Random thoughts on being prepared... or not...

[Chip]

We lost power for, what, 5 days. We did fine. There was power around town so it was never threatening, but losing power is always a learning experience.

There are sections of NY and NJ that are descending into complete chaos: No lights, food, water, heat. Toilets aren't flushing. 3 hour lines for gas. It does not take long.

So here's a few thoughts, please add yours. (Let's pretend you don't want to rely on Help, because It's probably preoccupied) :

"We" all have camp stoves, white gas, lanterns, water filters, extra food, right ?

My issues were:
- The house was starting to get cold. We have a fireplace but I don't normally use it as it only heats one or 2 rooms and does not do that well. I would need propane space heaters or a generator to keep the house warm if it got colder. Small gas generators are fine but run out of gas and gas stations aren't required to be operating and often don't when there's no electricity. You can't store gas easily either. I like diesel. It can be stored but you may have a couple hundred gallons already as it is home heating oil. A diesel car or truck and generator and a couple hundred gallons of fuel available would be comforting.

- We have a well and septic. No faucet drinking water and toilets need to be flushed "manually". We had plenty of drinking water but it takes about 2 1/2 gallons of water to flush a toilet. So a family of 4 might easily go through 5 gallons of water a day flushing. A bottomless supply of water would be a good thing; a pool, pond, stream, rain barrels or sump pump hole come to mind.

A small house with a good wood stove, a source for water and off the grid solar would be better.

Red Cross was serving hot chocolate and cookies to people who had no clothes, food, water or fuel. Don't think "Someone" will be there.
Oh: and if you live where it could POSSIBLY flood: Get the freak out early.

Sorry if this comes off as negative. I'm now warm with a cold beer at my disposal. I hope all are well.

 

[Raven]

Over the last few years, some of the storms in NH have knocked people out of power for 2 weeks. At that point I realized the power companies do not have the capacity to get people back on line in a reasonable time frame after a big storm. Being as self-reliant as possible can only help. I'm always trying to lesson my dependency on the grid for these reasons - long way to go still but with more of this likely to come, I think it makes sense. Small efficient homes have some advantages over large ones in this regard. Obviously, having batteries, rechargeable batteries, solar powered phone chargers will all come in handy.

Another great option - an inverter for $50 will allow you to run AC appliances from your car battery. Mine also has a USB connection for powering electronics. I keep 2-3 deep cycle marine batteries on hand and fully charged at any given time for this as they are designed to be drained and charged unlike car batteries.

I have about 40 gallons of fresh water in large sealed carboys and frozen in 1/2 gallon jugs in the freezers in the house. They act as great cold insulation in the freezer to save money but also serve as fresh water storage if needed and I use them in my coolers when I travel. Still ice in the mix after 3 days in a cooler. A rain barrel outside collects plenty of storm water to use in toilets, washing, etc. so drinking water can be used for drinking. Water treatment and a filter are nice to have to be sure water is safe after flooding if it needs to be collected from the pond across the road.

My hot water and stove run on propane, and my HW tank stays off unless I am planning to need HW sometime in the next hour. These need no electricity.

A generator combined with low energy "appliances" helps. I need electric for the fridge, basement freezer, lights, and a pump for flooding if needed. I gave up cable a few years ago so don't miss TV. I have enough food to last a while between canned and dried goods and what I have in the freezers. Once the trucks stop delivering, grocery stores have about 3 days of food before they are out. And this does not assume chaos, so I give it one day once people know there's a rush. Things like milk come in powdered form. I think it's smart to have a box.

For heat, it's hard to beat a woodstove for independence. Fireplace can do the job in a pinch. Unlimited fuel and no need for electric for any components. If things get cold, you can burn anything in it.

Know your neighbors. Whatever I don't have and need, they might. I have plenty that will help them in an emergency and by everyone helping out, everyone can probably get what they need. With how I have seen the world change in the last 10-15 years (both environmentally and politically), I think being as self-reliant as possible is only going to help in what I expect are going to be uncertain times.

