THTF - Trees Hitting the Fan...

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rwc

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Mar 11, 2005
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Location
Bainbridge Island, WA
Back online after what one Northwest utility is calling "The Big Whopper."

The basics:
Food - The more full a freezer is the longer it stays cold. My upright freezer is in the garage and vacuum packed venison stayed solid for the 48 hours we were without power. 3-5 days probably would have been trouble.

Water - Our shared well does not have a generator back-up and we had to haul water upstairs to flush the toilet. A couple rain barrels tied into a down-spout will take care of our flushing needs in the future, and if neccessary, allow water for drinking through filtering. We had enough drinking water stored.

Shelter - We recently moved to Bainbridge Island and power outages were on my mind. We decided to install propane as a backup for the otherwise all-electric appliances. Oh happy day. Our Valor gas fireplace doesn't rely on a blower and was able to put out enough heat to keep most of the house comfortable (it has a battery powered remote control system with a thermostat built in). I hadn't gotten around to buying the deluxe BBQ I've had my eye on :rolleyes: and I would have been regretting it if we hadn't had a propane cookset (Coleman type set-up with tank, two-burner stove, and lantern). We had plenty of flashlights, headlamps, and votive candles.

Lessons learned:
  • Don't let your car's gas tank go to "Empty" before a storm hits. The gas station I went to 10 miles away was busy and ran low on gas while I was there. If you can, call before you drive.
  • Do have a means of storing and moving water. A sturdy garbage can, a 5 gal. "pickle bucket", a regular 2 gal. bucket, and a nearby source of water will let you keep flushing. 15-20 gal. of potable water is nice to have too so you don't have to filter or boil everything you need for drinking and cooking.
  • Don't own only cordless phones for your land-line. When I biked out on Saturday looking for a basic $5 phone they were not available.
  • Do have car charges for your mobile phones. The phone networks stayed up in many areas that lost power and cable.
  • Do have a means for cutting large trees.
  • Do buy lots of batteries before you need them.
  • Don't go anywhere in the first 24 hours if you can avoid it. Let the road crews and line crews get where they need to be. Having every traffic light out in large swaths of 4 counties meant traffic jams at almost every intersection.
  • Do get to know your neighbors, before you have to.

And perhaps most importantly - Do not burn anything bigger than a candle in your house. Tragically, it appears that there are going to be more injuries and deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning than from direct trauma due to the storm. Even generators left outdoors are poisoning people (somehow). I set up my propane cookset on the front porch so we had hot meals and tea. I will be buying a couple flourescent lanterns (they look like Coleman lanters but are battery powered) tominimize the fire risk from candles.

Happy holidays one and all!

rwc
 
RWC, I can commiserate with you ... from down in South Kitsap, just got power back after three days ...

My lessons learned:
- Buy the biggest chain saw you can afford. When it's just you and the neighbors trying to clear your road so you can get to work, you need good equipment.
- The more expensive, QUIETER generators must be worth the extra 500 bucks or more ...
- If you're on a septic system, know where the pump's manual on/off switch is.
- If you're on a well, turn the breaker off to your hot-water heater before the power comes back on.
- Always keep a couple bags of charcoal around, and a few bottles of propane -- the stores (if they're open) run out of these (along with batteries) before everything else.
 
Get an extra 20# LP tank with hose and regulator for the 'coleman' stoves. That amt of gas will cook for the neighborhood for a couple weeks. Water purification devices can be had from hiker suppliers.
 
True - I have a few spare LP tanks. It's also important to have the right adapter if you have one with the modern connector (lg. plastic nut) and not the old reverse thread type.

I like the Katadyne base camp style filter where it's a water bag you hang and gravity does the work.

I assume the generators were too close to the door or window that the cord was coming in bt the news reports haven't been specific. Since CO flows downhill homes in low spots could be accumulating "pools" of it too.
 
Lessons learned:
Don't let your car's gas tank go to "Empty" before a storm hits. The gas station I went to 10 miles away was busy and ran low on gas while I was there. If you can, call before you drive.
Do have a means of storing and moving water. A sturdy garbage can, a 5 gal. "pickle bucket", a regular 2 gal. bucket, and a nearby source of water will let you keep flushing. 15-20 gal. of potable water is nice to have too so you don't have to filter or boil everything you need for drinking and cooking.
Don't own only cordless phones for your land-line. When I biked out on Saturday looking for a basic $5 phone they were not available.
Do have car charges for your mobile phones. The phone networks stayed up in many areas that lost power and cable.
Do have a means for cutting large trees.
Do buy lots of batteries before you need them.
Don't go anywhere in the first 24 hours if you can avoid it. Let the road crews and line crews get where they need to be. Having every traffic light out in large swaths of 4 counties meant traffic jams at almost every intersection.
Do get to know your neighbors, before you have to.
Click to expand...

