Arizona border containers repurposed into cooling centers

Containers that once created a barrier between Arizona and Mexico have been retrofitted to provide relief from the sweltering heat.

“Outside, burn in a matter of minutes, and you come inside here and it's nice and cool,” Glendenning said. Gov. Katie Hobb’s office confirmed the repurposed containers are the same ones used by former Gov. Doug Ducey to create a barrier between Arizona and Mexico. The state sold 444 containers for $807,543, and currently has on hand another 1600 shipping containers. It’s unclear how many of the containers sold came from the makeshift border wall.

The Arizona Faith Network is overseeing the two units in Phoenix. Some have dubbed the repurposed cooling containers “cooltainers.” The innovative cooling units were rolled out after a record-breaking summer in 2023 that baked the Grand Canyon State. On May 3, during a press conference, state officials announced that heat claimed 987 lives last year. Emergency rooms statewide recorded 4,000 heat-related visits, and cooling centers tracked more than 26,000 visits last year across the state, according to the Arizona Extreme Heat Preparedness Plan.

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