HOLLYWOOD, Fla. — New video shows the conditions inside a Florida nursing home where eight residents died days after Hurricane Irma knocked out its air conditioning, CBS Miami reports.
The 34-second video shows residents at the Hollywood Hills Rehabilitation Center suffering in the sweltering heat while staff used fans in an attempt to cool them. A couple is seen lying in their beds while a small fan sits on the nightstand beside them.
The video was taken by the couple’s daughter, who did not want to be identified.
The footage is the first look into what kind of conditions the residents at the Hollywood Hills Rehabilitation Center were living in that resulted in the death of eight patients.
At one point, the video shows a naked woman in a hallway who is hunched over what appears to be a hospital bed.
The video was shot Tuesday, Sept. 12, but the problems began two days prior, when the storm’s winds knocked out power to the transformer that powered the center’s air conditioning system.
Within the hour, the center’s administrators called the Florida Power & Light Company to ask for help. They say the company promised a crew would come the next morning, but they never arrived. A senior official at the center also called an emergency cellphone number Gov. Rick Scott gave out, but several calls went straight to voicemail.
They said they made more than 50 additional calls to Florida Power & Light.
The facility began calling 911 Wednesday morning, but four hours later several patients had dead. The rest of the center’s occupants were evacuated an hour later.
When Florida Power & Light workers arrived at the nursing home after the patients died, it took them approximately 20 minutes to get the center’s power back up and running.