I don't have a bus buried in the back yard yet for a shelter but I'm taking measurements.

Hope everyone that still can turns out okay from the storm and hopefully we are all better prepared for the next one. This was a category 1. We all know Florida is used to seeing 2's, 3's and the occasional 4. The 100 year storm definition needs to be updated.

 

[peakbagger]

Living out in the "boonies" has its advantages. In general most of the long term residents are set up for 3 to 5 days of lack of some utilities, although newbies arent and they usually have to go through a couple of events before they either leave or figure out a backup plan. FEMA recommends a 3 day emergency kit and up in the woods I expect most have 5 day kit.

A lot of the "prepper" concepts are somewhat off the mark and overkill but the presence of a TV camera encourages them. For every prepper on TV there are many more rational folks who have the basics and the knowledge to run off the grid for awhile. The LDS church(the mormans) have prepping as part of their religion and they have it pretty well figured out. As for the end of the world as we know it scenarios where the entire ecomomic and solcial system breaks down forever I dont really worry about it.

I have survived multiple week long backpacking trips with only the gear on my back and some hardy souls can go 10 to 14 days with the food on their overloaded backs. When I backpack, I intentionally lower my expectations for creature comforts and willingly spend my vacation time doing it.

I do have a generator and do keep some gas around as a matter of course. I also have an older style wood stove that doesnt require any power and unlike the newer EPA stoves, can burn green wood. I havent used it for awhile but I have the gear to hook it up and run it. I also primarilly heat with a wood boiler and with some minor alterations I can even run that off minimal power. I do have an unused surface well that served my water needs for 10 plus years, with a bucket and rope I have all the water I need and if I wanted to spend the dollars I could install a hand pump to use the well to charge up my regular water system. For those with deep artiesian wells, there are hand pumps that can be installed in the same casing as an electric pump and also can be used to charge up the household water system. My PV systems are both grid tied without batteries so I am just as out of luck as someone without solar during a grid outage, but I could probably rig up way to charge a few car batteries to run an inverter if I needed to. For about $5000 I could add the appropriate equipment to make it able to run normally during a power outage, but as most new englanders would attest, the sun didnt shine for a week. If I did go with batterie storage I could use a generator to charge them up as needed which cuts way down on gas usage. Since I bought my generator afterthe Y2K hype was over, I have never used it, but its there with all the fuel drained out and I have all the hardware to hook it up.

If i do anything remotely "prepper" is I keep a couple of cases of MRE's around. They are shelf stable for years and each one supplies a lot of calories and some variety. They also are supplied with a just add water heating pack that heats up the meal. Like all good survival foods, some of the main courses are borderline palatable so the only reason most folks will eat them is in a emergency. I have heard that folks in Alaska throw cans of dog food in their cars for the same reason, if its an emergency they have something to eat but its not something they will willingly eat (even though depressingly some dog food is currently marketed on the sly to low income folks).

I hope everyone does get proactive about planning ahead but I expect buying the next electronic goody is far higher on most folks list.

 

[Chip]

In a small town like Bethlehem , I wonder how long they can keep the city water pressurized in a blackout ?

 

[peakbagger]

Bethlehem may be gravity system. It all depends on how high the source is (on the Gale River Road) The greater Portland area is all gravity and I think Berlin Nh and Gorham NH each are gravity systems.

 

[RoySwkr]

It all depends on how high the source is (on the Gale River Road) The greater Portland area is all gravity and I think Berlin Nh and Gorham NH each are gravity systems.

NYC has gravity feed all the way from Catskills

But it takes power to run the treatment plant and I'm not sure they would distribute untreated water, and they may need pumps in some parts of the system

Sewers are generally gravity flow but some have force mains that require power

Note that water, sewer, gas, phone all have backup power independent of electric co., do you plan for them being out also?

