such as Clean Water of El Paso responded and patched me up because if it wasn’t for them, I’d still be waiting on the other plumbers to call me back.