Why Texas still isn’t prepared for disaster – The Cougar

Going to the store days before a winter storm in Texas is like preparing for the apocalypse. A line goes down the street to look for a parking space and the store is flooded with people gathering supplies. Every aisle is ransacked, there is no water, toilet paper or milk. 

People gather what they can and hunker down at home, praying the storm passes by quickly. The storm passes after a few days, with minimal damage in its wake.

One thinks in hindsight that they overreacted; it was just a small storm. But under that doubt, there are memories of almost five years ago. Memories of cold, powerless nights and being forgotten by those who were meant to protect them.

Texas has left its citizens stranded and unprepared during natural disasters. Consistently, it has taken the bare minimum steps to prepare the state, or even worse, acted too late in an emergency.

A pattern of neglect

In 2017, the second most destructive hurricane hit most of Texas and Louisiana. Hurricane Harvey caused $125 to $160 billion in damage, causing major flooding. Most places experienced a minimum of one to three feet of flooding, with some counties reporting four to seven feet, which devastated entire towns. 

68 Texans lost their lives as a result of Hurricane Harvey, of which more than half were from Harris County. As the storm passed, and the rescue and reconstruction efforts began, Texas received $820 billion in relief from a federal disaster program. However, 62% of this funding has gone unused by the Texas government.

Only four years later, another disaster would strike Texas. On Feb. 11, 2021, Texans received their first weather advisory of an upcoming Winter Storm.

As Winter Storm Uri swept into Texas, more warnings were issued until Feb. 14, when the entire state of Texas was placed under a winter storm warning.

Those three days weren’t enough to prepare Texans for the disaster to come, and just as everyone began to stay indoors, it went from bad to worse as people began to lose power. 

Uri’s record-breaking temperatures and conditions quickly overwhelmed the state’s power grid. On February 15, 40% of the grid’s capacity failed, causing over 4.5 million homes and businesses to lose power, with some outages lasting several days. 

Now, millions of Texans were stuck in their homes in single-digit or sub-zero temperatures. People were dying in the cold, and to make matters even more insulting, Senator Ted Cruz left Texas with his family amid the crisis and hopped on a plane to Cancun.

He returned shortly after, but the damage had been done. Texans who were freezing in their homes had watched one of their leaders abandon them, and it was a transgression that nobody has ever forgotten.

The storm cost the state an estimated $195 billion, and 246 people were lost to the freezing temperatures. 

Why did this happen?

One major reason so many people lost their power was due to how Texas’s power grid is run. It is run by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, and how it works is the reason we saw heavy outages.

The US is divided by three major power grids. The Western interconnect and the Eastern interconnect cover several states. 

This allows so that when one state or area experiences an outage, the state can receive power transferred by another state. However, in the 1930s, Texas wanted to avoid the federal regulations that came with interstate power transmission.

As a result, they created a third power grid, one that only occupies and relies on the energy of Texas. So, when our grid lost power, we had no one who could help us, leaving millions of Texans without power for eight to nine days.

Another storm arrives

It’s now January 2026, and another winter storm has come and gone. All in all, this year’s storm was a lot more tame. It only lasted five days, and about 130 thousand homes and businesses lost power for a day or two. 

The temperature only reached below the late teens. However, one thing stayed the same: Ted Cruz’s leaving the state served as an omen to Texans. Reminders of the devastating 2021 storm quickly came to mind, and thousands of Texans began doomsday prepping.

Natural disasters are unavoidable, especially in such a weather-diverse state as Texas. However, how the Texas government has chosen money and federal independence over the well-being of its citizens is disappointing. 

While winter storms on the whole are uncommon, disasters are not. What if another hurricane comes to destroy the state, leaving us without power? Why does it require a fatal disaster for preparations to be put in place?

Texas deserves a government that acts quickly and without hesitation. One that puts people over profit.

opinion@thedailycougar.com