RoadkingLarry
Member
As some of you may have heard we had us a bit of an ice storm last week here in Oklahoma and points North and East.
I lost power Monday morning about 6:00am and got it back Saturday midday. As it turned out I was ill prepared both material wise and mentally for an extended power failure in cold weather.
Sunday, the wife and I went to the local grocery store to pick up a few odds and ends in case the roads got bad. while at the entire town went dark and as it turned out would not come back on for 3 days. We went to a neighboring town and picked up our groceries. I did not think to buy an extra battery or candle or disposable propane tank but I did buy a bag of ice melt.
During the evening we listened to trees crack and shatter with barely a thought to loosing power.
Monday morning we woke to 1/2" or more of ice on everything in sight and I had the pleasure of spending an hour with my chainsaw just to get out of my drive way and to partially clear the county road in front of my house so I could get to work.
My wife was content to stay at home and bundle up and keep a big pot of water boiling on the gas stove to help keep the house warm. Monday wasn't too bad and the water bed still had retained some heat so we didn't do too bad the first night. Tuesday the house had cooled considerably and wife was beginning to show the strain and we had now lost water so I called her sister to come and get her since her car was still blocked by broken limbs.
In the rural neighborhood I live in I had given little thought to any kind of "tactical" issues till I was checking my dads place next door Tuesday evening. I had seen a strange truck creeping down our dead end road that was slowing and looking intently at houses that had been vacated, stepped from around the corner of the garage and turned my light towards them and they took off in a hurry, maybe nothing maybe?? Until then I had remained unarmed. I didn't sleep too good that night half listening for ???
Wednesday I was able to borrow a good size generator and get my gas furnace up and get the house warmed up and run some lights. Still no water.
But since we had heat the wife came home and picked up drinking water on the way in. Once we were on the generator things were almost normal but at $30+ a day to run the generator it could add up.
Lessons learned, I had an inadequate supply if emergency drinking water (none) thats been fixed. I had no portable propane bottles for lantern and camp stove, fixed.
I had no adequate source of heat with electricity off, gas stove was not gonna cut it. I'm looking at options.
I will buy a good sized generator in the near future.
comments?
I lost power Monday morning about 6:00am and got it back Saturday midday. As it turned out I was ill prepared both material wise and mentally for an extended power failure in cold weather.
Sunday, the wife and I went to the local grocery store to pick up a few odds and ends in case the roads got bad. while at the entire town went dark and as it turned out would not come back on for 3 days. We went to a neighboring town and picked up our groceries. I did not think to buy an extra battery or candle or disposable propane tank but I did buy a bag of ice melt.
During the evening we listened to trees crack and shatter with barely a thought to loosing power.
Monday morning we woke to 1/2" or more of ice on everything in sight and I had the pleasure of spending an hour with my chainsaw just to get out of my drive way and to partially clear the county road in front of my house so I could get to work.
My wife was content to stay at home and bundle up and keep a big pot of water boiling on the gas stove to help keep the house warm. Monday wasn't too bad and the water bed still had retained some heat so we didn't do too bad the first night. Tuesday the house had cooled considerably and wife was beginning to show the strain and we had now lost water so I called her sister to come and get her since her car was still blocked by broken limbs.
In the rural neighborhood I live in I had given little thought to any kind of "tactical" issues till I was checking my dads place next door Tuesday evening. I had seen a strange truck creeping down our dead end road that was slowing and looking intently at houses that had been vacated, stepped from around the corner of the garage and turned my light towards them and they took off in a hurry, maybe nothing maybe?? Until then I had remained unarmed. I didn't sleep too good that night half listening for ???
Wednesday I was able to borrow a good size generator and get my gas furnace up and get the house warmed up and run some lights. Still no water.
But since we had heat the wife came home and picked up drinking water on the way in. Once we were on the generator things were almost normal but at $30+ a day to run the generator it could add up.
Lessons learned, I had an inadequate supply if emergency drinking water (none) thats been fixed. I had no portable propane bottles for lantern and camp stove, fixed.
I had no adequate source of heat with electricity off, gas stove was not gonna cut it. I'm looking at options.
I will buy a good sized generator in the near future.
comments?