GERMANTOWN, Md. — At least 38 residents of the Middlebrook Gardens Mobile Home Park community in Germantown were evacuated Friday night to a shelter at the nearby Plum Gar Community Center after a power outage plunged the complex into a deep freeze.
Many other residents said they fled to the homes of nearby families, spent the night in motels, or tried to endure the cold by warming up in vehicles overnight.
Montgomery County authorities announced they went door to door in the community Friday night, offering shelter as PEPCO utility crews battled the extreme cold to respond to hundreds of power outages in the area caused by Friday's winter blast.
The American Red Cross assisted Montgomery officials in setting up the shelter at the Plum Gar Center.
As the sun rose at Middlebrook Gardens, the outdoor temperature sat at 6-degrees farenheit.
"It's absolutely, terribly cold," said Yuri Aguilar, who said she abandoned her home in favor of a hotel to warm up before going to work at a nearby nursing home.
Resident Elida Albarado said it got so cold in her family's trailer that a pet tropical fish died in its tank.
"We had a lot of blankets and we slept all together," Albarado said.
The family set up a generator but it did not supply enough power to run the unit's heating system.
PEPCO began restoring power to Middlebrook Gardens by the middle of the morning.
Many residents said they had frozen plumbing and they fear pipes may burst and cause flooding as the complex thaws out.