Humble Apartment Residents Sweat Out Days Without Power, Fear Losing Insulin

Residents at Northlake Manor Apartments in Humble say they have gone more than a day without power, forcing at least one tenant to sleep outside on her porch and another to watch roughly $1,200 worth of insulin sit unrefrigerated as the Texas heat bore down on their units.

Tenant Nina Christian told FOX 26 Houston she pays about $1,500 a month in rent, and with no relief from the heat inside her apartment, she sent her niece elsewhere to stay while she herself slept outdoors. She said she asked management to let affected residents temporarily use vacant, air-conditioned units, though it is unclear from her account whether that request was granted.

Fellow tenant Patrice Seville, who lives with diabetes, said she was in danger of losing about $1,200 worth of insulin that requires refrigeration, according to the same report. She told the station she felt brushed off by property management as she sought answers about the outage, and said residents were getting conflicting information about when the power would actually return.

Crews Came, But the Lights Stayed Off

According to residents, CenterPoint crews visited the complex, but power remained out afterward, leaving unresolved whether the outage traces to the utility's grid or to the property's own internal electrical infrastructure. FOX 26 Houston reporter Leslie Delasbour covered residents' complaints about the outage, noting that tenants across the complex were also worried about spoiled food piling up in dead refrigerators.

Northlake Manor Apartments sits at 6910 Old North Belt Drive, also listed as 6910 N Sam Houston Pkwy E, in Humble, according to Apartment Finder. The low-rise complex in northeast Harris County advertises one- to three-bedroom units with rents starting around $899 to $929 a month.

What Texas Law Says About Losing Power

Texas landlords are required to make a diligent effort to repair or remedy conditions that materially affect a tenant's physical health or safety, a duty that legal guides say extends to dangerous electrical failures and a lack of cooling during summer heat, per Texas Property Code § 92.052 as outlined by FindLaw. Separately, Texas Property Code § 92.008 bars landlords from cutting off electric service unless the interruption stems from legitimate repairs, construction, or an emergency, and it allows tenants to pursue a court-ordered writ of restoration along with statutory damages, according to the same legal guidance.

Before tenants can access those remedies, however, Texas Property Code § 92.056 requires them to give their landlord written notice of the habitability problem and allow a reasonable amount of time to respond, per Justia Law. Tenants generally also have to be current on rent when they deliver that notice, a procedural hurdle that can complicate quick fixes during an active outage.

Heat Risk Rises the Longer the Power Stays Off

The health stakes of losing air conditioning during a Texas summer are not abstract. The FDA notes that unopened insulin can remain stable at room temperatures up to 86°F for as long as 28 days, but potency degrades rapidly once temperatures climb higher than that, which is the exact risk Seville described facing. Harris County Public Health has also warned that prolonged indoor power loss during high summer heat can expose residents to heat exhaustion, heat stroke, and acute kidney injury, with body temperature in heat stroke cases capable of reaching 106°F within just 10 to 15 minutes.

Those warnings track with a broader trend documented by Harris County Public Health: heat-related illnesses across the county jumped 329% between 2019 and 2023, with 61% of those incidents occurring when the local heat index hit 103°F or higher, according to a report covered by Community Impact. The situation at Northlake Manor also echoes an April 2023 case FOX 26 Houston covered at a South Houston complex on Holly Hall Street, where more than 200 units lost power for multiple days and tenants with refrigerated medication and spoiled food protested management's lack of communication while waiting on CenterPoint.

It remains unclear whether Northlake Manor's outage originated with CenterPoint's grid or with the property's internal wiring, and management has not been quoted responding to tenants' specific requests for temporary housing in vacant units. For now, residents like Christian and Seville say they are left waiting, sweating, and hoping their medication and their patience hold out until the lights come back on.