# Storm & power outages



## Moose33 (Jan 1, 2011)

We had a bit if a storm over the weekend. Yesterday at work one person has no heat, no water and no power. He was going home to wrap up in blankets and sit in the dark until morning. Another lady brought two gallon jugs to fill with water at work. She, her husband, three kids and a dog had no water and stores are sold out.

It's Maine, it's winter, I wonder what it is people expect.


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## jeff47041 (Jan 5, 2013)

Last winter, a few roads over from me, a water main broke. People were all over facebook saying they had no water. Finally, they figured out that they could go outside and get snow to melt to flush their toilets. I read comment after comment about how rough their morning was going. I finally couldn't stand it and posted that everyone should have AT LEAST 72 hours of water needs in their home. I also posted a link to the 72 hour preparedness site from IN.gov. Lots of idiots commented that this was ridiculous, because the stores sell water everyday. It just boggled my mind. 

I really did think people around here were smart enough to at least have water stored up in case the electric goes out for a day. Until just about 5 years ago, our area was notorious for loosing electricity for a day or two for no real reason. I guess people forgot about that. 

Oh, and the next day, at a family event, I brought that facebook conversation up. I was shocked at how many of my nephews said that they don't have any water stored up. They got an earful from me.


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## UncleJoe (Jan 11, 2009)

Kinda like some folks around here. They wait until October then put an ad on craigslist _"desperately looking for firewood for this winter"_.

Winter comes to these parts every year. It's a scheduled event. I have no sympathy for someone that waits until this time of year to start looking for wood.


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## Moose33 (Jan 1, 2011)

My power goes out once a month too. How numb does one have to be to not expect it??

Yup, we have two seasons. Winter and getting ready for winter. Ignore the latter and you deserve what you get during the former.

It just boggles my mind sometimes.


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## jeff47041 (Jan 5, 2013)

Every year!? Crap, I better get some wood!

I don't have a wood burner, but I have a stack of firewood. 
I actually ordered the double walled pipe and all of the fittings that I need this past month. YAY! I might not be able to get a wood burner this year, but at least it's a start. I have a Volgalsang little stove that has two cooking tops on it. Figured I can get that in the house and use it if something happens.


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## helicopter5472 (Feb 25, 2013)

Yep, like Moose33, you need to be prepared when in Maine. We are going on the third day without electricity, The electric company's phone line is always busy as usual.


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## ZoomZoom (Dec 18, 2009)

Last Sunday was clean-up day at the local sporting field. I opted to take the task of the full maintenance of the generators (a pair of nice Honda iu2000's).

I asked the club president what I should do with them once completed (I was taking them home to do the work). I was told I could keep them over the winter or take them to their house. I asked if they had a generator at home and was told "no". I was set back a bit then said I was bringing the gensets to their house. _I'm continuing to scratch my head on why someone without a generator wasn't even interested in keeping/storing a nice pair of them_.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

jeff47041 said:


> I have a Vogelzang little stove that has two cooking tops on it. Figured I can get that in the house and use it if something happens.


Use pieces of tin foil to seal the cracks. That stove isn't "airtight" and you'll find that making aluminum foil "seals" will slow the airflow down a lot and actually let you control the fire! I heated the house for two years using one and got pretty good at running it right.


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## Geek999 (Jul 9, 2013)

As you all know I was in the area affected by Hurricane Sandy. I was quite comfortable due to having installed a generator the prior year. I was the only one in the neighborhood with a wired into the house generator. Want to guess how many of my neighbors have installed generators post Sandy? Well, I am still the only one in my neighborhood with a wired in generator.

Obviously most people don't get that electrical power is unreliable.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Geek999 said:


> Want to guess how many of my neighbors have installed generators post Sandy? Well, I am still the only one in my neighborhood with a wired in generator.


I'll bet a lot of them felt it was such an unusually rare occurrence, that they'll never have to worry about another "Sandy" for 100 years or more.

"I lived through this one, there won't be another in my lifetime" is a common narrow-minded viewpoint. There are other disasters that can occur.

I does often baffle me how so many don't feel *any* need - - to prepare for ANY emergency at all!


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## Geek999 (Jul 9, 2013)

LincTex said:


> I'll bet a lot of them felt it was such an unusually rare occurrence, that they'll never have to worry about another "Sandy" for 100 years or more.
> 
> "I lived through this one, there won't be another in my lifetime" is a common narrow-minded viewpoint. There are other disasters that can occur.
> 
> I does often baffle me how so many don't feel *any* need - - to prepare for ANY emergency at all!


Actually, we've had numerous power outages between Hurricanes and good old NYC or northeast blackouts. Sandy was unusual only in the length of the outage.


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## Country Living (Dec 15, 2009)

Geek999 said:


> As you all know I was in the area affected by Hurricane Sandy. I was quite comfortable due to having installed a generator the prior year. I was the only one in the neighborhood with a wired into the house generator. Want to guess how many of my neighbors have installed generators post Sandy? Well, I am still the only one in my neighborhood with a wired in generator.
> 
> Obviously most people don't get that electrical power is unreliable.


How many of your neighbors think / know they'll just be able to come over to your house if there is another event? Out of curiosity, do you know if any of your neighbors were running extension cords from your outside outlets to their house (with or without permission)?