Funny how everything here sits pretty much in line with hurricane preparedness, yet with all the major destructive hurricanes we've had in the last 4 years people still have the "It can't happen to me" attitude then find out too late that "Yes....it can".
 
Everyone knows you should clear a 150 yard field of fire around your house. It will keep "charlie" from sneaking up on you and prevent any trees from falling on your wire.:neener:

I am glad things worked out ok for you. We didn't have too much damage over here on the East side, but back in the "Ice Storm" of the mid 1990's my house was without power for about 7 days. It amazes me just how many houses are built in the Northwest these days without fireplaces. When it is 5* outside and the power to your furnace is off, a good fire can go a long way to keeping you warm. The other thing I noticed is these idiots using generators and propane heaters in their houses without ventalation. IIRC there were at least 4 people found dead in their homes with the generator running indoors.:banghead:

Edit to add: Back when we lost power in the ice storm, my family hadn't given much thought to preparedness. We had no generator, no stores of water, and no emergency food supplies. Lucily, we had (by chance) enough to see us through. We had a fire and candles for heat and light, and my mother like to keep a well stocked pantry. Canned peaches, pears, and green beans get old after a while, but you can survive on them. Our biggest concern was water, we managed to buy 2 gallons from the store before they ran out. We were fortunate to have a gas stove that could still be used without power; we took buckets of lake water, boiled and filtered it to suppliment our drinking water. Now my family does a lot more preperation for emergencies.
 
And perhaps most importantly - Do not burn anything bigger than a candle in your house.
Click to expand...

Actually the real trick that you shouldn't have open flame in your house at all. Enclosed flame (like old kerosene lanterns) is the trick. Even then never leave it burning unattended and understand that modern houses are much "tighter" than in days of old so if you are burning stuff you need to vent at least a little (open the windows a crack).

Here's one most people don't think about...
If you live in an area subject to a power outage and will be using things like camping cook stoves, lanterns of various types, and generators, then you should invest in a few sensibly placed carbon monoxide detectors! (and make sure it has battery power so it'll still be detecting during the power outage).
 
Power Outage Preps

Funny, our preps here fall in line with "power outage" as the standard hits-the-fan setup.

We have water, food, and all that, for at least a couple of weeks; would do for a month if needed.

We also, after some thought, picked up some cast iron cookware and a "campfire grill" gizmo that allows us to cook over the fire in our (wood) fireplace. We have an unusually large fireplace, so this gives us some options, including charcoal if need be.

Although the fireplace won't warm the whole house, it makes it livable, and we have good sleeping bags.

We also have a portable potty (bucket style, with bags) for use in the event of prolonged water outage.

No generator, gotta work on that. Plenty of candles. Lots of batteries. Car chargers for all the cell phones. Butane stove, rated specifically for indoor use, and lots of fuel for it. Radios, including both battery-powered and hand-cranked. Even have a hand-cranked flashlight. We're adding a solar gadget so we can recharge our various (rechargeable) batteries. Getting the one Brunton sells.

Regular (line-powered) phones, two of those. We've had power outages that killed the local cell network. Redundancy is good.

We always keep our fuel tanks at-or-above the halfway mark in both vehicles. That was from an earlier "lessons learned" moment.

We have made a point, over the last two years, of getting to know our neighbors. When we moved into the neighborhood, we showed up at their doors with fresh pies and introduced ourselves. We call one another if we think something's not quite right.

We also have plenty of board games and cards. If we get stuck without power, and thus no TV or electronic entertainment, we're in good shape.
 
Excellent information

I live in the mountains and winter storms with snow and wind bring the same results. We've been caught short so many times I think we are fairly well prepared now. A couple of tricks I use. Fortunately I have two bathrooms. At the sign of any kind of major storm I usually fill one tub full of water. Makes flushing a snap when all else fails. Also when the power goes out and you loose water pressure you can't get hot water out of your heater anyway. That's 35 gallons in my case and it is potable without boiling. And thanks to Sportsman’s guide or Cheaper than dirt or somebody, I keep 3 wool blankets and a few cans of Spam or corned beef or beef stew and candy bars in old flight helmet bags in each vehicle. Not for survival but we have been caught on the road during closures. You’d be surprised how good a can of corned beef tastes after being stuck for 8 hours in a road closure.
 
