Some folks on Sunday cleaned up the mess left behind by Friday evening's storm, others sought out a cool place to pass the time and many waited in long lines at the handful of local gas stations that were open.
Nearly everyone was in the same boat, with a power outage leaving thousands of Mid-Ohio Valley residents sweating in their own homes, throwing out pounds of spoiled food and unable to get any water from their faucets.
"It hasn't been too bad until today," Lisa Miller, 45, said Sunday. "The house is 80 something degrees and that's the main floor - forget the bedrooms. We slept in the basement last night."
Miller, who lives on Lancaster Street in Marietta, took advantage of a cooling station set up at the community building at Lookout Park Sunday by the Washington County Chapter of the American Red Cross. She was there with her two daughters, Abby, 6 and Hannah, 13.
"We got water back (Sunday) morning and that was a godsend," Miller said. "We went to the (Marietta) Fire Department (Saturday) and got water we could use in the toilets."
Although the family still didn't have power Sunday, that didn't bother Abby Miller too much.
Fact Box
At a glance
American Red Cross cooling stations:
- Community building, Lookout Park, Lancaster Street, Marietta.
- New Matamoras Elementary School, Grandview Avenue, New Matamoras.
- Both were open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday.
- Call the American Red Cross in Marietta at 373-0281 for information about cooling stations Monday.
"I took a shower in the dark," she said. "It was fun."
Lisa Miller said Sunday afternoon her primary concern was trying to get gas, as they had used almost all of it while running power to their refrigerator through their vehicle.
"It's been kind of like McGyver trying to get everything finagled," Miller added.
It was clear Sunday that gas was a hot commodity, with only some gas stations having opened for business. Those stations were so busy employees had to direct traffic for the lines of cars and in some instances gas ran out.
Friday night, some Interstate 77 travelers were stranded in the Marietta area after running out of stations. Immediately after the storm, no stations were open.
Sunday morning, lines for the Muskingum Drive Speedway in Marietta and the Starfire station on Muskingum Drive stopped traffic along Colegate Drive and Ohio 60 for long distances, stopping those traveling the roads and not stopping for gas completely.
Belpre resident David Taliaferro, 64, was among those in a long line at the Par Mar station on Alta Street in Marietta Sunday afternoon.
"Yesterday at the Cool Spot on (U.S.) 50 there must've been 100 cars," he said.
Taliaferro said Sunday he still didn't have power at his home. He said his cell phone went dead because he wasn't able to charge it so he purchased a car charger.
"It's amazing when you lose communication...it's a little scary," he said. "This has been a couple days. Can you imagine being in a situation like this for a month?"
Taliaferro noted that he works part-time at a retail outlet in Parkersburg and there was no power there as of Sunday so he wasn't sure what the work week held for him.
Some folks were given false hope at one point over the weekend when their electric turned on but went off again shortly thereafter.
"When the power came on (Saturday) night we were so happy and started turning everything on and it was devastating when it went off after five minutes," said Lesley Carpenter, 36, of Wooster Street in Marietta. "I can't believe how technology has impacted us so severely in how we live that we can't function without power."
She was at the cooling station at Lookout Park Sunday with several family members, including her 5-year-old nephew and 1-month-old daughter. She said they went to the cooling station after the children started showing symptoms of heat exhaustion due to not having air conditioning in their home.
"We're not so much worried about us as we are the kids," said Carpenter's sister, Rene Summe, 29. "We ran extension cords from the battery on the truck just to run fans."
At the cooling station the family ate snacks they got from Walmart as well as bologna from their refrigerator.
"We have two big freezers that have most of the food in them and it's good," Summe said. "We don't open the fridge unless we have to."
Seeking refuge from the heat and getting gasoline were among folks' top priorities Sunday, but so was obtaining food and keeping as much food as possible cold and edible.
"We all pulled our dry food together and we're trying to leave our freezers closed at this time hoping it won't unthaw," said James Warner, who lives on Tenth Street in Marietta. "We filled everything we could with water (Saturday morning) because we heard it was running out."
Warner, 31, added that he went out in the river Saturday in an effort to stay cool.
"I like the outdoors to a certain extent but I didn't realize how much I like my air conditioning," he said.
Warner noted that Saturday he went to a gas station on Pike Street in Marietta and there was an hour-long wait.
He said the situation over the weekend was much like one he has been in before.
"I was in the flood in Noble County in '97) or '96) and it likens to it," he said.
Some folks have had to endure a power outage longer than others. Miranda Duty, a resident of Sharon Street in Marietta, said hers came back Saturday around 11 p.m.
"We were one of the lucky ones," she said. "My dad had a generator and we were able to keep our food from going bad."
"We have neighbors on oxygen and we kept checking on them so we were lucky it came back on when it did," added Duty, 33.
Elaine Vankuiken's power also turned on Saturday evening. The Colegate Drive resident was among the many people at Giant Eagle in Marietta Sunday.
"I had to throw away everything in my freezer so today I'm replacing everything that had to be thrown away," she said.
