Dec 10, 2002 3 min read

DURHAM, N.C. (AP) – On a sunny afternoon before another cold night without heat, Sharon Fogel ambled down her driveway to a camouflage Humvee stuffed with four uniformed soldiers. The National Guard had arrived.

“I guess we’re really in an emergency,” Fogel said.

Four days after an ice storm began blanketing the state and shutting down the electricity grid, Fogel and her neighbors face the prospect of several more days without heat, lights or appliances.

About 573,000 customers in North Carolina still lacked power Monday, according to utilities.

The temperature was expected to rise only into the low 40s Monday, but readings have gotten into the 50s since the ice storm.

Duke Power, which supplies electricity for most of the state between Durham and the Tennessee state line, said it would be midnight Wednesday before it can restore power to most of its 444,000 customers still without electricity.

Carolina Power & Light, which serves most of the state east of Durham, still had about 88,000 customers without electricity Monday morning. The state’s electric cooperatives reported about 12,000 customers without power Monday.

National Guard volunteers have been going door to door since Saturday in 21 counties, making sure residents are safe and that they know how to safely heat their homes without being poisoned by carbon monoxide from poorly ventilated heaters.

The invisible, odorless gas apparently was involved in three deaths during the weekend.

Epifanio Arody Navarro, 32, of Durham died in his bed after residents took a charcoal grill into the house, police said. In Shelby, a man died and his wife was hospitalized after they ran a generator on an enclosed sun porch, police said. A Charlotte woman, whose name was not released, died Sunday after burning charcoal in the fireplace of her apartment, Mayor Pat McCrory said.

They brought the total number of deaths blamed on the storm and its aftermath to 30, in states extending from Arkansas to New York.

While some guard soldiers checked on residents, others worked to fulfill requests for help they had gotten the day before.

Robert Nolan had spent the previous night with two adult family members in their car, which was heated by the running engine. The car ran out of gas, and he asked the citizen-soldiers if they could bring him more since the nearby gas stations were unable to pump fuel for lack of power.

The troops returned Sunday with the gas, plus firewood for a neighbor.

Gov. Mike Easley joined National Guard members going door to door Sunday in Wendell, a town east of Raleigh, and said the uniformed volunteers had so far checked on more than 10,000 homes.

Easley said he planned to ask President Bush to declare North Carolina a federal disaster area.