More than 4,800 inmates at the Bexar County Adult Detention Center went without air conditioning for days after a violent storm knocked out power across San Antonio, forcing the jail onto backup generators that could keep the lights on but not cool the building. Deputies handed out containers of ice water and large fans to affected units while roof leaks and spotty power delayed inmate intake, according to The Cool Down.
The jail relies on electricity for lighting, ventilation, communications, electronic security systems and daily operations, per the same report. Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar told WOAI / News 4 San Antonio that backup power was enough to keep lights on but not to run building-wide cooling, and that storm-related roof leaks combined with limited generator capacity slowed booking operations as deputies struggled to keep the laptops used for intake charged.
Generators Couldn’t Handle the Heat
The outage came right as Texas jail regulations require indoor temperatures to stay between 65 and 85 degrees in occupied areas, a standard set under 37 Texas Administrative Code sections that govern climate control at county detention centers, according to the Texas Commission on Jail Standards. At the time of the outage, the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office said there was no estimate for when electricity service would return and had not identified which jail operations were affected, per News 4 San Antonio’s August 29 reporting cited by The Cool Down.
Full municipal grid power wasn’t restored to the jail until Sunday morning, August 30, following an on-site inspection the day before by Bexar County Judge Peter Sakai, according to KSAT. Sakai visited the facility in person on Saturday before county leadership confirmed operations had returned to normal.
A Storm That Followed 12 Days of Triple-Digit Heat
The severe weather that triggered the outage hit San Antonio on Friday, August 28, with straight-line wind gusts reaching 75 to 80 mph and 1.69 inches of rain, ending a 12-day stretch of triple-digit temperatures, according to Atma Energy. The downburst knocked out power to more than 112,000 customers at its peak and prompted CPS Energy to field over 600 downed-wire reports…