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## Geek999 (Jul 9, 2013)

Country Living said:


> How many of your neighbors think / know they'll just be able to come over to your house if there is another event? Out of curiosity, do you know if any of your neighbors were running extension cords from your outside outlets to their house (with or without permission)?


The neighbor that asked about the Internet did so because he heard the generator. I have offered my next door neighbor the opportunity to come over and charge up phones or other devices, but he didn't take me up on it during Sandy.

If the outage lasted longer than the Sandy outage I'm sure a few more would eventually come by.

I don't have a problem with the idea of someone charging an electronic device during an outage, but you would need ridiculously long extension cords to really extend to another dwelling, so I don't expect anyone to try to draw power without my knowledge.

What surprises me is the lack of interest in making their own homes more reliable. Even if you're not a prepper the unreliability of power in our area is pretty obvious.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Geek999 said:


> I have offered my next door neighbor the opportunity to come over and charge up phones or other devices, but he didn't take me up on it during Sandy.


You would think that he would have?!?!?!

Conversely, After hurricane Ike in Houston, my uncle "tossed a cord over the fence" with the instructions it was only to be used for the neighbor's fridge (with ice maker). If you needed power for something else, you had to unplug the fridge.

After he kept popping the breaker on the generator, he went to the neighbor's house to investigate, and found they had plugged in a power strip, and another, and another.... 

Some people, if you give them an inch....


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## Geek999 (Jul 9, 2013)

LincTex said:


> You would think that he would have?!?!?!
> 
> Conversely, After hurricane Ike in Houston, my uncle "tossed a cord over the fence" with the instructions it was only to be used for the neighbor's fridge (with ice maker). If you needed power for something else, you had to unplug the fridge.
> 
> ...


Well, after the first day the backup power to all the cell towers ran out, shutting down cell service. Maybe he had nothing else worth charging?


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## Tucker (Jul 15, 2010)

I think the "prepper" mentality is something that we apply to all facets of our life, not just storm and power outages. For instance, I keep lots of pet food on hand at all times. Right now, I have 15 cases of food I use to make soup for my ferrets (will last 360 days). My friend, who also has ferrets, waits until she runs out to get another case. When the manufacturer delayed shipments of the food earlier this year, she had to scurry all over to try to find some. She also blamed the local pet store for not keeping a case of food in stock with her (that one left me scratching my head). :scratch She now pays MORE to have someone deliver a case to her door as needed. :scratch :scratch

It's hard for me, as a prepper, to understand why people have their head in the sand (or someplace else).


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## readytogo (Apr 6, 2013)

Moose33 said:


> We had a bit if a storm over the weekend. Yesterday at work one person has no heat, no water and no power. He was going home to wrap up in blankets and sit in the dark until morning. Another lady brought two gallon jugs to fill with water at work. She, her husband, three kids and a dog had no water and stores are sold out.
> 
> It's Maine, it's winter, I wonder what it is people expect.


Every time I read postings like this I wonder about people more and more, it seems to me people tend to get more ignorant as the years go by, we all here know that the weather will change every year, we know what those changes can bring to our areas and yet people seem not to care, in the summer I can open a window but winter time can kill you or leave you stranded do to a heavy snow fall, anyway this is a good time to remind everybody out there in snow country to keep a few extra blankets in your vehicles some water a full tank of fuel and some food items. Stay Safe Folks.


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## fteter (May 23, 2014)

Emergency prep is highly encouraged by both the government and the LDS Church here in northern Utah. But even with that, I'm still stunned by the number of folks in my neighborhood who don't have a generator or water or a backup heating solution for short-term needs - about 50% of the neighborhood from what I can determine. And, yeah, this is definitely snow country. I guess some folks just aren't going to deal until it hits 'em in the face...


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## Ezmerelda (Oct 17, 2010)

It's just like life-long residents of Florida, scrambling EVERY year to buy plywood to cover the windows for a hurricane. I want to ask them, "Why didn't you keep the plywood from last year? You have a shed AND a two car garage in which to store it!"

Suddenly I understand the "born yesterday" label. Too many people act as if they were, in fact, born yesterday.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Ezmerelda said:


> I want to ask them, "Why didn't you keep the plywood from last year? You have a shed AND a two car garage in which to store it!"


I have always wondered if "used one time only" plywood was for sale cheap in Florida.....

If the Mexicans in Florida are like the Mexicans in Texas, you just set something you don't want by the curb and it will be gone in just a couple hours.


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## readytogo (Apr 6, 2013)

Ezmerelda said:


> It's just like life-long residents of Florida, scrambling EVERY year to buy plywood to cover the windows for a hurricane. I want to ask them, "Why didn't you keep the plywood from last year? You have a shed AND a two car garage in which to store it!"
> 
> Suddenly I understand the "born yesterday" label. Too many people act as if they were, in fact, born yesterday.


I have 6 windows in my house the plywwod is cut and ready and under my bed just as when I got them,with a coat of waterproofing will last a life time but people around here love to complaing and waste money as always.


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## readytogo (Apr 6, 2013)

*Weather Warning Folks*

Intense storm headed to Alaska's Aleutian Islands
http://news.yahoo.com/remnant-typhoon-nuri-headed-aleutian-islands-232035931.html


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