Foothills residents share struggle during monsoon power outage

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — It was day two without power for Octavio Ramirez. He's lived in the Foothills for almost fifty years, now walking around his house with the only source of light he had: his cell phone.

“We’ll go to the car and charge it up in the car, let it run for an hour or so,” Ramirez shared.

He’s lived in Tucson his whole life and has gone through a lot of monsoons.

“But I’m not used to being out of power for this long, but there’s a first time for everything,” he said.

The Tucson Electric Power says some in the the Foothills area might not have power until Wednesday night.

Without power, Ramirez wasn’t able to use appliances like his refrigerator, which had melted ice cream, or his coffee brewer, but he was able to use an old-fashioned coffee pot.

However, he’s still trying to stay cool, especially at night when he said he doesn’t sleep much due to not having air conditioning or even an electric fan.

“Been in the pool a few times, take a cold shower, but it’s still pretty miserable,” he said.

Joshua Baker has lived in the same neighborhood as Ramirez for about ten years and also lost power.

“The storm last night was one of the worst I’ve ever seen and I’ve been in Tucson my whole life,” Baker said.

He owns Postal Annex in the Foothills and also lost power there last night.

“It was down all last night. When I came in this morning, the power was back up here at the store,” he said.

However, he hasn’t had power all day at his house, so he brought a familiar face to work.

“So we’ve juggled the dogs around, brought them to work because we cant leave them at home because there’s no air conditioning,” he said.

Both Ramirez and Baker are hoping the power comes back on, but may still have to wait a day.

“I’m sure they’re working as hard as they can to get it fixed, but you just have to adapt to it,” Ramirez said.