My mother bought a gas space heater that runs on city gas without needing electricity, the EPA doesn't like them because the pilot light wastes gas but plenty of times the electricity has gone off shutting down furnace but heater kept us warm

After a storm like Sandy where it's 60 degrees I could survive for weeks on the food that's around, would be a pain if water went off and worse if sewer backed up but I could deal with it - but if gas and electric went off in cold winter it would be more serious

 

[LivesToHike]

We live in the 'burbs of Southern NH. Over the years we've been through several cold weather power outages, most lasting fewer than a couple days. The last 4 outages have lasted 2-4 days. Just before the four day outage with a big ice storm in Dec 2008 we had fortuitously bought a wood stove, which required power to run a fan. When the power went out, I hooked up small fans to it. This helped a little to circulate heat, but frankly, using an inverter with marine batteries probably would have been more effective Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hikesnh/3114636048/

After that outage, we invested in a small, portable generator and had a transfer switch wired in to run our heat, refrigeration and a few lights. As anyone will tell you, it's not a perfect solution, as you need to keep the generator fed with gasoline, change the oil after some 10's of hours and keep it safe from thieves. That said, it helps a little to get by some of the shorter outages. A really long outage without any ready supplies of gasoline would be a challenge. During the snowtober of 2011 many of our gas stations were without power for a couple days. We fortunately, had 2 days of gas on hand. But it does make one think.

Perhaps, one solution is to hook a generator to a propane tank, and then have a month's worth of propane on hand for electricity and heating, which can be very expensive, both for the equipment and propane inventory, depending upon the electrical power and btu's required.

That said, if you have a 40 or 50 gal hot water tank, you likely also have water on hand. Having canned and dry food helps too.

--LivesToHike

 

[Tim Seaver]

Perhaps, one solution is to hook a generator to a propane tank, and then have a month's worth of propane on hand for electricity and heating, which can be very expensive, both for the equipment and propane inventory, depending upon the electrical power and btu's required.

Living out in the sticks on a back road in VT and having had enough of power outages, I installed a standby-type propane generator 2 years ago ( we already had propane for our heating system). It's A Generac 10K unit from Home Depot. It's come to the rescue several times, most notably during Irene, when it gave us continuous power for 3 days while it was out. It comes with a separate breaker box panel that you can wire to direct the power to the most important circuits - the 10,000 watts is more than enough for our house. It waits 10 seconds to come on after an outage, and disconnects automatically when power returns. Not cheap, about 3k+ ( and that's doing everything myself), but well worth the peace of mind for where and how we live.

 

[hiking lady]

We are completely off the grid, have no poles coming to the house. (We live a mile up a mtn on a class VI road). We have a compost toilet and propane to heat our stove and provide some heat to the kitchen and bathroom. We also have a woodstove and fireplace, dug we'll and cell phone, and 2 generators if need be.

When the ice storm of 98 hit we couldn't get out for a few days due to all the trees down on our section of road as well as our neighbor having her power lines crossing the road with no way for us to get around. It took a while for the power company to come to remove them. We had plenty
of food so were all set.

Often times when people lose power we don't know it until we are out and about.

Where we live we don't have to worry about flooding as much as worry about wind and trees.

 

[Little Rickie]

"Chip;384301]We lost power for, what, 5 days. We did fine."

I think people that have spent time out doors have a greater respect for natures power and volatility. We know we don't stand a chance when she is at her worse. Survival depends on preperation and staying out of her way.

People in the burbs and cities just don't know having never directly felt/experience the: stunning, awsome, beautiful, crushing power of rain, wind, water and gravity. It's just not the same as watching the news or a nature show. They have never have felt small or overwelmed.

They just don't know. Who in their right mind would ride out a storm surge higher than the first floor of their house or higher than the near by lands high mark? A full tank a gas can take you pretty far from the shore and a storm coming inland. Outdoor people are fortunate in many ways.

