As 475-thousand will be eligible to get vaccinated in Louisiana Monday, Governor Edwards urges residents to be patient. Brooke Thorington explains.
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The Public Service Commission is planning to investigate just how the power situation went so wrong across much of the state this week. Matt Doyle has more.
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With oil refineries shutting down due to the recent winter weather across the south, gas prices have risen almost 3 cents overnight from 2.25 a gallon to 2.28 a gallon for regular gas. Triple-A Fuel Analyst Don Redman says this is the type of spike we would typically see during hurricane season.
Gas prices were already on the rise before the winter storms and the weather only made things worse. Redman believes that gas prices will continue to rise.
Redman says you should keep your tank full because there could be a gas shortage for the coming days.
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On Monday COVID vaccine eligibility will increase by another 475-thousand. The historic winter storms delayed COVID vaccine shipments across the state. But Governor Edwards says with an increase in weekly allocations he’s comfortable in allowing more to be vaccinated.
Beginning Monday, those ages 55 to 64 with certain health conditions will be eligible for vaccinations, along with K-12 teachers and school support staff, day care staff and pregnant women.
Edwards says there will be enough doses to go around
Edwards says with the winter storms causing delays in vaccine deliveries and administering doses, he’s urging those seeking to be vaccinated to be patient.
For a list of participating vaccine providers go to CovidVaccine.LA.Gov or call 211.
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Public Service Commission Chairman Craig Greene says once the winter weather has passed the PSC will investigate what went wrong and why power providers had such poor communication with customers.
Greene says we just didn’t have the emergency capacity to keep everyone’s lights on during this historic week of winter weather.
The order to initiate rolling blackouts was made by MISO, a super-regional entity in charge of maintaining power reliability.
Greene says companies’ failure to give customers a heads up when they would be subject to a rolling blackout needs to be addressed. He says there must be a better system in place.
Governor Edwards has requested everyone limit energy consumption from 7PM to 10 PM tonight and 7 AM to 9 AM tomorrow to help reduce the need for rolling blackouts.
Greene says they won’t have immediate answers to what went wrong, but they will conduct a thorough investigation.
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It will be until Saturday afternoon before the highways are free of ice in north Louisiana. State Transportation Secretary Shawn Wilson says some melting will occur today, but they expect re-freezing tonight as temperatures fall into the teens
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The state transportation of department is facing criticism for not doing enough. Wilson says they had 14-hundred workers, primarily in north Louisiana before the storm arrived, salting and brining major roads
Wilson says DOTD also used three and a half million pounds of salt and thousands of gallons of brine in an effort to keep interstates from becoming too slippery.
He says mother nature can be their best ally by providing several hours of temperatures above freezing.
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The LSU men’s basketball team will host Auburn in Baton Rouge on Saturday at 3 p.m. While Auburn sits at 11-11 on the season, they’ve played well lately led by point guard Sharife Cooper. Coach Will Wade says Cooper does a great job of distributing the ball to his teammates.
Auburn has a great transition offense and Wade says his team will need to be ready to defend after made baskets in order to slow them down.