Last year in March I wrote about the cold winter we were having — but like many of you have also experienced, this has been an even colder winter for us. We had an arctic cold front that swept through the area dropping temperatures down to 9 degrees below zero. Mike Halloran, who manages the Lord’s Ranch, said that in the 30 years he has been living there he can only remember temperatures as cold as 9 degrees above zero. This was by far the coldest winter we’ve had since Father Thomas started the Ranch in 1975.
As a result of the frigid weather, many of the pipes froze and broke around the Ranch, including the 6 inch pipes coming out of one of our main water tanks. This tank holds the water pumped up from our well for all of the houses and buildings on the Lord’s Ranch to use. Because the pipes had cracked and split, when the ice inside the pipes and tank melted, all those 10,000 gallons of water sprayed out on the ground. Mike had to dig a deep hole with the tractor to contain the water as it spurted out so that all those gallons wouldn’t flood the house nearby. Thankfully we have two main water tanks, and the pipes out of the second one were not damaged so we still had water.
But many people in El Paso and Juarez were without water — some for several days. There was also a complete power blackout in some areas, while others were without power on and off, and still others had no natural gas.
As you can imagine the cold has been particularly hard on the poor in Juarez. Many of the people we serve, if they have any source of heat at all, have gas heaters that cannot be left on overnight due to the danger of carbon monoxide poisoning. So they grab any blankets they may have and stay wrapped up in bed. Thanks to some generous donors in El Paso, we were able to buy several hundred thick, warm blankets and distribute them to those in need. Just in time, because the following week we had another cold snap — not as brutal as the previous one, but very cold nonetheless. When we went to visit the people in their homes the following day, many were still in bed bundled up against the icy cold.
As I write this letter the outside temperature is 68 degrees with warm sunshine streaming through the windows — a very welcome gift from God. As they say here, “The sun is the blanket of the poor.”