I'm one of those extremely overprepared folks and I've found a few things that are really useful. Nicad batteries and solar chargers are some of the most useful things ever. We all use batteries throughout the year so we might as well make them rechargeables. The solar chargers are cheap backup insurance that you'll always have all the batteries you need during a crisis. This has been a money saver throughout the year, and on camping trips we don't need to worry about conserving batteries.

Think kerosene. Kerosene lasts practically forever and is safe to store. It has more heat value per gallon than any other fuel, even more so than white gas which is more dangerous to store. You can use it for lanterns, heaters, and most of all, stoves. I use the Alpaca kerosene stove, but there are smaller and larger units depending on need. You can get by a long time on very little kerosene.

When it comes to water storage, it seems that it all costs about a buck a gallon for any storage solution. There's an alternative that's less costly and quite convenient though. Bladder storage tanks. Some years back, I bought a 300 gallon water bladder and it was about $70. They made them in all sizes. I wish I remembered the company I got it from, but a google search should turn some up. They fit almost anywhere because of their low, flat shape.
 
Not gun related, but definetly related to stratagey:

Anyone on board had experience with those flashlights you shake? I'm guessing they use a capacitor set up of some sort to run the bulb? And the shaking creates and electrical charge that charges the capacitor(similar in concept to the spinning rotor in your cars alternator) I'm guessing?
 
Not gun related, but definetly related to stratagey:

Anyone on board had experience with those flashlights you shake? I'm guessing they use a capacitor set up of some sort to run the bulb? And the shaking creates and electrical charge that charges the capacitor(similar in concept to the spinning rotor in your cars alternator) I'm guessing?
Click to expand...

Not really worth it for two reasons.
1) there's a glut of cheap fakes that do, in fact, run on hidden batteries and when the batteries die, that's it for the light.

2) You don't get something for nothing and the amount of shaking you have to do to charge one does not (in my mind) equal the amount of light you get out of it. Pretty much the same for the crank lights.
 
kerosene

I have started using oil lanterns, as I got fed up with changing batteries for the times I needed them. My lanterns run on lamp oil, and I believe, kerosene. It was this feature I liked - as I'm considering switching our camping supplies away from gas canisters to another common fuel.

Two things though -

1. I thought you couldn't burn kerosene lamps inside, because of the CO.

2. I wasn't able to easily find other kerosene "appliances", though I found Coleman fuel/gasoline stoves.

And finally, as an aside, if you were stuck in a vehicle for a while, would using an oil lamp lantern inside be a "very bad idea"?
 
The trick is to tie a shoestring or whatever to the end of the shakelight, and then you sling it about in circles for a minute or so, it really doesn't tire you out, and it works a lot better than shaking it in your hand.

That said, a solar-powered battery charger would be a lot better.
 
Actually, the real trick with shake lights is to give them to your kids. The kids have way too much excess energy, being cooped up inside with the storm, and are prone to wasting battery-powered lights in any case. Shake lights solve both problems. :)

We were out of power for a little over 48 hours. Woodstove kept us cozy; lotsa hurricane lights and a couple of Coleman lanterns kept us lit. No substantial worries about using lanterns or cookstoves in this drafty old country house, provided just a tiny bit of common sense is used.

Lessons for me?

Heat: No significant issues. Love wood heat! It's our primary heat source all winter long.

Food: No significant issues. We live too far out of town to not have a good supply of basics always on hand.

Cooking: We need to separate our emergency gear from the camping gear. Getting into the camp trailer during a storm is a pain in the backside. Not willing to give up the convenience of being able to just hook up the camp trailer and go, so it's time to start duplicating gear to store in the garage.

Septic: We can flush toilets with buckets for the first few days, provided we're careful with it, but because the house has a mound septic with internal pump, there's a limited amount of waste we can put down the toilets during a power outage. Next purchase on my emergency list is a port-pot to handle solid wastes during extended outages. No problem this time, but could have become one if the outage had lasted twice as long as it did.

Electricity: No generator here; too much money for not enough use.

Phone: No significant issues; I enjoy the phone being out and we turned cell phones on to check messages from time to time.

Water: We have a hand pump which we attach to the well (minor amount of re-plumbing to do it) which supplies our water needs just fine. Need to take steps to assure that the tools to make the switchover are always present in the wellhouse, and need to purchase a few more water-hauling and water-holding devices for convenience' sake.

Entertainment: The kids were sad the power came back on. A near-continuous game of Mexican Train (dominoes), marshmallows for roasting, and a pot of cider simmering on the stove might have had something to do with that.