I live in the burbs. No power, no problem. If I lose my frozen food after eating everything I can for a few days, so what. No water, I can get by for a few days, especially if it rains. Can & dry food is never a problem. Light, got that covered. First aid, minor, all set. No cable, hurrah!

No heat in cold weather, now we got a problem, frozen pipes but not a physical discomfort problem. We went 8 days without power after our ice storm. We had a very small wood stove but it did the job.

If I wanted to survive in style I'd get a generator, an insert for my fire place and invite the neighbors over.

 

[Red Oak]

We are completely off the grid, have no poles coming to the house. (We live a mile up a mtn on a class VI road). We have a compost toilet and propane to heat our stove and provide some heat to the kitchen and bathroom. We also have a woodstove and fireplace, dug we'll and cell phone, and 2 generators if need be.

When the ice storm of 98 hit we couldn't get out for a few days due to all the trees down on our section of road as well as our neighbor having her power lines crossing the road with no way for us to get around. It took a while for the power company to come to remove them. We had plenty
of food so were all set.

Often times when people lose power we don't know it until we are out and about.

Where we live we don't have to worry about flooding as much as worry about wind and trees.

I vote you for president!Nice job with your git up....

 

[Chip]

After the dust settles, maybe a few months, I'm going to buy a small diesel generator.

 

[Stash]

After the dust settles, maybe a few months, I'm going to buy a small diesel generator.

Something to think about having spent a few years in a place my generator gets lots of use. In the real nasty storms you sometimes have to travel to find gasoline for a non-permanent (propane) generator. All stations have gasoline. Some have diesel.

 

[Brambor]

We've had our log cabin since 1997. We have gone through many outages and got burned enough times. Today we have a full time wood stove, sump pump in the basement and a well for our water. We bought a generator. 5 years ago I bought and installed a Reliance transfer switch and this made all the difference during outages. Now we just start the generator, go to the basement and switch over the water pump, water heater, refrigerator and we still have a few choices to light up the rooms although we usually just light up the candles. During a power outage all we need to worry about is to have enough firewood and enough gasoline to run the generator.

 

[Chip]

All stations have gasoline. Some have diesel.

Not all stations have electricity, though, and many in NY and NJ that have gas are rationing or there are 4 hour lines. I have 150 to 250 gallons of home heating oil (diesel) on hand at any given moment. I've considered propane but they charge you for the tank and installation if you're not using it full time...but again I already have a tank of diesel at my disposal.

 

[Tom Rankin]

NYC has gravity feed all the way from Catskills

But it takes power to run the treatment plant and I'm not sure they would distribute untreated water, and they may need pumps in some parts of the system

If you are referring to NYC, they do not treat the water that comes from the Catskills.

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dep/html/drinking_water/index.shtml

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dep/pdf/2011_bws_fad_annual.pdf

 

[Tim Seaver]

I would have preferred the longevity and heavy-duty ability of a diesel standby unit, but if I remember right, it would have been at least 5k+ installed myself. The used US military units are bombpoof, but generally have to be done as custom installs if you want to use them as a stand-by unit.

 

[Chip]

Tim, there are $1200 "portable" diesel units, pretty quiet.

I love this new quote today from NY Mayor Bloomberg regarding gas rationing and the wait to get gas:
“...social pressure will help ensure compliance.”

They are considering "housing" the displaced in tent cities and an old prison. EDIT: As bad as that sounds it should have been accomplished nearly 2 weeks ago.

 

[coldfeet]

Just got power after 9 days... have to keep you cool and not get excited or fustrated. Many people have it worse, that's what my wife and I kept thinking. But my wife did get to use my LL Bean down 35f sleeping bag and it kept her warm while the temps dipped into the 30's. Hmmm maybe she will buy me that Western Mountaineering bag for my birthday, just in case! Be well

Chip, hope to get out to see you soon in CT probably, be well.

 

[Tim Seaver]

Tim, there are $1200 "portable" diesel units, pretty quiet.

Yes - I was referring to a stand-by type setup.