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OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
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Darkness: life in Puerto Rico without electricity
Vox
ADJUNTAS, Puerto Rico — In the final frantic days before Hurricane Maria devastated this small town in the mountains of central Puerto Rico, Rosana Aviles Marin did everything she could to help her elderly parents prepare for what was coming.
She brought in food and water, and used plywood to reinforce the walls and roof of their modest two-story cement house. It didn’t matter. The winds of up to 155 miles per hour that roared across the island buckled the house’s walls and tore holes in the ceiling, letting in water that destroyed furniture, framed photos of Marin and her siblings, and brightly colored ceramic statues of Jesus.
That wasn’t all it destroyed. The storm also downed power lines throughout the area, and Marin and her parents have been entirely without electricity for weeks. Much of their food went bad, they have no cellphone service, and local markets and restaurants remain closed. Her parents use a small diesel generator to power lights and, for a few hours per day, a small refrigerator. The rest of the time, she tells me during a recent trip to the area, “my parents live in darkness.”