Computer: Dang, I'm addicted. That's all I'm gonna say about that.

pax
 
I have started using oil lanterns, as I got fed up with changing batteries for the times I needed them. My lanterns run on lamp oil, and I believe, kerosene. It was this feature I liked - as I'm considering switching our camping supplies away from gas canisters to another common fuel.

Two things though -
1. I thought you couldn't burn kerosene lamps inside, because of the CO.
2. I wasn't able to easily find other kerosene "appliances", though I found Coleman fuel/gasoline stoves.

And finally, as an aside, if you were stuck in a vehicle for a while, would using an oil lamp lantern inside be a "very bad idea"?
Click to expand...

The usual disclaimers, I'm not a lawyer, I'm not giving you advice, you do stuff at your own risk, blah blah blah...

Kerosene lamps and lanterns can be safely used indoors though you will want to vent at least a little bit (crack a couple of windows and you should be fine). They produce very low levels of CO when used with modern, clean, fuels (kerosene, kleen-heet, lamplight farm lamp oil). Lamplight farms has some good instructions for using a kerosene/oil lantern.

White gas and some propane fueled devices (the pressure type coleman lanterns) are NOT safe indoors and produce a LOT of carbon monoxide.

Other kerosene appliances can be found at Lehmans website (http://www.lehmans.com/index.jsp) like the Alpaca. (by the way, the Alpaca isn't safe to use indoors).

Also, regardless of if a device is supposed to be safe indoors or not you should see my post (#10) about having a battery powered Carbon Monoxide detector.
 
I would also suggest tools and spare lumber (if you have the room) just in case. I had no issues at my house other than power being out for a little while but I had to run up to my parent's place (who are much more well equipped than me, generator big enough for the house, wood, well, lots of food, etc) to help my dad board up the huge kitchen window after a tree limb went through it. That'll suck the heat out of a house REAL quick. Luckily the skylights made it unscathed.
 
Damn you make me feel lucky , I live in Mason county in the middle of a tree farm and my power was out for only 14 hours ! I do have a generator but by the time I felt the need to break it out my power was back on . During the ice storm in the early 90's I went 11 days with out but it was snowy so refrigeration was no problem . So far this thread has given alot of good tips that I had to learn the hard way another tip is to find some storage containers for extra fuel for your generaor , I have 5 20 gal plastic chemical containers someone gave the hold enough fuel to run my generator for 20 hours straight .
 
On the subject of the generator:

Make sure you have the main shut off before plugging the generator into the house line, if you are using an all-house gen set. Most (all?) states require a master switch that opens the main when switching in a permanently mounted generator, but a jury-rigged system might not have this type of master switch.

I have only the little 1KW camp gen set, so I can't run the whole house. I turn off the master breaker in the breaker box and pull the 15 amp breaker for the circuit that feeds the wood stove stack robber. To this line, I have a connector cable that goes to my little gen set. I placed the gen set a bit away from the house, so a wind from any direction will dissapate any exhaust fumes before they enter the house. This gives us the stack robber and one light bulb.

We didn't lose power during this storm, but we have in others. We have all the food, lights, cooking apparatus, water and several etceteras to boot. :neener:

Pops


Pops
 
At the sign of any kind of major storm I usually fill one tub full of water.
Click to expand...
We found out the hard way that our tubs don't hold water very well. At all, really. Rubber stoppers are on the shopping list.

Actually, the real trick with shake lights is to give them to your kids.
Click to expand...
Pax is spot-on about hand-crank lights and kids. We went down to my wife's grandparent's place in Burien on Sunday and they still didn't have power. The storm didn't stop the traditional family caroling party and the hand-crank light I brought was very popular with the kids (all 10 of them I think).

Electricity: No generator here; too much money for not enough use.
Click to expand...
I've been debating a hard-wired gen-set vs. a portable model. Any folks have generator recommendations?
 
Make sure you have the main shut off before plugging the generator into the house line, if you are using an all-house gen set. Most (all?) states require a master switch that opens the main when switching in a permanently mounted generator, but a jury-rigged system might not have this type of master switch.
Click to expand...
Yes it's vital to have a disconnect for the house. Not only will you be powering your neighbors houses with your set but you may kill some poor lineman trying to reconnect power.
 
My lessons learned are pretty much the same.

Always have plenty of:

Batteries
Flashlights
Candles
non-parishable food
wood
water
propane (for your BBQ)
1/2 tank gas
..and a generator would be nice too.

BTW a wood burning stove does an awesome job of heating a house.

I had all of this, and fared well. You should've seen the lines at the gas satation, and the people at Fred Meyer who were put off when they found out they were sold out of batteries and light!
 
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