With Tens of Thousands Across Cleveland Still Without Power, Residents Scramble for Food, Places to Stay, Medical Help

The three tornadoes came in quickly and left just as swiftly on Tuesday afternoon.

In Avon Lake, one touched down at quarter to four, near Wedgewood Drive, and destroyed homes in Rocky River nine miles away. Another landed ten minutes later on Holland Road, and tore pieces off the Brook Park Rec Center. The third, a category EF-1—with winds averaging 100 miles per hour—traveled from Brecksville and petered out in Peninsula.

Elsewhere, winds still pushed across the region at 60, 70, 80 mph, downing trees, power lines, and causing widespread damage.

By Wednesday morning, hundreds of thousands were left without power. In Cleveland, about one out of every five—67,000 people—are still without electricity as of Thursday afternoon, according to outage maps.

As power company crews circulate through the city, cleaning up downed tree limbs, restoring lines and bringing substations back online, residents are left with coping with the ensuing fallout. Many need to find water or escape the night's balmy heat, others need power to keep breathing machines going, others to run laptops and phones necessary for the day's work. Groceries have soured.

A city without power, an inconvenience to some and life or death to others, that could potentially get much worse. As for FirstEnergy's 56,000 customers in Cleveland still without electricity, days without lights could extend to the middle of the month. "We expect power will be restored for the majority of customers before August 14 at 11:30 p.m.," the company's outage map reported to residents looking for answers.

For many interviewed by Scene in the two days following, Tuesday's storms called up images of last August, when an EF-1 tornado touched down near Carnegie Avenue on Cleveland's East Side. Fortunately, power city-wide was kicked back on in two, three days for most.
But this week's disaster, which has left some scrambling to book motel rooms and others to stay with friends or parents, has left a brooding sense that the climate is only getting fiercer.

"This is the worst I've seen in my life," an employee for Cleveland Public Power who wished to remain anonymous told Scene, echoing what members of City Council said in committee meetings on Wednesday.

Seven-times the average number of CPP feeders (or main power lines) that carry electricity to neighborhood substations went down than in an average Cleveland storm.

"I have never seen more than five to ten feeders [go down] at once," they said. "This storm took more than 70. And that's just for CPP."

Though the utility has restored power to tens of thousands, 11,000 customers were still in the dark Thursday.

FirstEnergy did not respond to an email asking for comment Thursday, but a spokesperson told Axios Tuesday's storms were the single most impactful weather-related event in Northeast Ohio since 1993. And that the Aug. 14 date? Worst-case scenario. "Many customers will have service restored sooner, based on the level of damage in their area," they claimed.

That response has been unacceptable to many, including Rep. Bride Sweeney and other reps from Cuyahoga, Lorain and Geauga Counties who have asked the governor to declare a state of emergency and provide further resources. "I’m calling on Gov. DeWine & First Energy to do more to assist our local communities and get traffic lights, businesses, & neighborhoods back up and running," she wrote on X along with a copy of her letter.

In the meantime, thousands were in the midst of getting their bearings while planning a relatively nebulous week ahead. Whether that be preserving food in coolers or texting friends to plan times to charge-up phones, which may or may not even fetch a signal as networks are jammed. The elderly and disabled need assistance. People with asthma and other breathing problems seek air conditioning.
"The problem is no one has phone service, no one has data," Samantha Loomis, 29, a music teacher, said walking her dog on Belle Avenue in Lakewood.

She said her and her boyfriend had been unable to reach their property manager for ways to find water—their system requires an electric pump—and had turned to friends to clear the chaos. Loomis said she's looking into a hotel stay, but winces at the cost for a week's stay.

"We've been asking around," Loomis said. "The problem is, like, nobody has power."

Further west, on Lorain Avenue and West Blvd., is Heather Grubb, 32, who had left a homeless shelter Thursday morning in hopes she could stay at a friend's place. A tree had smashed the shelter. The A/C died. Water stopped running.

"We're just here, trying to make some money," Grubb said in front of a downed tree. "I mean, I have kidney failure. I have thyroid cancer. I honestly don't know what to do right now."

The long delay in restoring power, and the lack of clarity from FirstEnergy, has kicked area churches and nonprofits into gear to keep residents fed, hydrated and healthy while they wait out the next week or so.

It's what led Christopher Martinez, City Hall's Hispanic Liaison, to reach out to Pastor José Reyes at the Iglesia Nueva Vida off West 25th and Clark Avenue in Clark-Fulton. Ward 15 Councilwoman Jasmin Santana was equally perplexed at the projected wait time for FirstEnergy, and worked hand-in-hand with Martinez to fashion Nueva Vida into a kind of emergency shelter.

On Thursday afternoon, women prepared pork sandwiches and chicken soup in Nueva Vida's kitchen, while others played dominoes outside and kids drank Gatorade. "What concerned me is the kids," Martinez told Scene. "They need water. They need juices. They need something to eat. Babies need warm milk."

"And," he added, looking inside. "This man over here has a respiratory problem—we were luckily able to provide him a machine."

Martinez grimaced when considering what the next week looked like, how area restaurants like the Blue Palm and La Playa could continue to donate food and water for about 560 nearby.

As for the prospect of going another six days?

"Unacceptable," Martinez said. "Unacceptable."

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