Pubs are opening their doors as temporary warm banks for frozen Sheffield residents cut off from gas for the sixth day as the nation endures a brutal cold snap.
The city's council declared a major incident yesterday, five days after water mains burst and severed a crucial gas pipe.
It left 2,000 homes in the Stannington, Hillsborough and Malin Bridge areas of the city without gas, which meant many have had no heating since Friday.
The fiasco couldn't have come at a worse time as temperatures plummeted this week with the arrival of the 'Troll of Trondheim' weather phenomenon, which the Met Office said will last into next week.
Overnight temperatures have dropped as low as -10C in some parts of the UK, posing a serious threat to those without heating.
A number of pubs and cafés in the Steel City have opened this week to give residents a play to keep warm and get a hot meal as overnight temperatures in the area have dipped below zero.
One such pub is The Peacock pub in Stannington, who told Mirror Online they are right next to a care home which saw elderly residents go without warmth for nearly five days.
Will Harrison, who works at the pub, said the gas outage had forced frozen families to turn to electric heaters, and that as a result the power grid had had to resort to generators threatening an electric blackout.
"We've been open throughout the crisis offering free tea and coffee and half price meals," he said.
"Most of the people coming have been elderly - they're going to feel it a lot more. We're right next to a residents' home and thankfully they've got their power back now, but they were without any for four or five days."
Will added that the power grid had urged people not to use too much electricity amidst unsustainable pressure on supplies.
"We've been told that tomorrow should be when it comes back on, but they've said that before and it didn't happen. If it doesn't get sorted tomorrow, we could be looking at powercuts, too."
Furious residents meanwhile have demanded compensation from Yorkshire Water, the city's water provider, after the disaster.
A crowdfunding page has demanded the company take responsibility, calling on them to provide "a minimum of a year’s free water supply for all properties affected".
Nurse Philippa Williamson, 62, lives with her partner, multiple sclerosis sufferer Lyndon Webster, 44, just a quarter of a mile from the epicentre of the flooding incident.
She had to attend her mother's funeral on Tuesday with mourners shivering in a freezing chapel and school room for the wake.
"It's cold. I've been working in my study with a fan heater on, with two pairs of trousers on and a pair of tights, a t-shirt, a jumper and a cardigan.
"And I did a call with a bobble hat and blanket around me. It's ridiculous. The fan heaters are not really warm - and we're only supposed to heat one room at a time."
Sheffield City Council leader Terry Fox has praised what he dubbed "a real community spirit" after people came together during the crisis.
"We're very worried. That's why we called the major incident," he said on Wednesday.
"But, what we've seen, to be brutally frank, is a real deep community spirit where people are helping individuals."
Another family meanwhile said they'd had to switch off the lights on their Christmas tree in a bid to save any ounce of electricity to prevent further powercuts as chilly residents rely on electric heaters.
Mum-of-three Kirsty Ellin, 41, has an asthmatic son and a daughter living with anorexia, meaning both were incredibly vulnerable to the cold.
The children's hospital worker said: "We can't sleep. We get up at 5am every night just because it's so cold."
Gas suppliers Cadent Gas have been praised by some residents for their efforts to rectify the situation.
Retired nurse David Smith, 67, said workers from Cadent had been at the scene "24 hours a day" to restore the supply.
"But Yorkshire Water have not been seen they have been notable by their absence. I'm going to lodge a complaint. They fixed the water leak then they walked away."
Yorkshire Water said: "Burst pipes can happen for a number of reasons - often related to a change in temperature or pressure within the pipe.
"We constantly monitor our pipes so that we can reduce the risk of bursts, and the pipe in Stannington hasn't burst in almost a decade."
