Not the End of the World-- Just a Crippling Ice Storm . . .
Over the weekend, parts of upstate New York and much of New England were hit with crippling ice storms and lost power. As of today, states of emergency are in effect and many still have no power. My questions:
- How many were prepared to deal with this sort of problem?
- How many are warm and comfortable, despite the disruptions?
- How many are waiting for the government to solve their problems?
You should always be prepared to easily cope with problems like this-- here is my post, Are You Prepared For a Natural Disaster?
Posted by DDFD at 12/15/2008 7:57 AM 
Categories: Homesteading, Self Sufficiency, DIY, Simple Living
Tags: Homesteading Self Sufficiency DIY Simple Living
Categories: Homesteading, Self Sufficiency, DIY, Simple Living
Tags: Homesteading Self Sufficiency DIY Simple Living
Is it reasonable to think that I could make use of public or quasi-public facilities in the event of outages? Where I live tornadoes are possible, but not earthquakes or hurricanes. Aside from tornadoes, the major problem, theoretically, would be a power failure during cold weather. This has never happened because we generally don’t get ice accumulation on trees and power lines; the temperature plunges past that level too fast! If it did, however, the problem would be running the furnace. It burns gas but requires electricity for its controls, and also for distributing the heat around the house. If we did have a forty below night with no heat, I would move my family first out to the car, that I could run and keep warm, and then to a college building up the hill. So, I am depending on that institution which is not in any way obligated to me, for refuge. Certainly as long as I could buy gas for the car we could stay warm, and we could use that same car to reach a hotel with heat.
Reply to this
Is it reasonable to think that I could make use of public or quasi-public facilities in the event of outages? Where I live tornadoes are possible, but not earthquakes or hurricanes. Aside from tornadoes, the major problem, theoretically, would be a power failure during cold weather. This has never happened because we generally don’t get ice accumulation on trees and power lines; the temperature plunges past that level too fast! If it did, however, the problem would be running the furnace. It burns gas but requires electricity for its controls, and also for distributing the heat around the house. If we did have a forty below night with no heat, I would move my family first out to the car, that I could run and keep warm, and then to a college building up the hill. So, I am depending on that institution which is not in any way obligated to me, for refuge. Certainly as long as I could buy gas for the car we could stay warm, and we could use that same car to reach a hotel with heat.
Reply to this
Although I have not acted on it, my thinking is that I should have a (backup) heater that uses gas alone without electric controls. I am presuming that whatever disrupts the electricity would not disrupt the underground natural gas lines. Alas, I don’t know what dependencies the gas company has in its distribution system.
Reply to this
Backups are an excellent idea-- electricity can go down due to many problems including remote problems. The grid is interconnected and an ice storm in the northeast could cascade or domino into major collapses elsewhere in the country. I am not saying end of the world-- but major interruptions can happen . . .
Reply to this
re interconnected grid: good point!
Reply to this