US: Severe cold, power outages cause major water problems

Millions of Texas residents suffer water and power cuts as sustained cold snap enters its sixth day.

About 7 million people in Texas – a quarter of the United States’s second-most populous state – have been told to boil their water or stop using it entirely as homeowners, hospitals, and businesses grappled with broken water mains, burst pipes and power outages. Winter storms during the past week in the Midwest, Texas and the South forced water service providers to scramble to manage flows as sub-freezing temperatures set in. Nearly 3.4 million customers around the US were still without electricity on Wednesday. The Texas city of Kyle, south of Austin, asked residents on Wednesday to suspend water usage until further notice because of a shortage.