At the start of the month we had a wind storm lasting several days. Around where I lived we had sustained winds of 25 mph and gusts up to about 70 mph. This was the worst one that I can remember in over twenty years (we had a few ones that seemed worse when I was a kid, but I might be remembering them wrong).
A few years back we had beetles kill nearly every mature spruce tree in the region. This meant lots of standing dead trees were blown onto power lines all over the Borough (county), causing widespread power outages. It also happened to coincide with cold temperatures, with the temps staying around 0°F.
I'm in Alaska, and a person might think that wind, cold and power outages would be no big deal here. This time was a little different. It's not usually very windy in my area, and normally it actually coincides with warm temperatures. It's pretty unusual to have the wind at the same time that it's cold. Also, while we have pretty frequent power outages the line crews are really good at getting them fixed within a few hours. I think that this had lead a lot of people to get complacent, which was not good when the people fixing the power lines got completely overwhelmed and it was cold enough to freeze up houses quickly.
At my place our power was out more than it was on for about four days. Because we were fairly well prepared we didn't end up with any serious damage. People further south of us in town had it worse than us. A lot of people had their power out for longer, despite being in the city, which was a little surprising. They did have stronger winds (90 mph) and I think they got hit with freezing rain as well. I haven't heard of any serious injuries, but there was a lot of debris flying around so it's possible, but mostly what I heard about was property damage.
My family didn't have much damage. At my place one window frame was damaged (it was already in need of replacing) and the wind shook the house badly enough that one shelf fell over that had stood through many earthquakes. At my grandma's house a tree fell on an outbuilding, but it doesn't appear to have cause any real damage. Pipes froze up at one building before we got some heat on them, but not enough to burst any pipes. The last day the well house for my building froze up a little, the heat bulb we had in had burned out without us realizing it, but we were able to get it fixed pretty quick with no apparent damage. Overall, we got off really easy.
Some things that went well:
I have a UPS for my computer with an LED lamp also plugged into it, plus I have multiple flashlights and plenty of batteries close to hand, so I was never stuck groping around in the dark.
I have a Mr Heater Big Buddy and several small propane bottles, and a bunch of candles and matches, so I was able to keep the pipes inside my house from freezing.
I had plenty of gas in the tank of my car.
Our shelters for our livestock are good enough that are pigs and chickens suffered no cold injuries.
I had enough water stocked up that I didn't have to resort to melting snow.
Some things that I need to improve:
Organization is the biggest thing. I haven't been prepping as much the last seven or so years, and I have moved houses a couple times in that period, so finding my stuff can be a challenge even when I'm sure I have it.
A more convenient way to cook (or at least heat water) would be good. I've got some camping stoves that I could dig out and use, but see the above problem with organization. I never bothered partly because they are stoves I would have to use outside, which seemed extremely unpleasant and potentially dangerous given the weather. This problem will eventually solve itself as the place I'm supposed to be moving to has wood and propane stoves.
I could stand to have more cash in smaller bills. I had about $25 in small bill. I had more cash but it was in $100s. The store nearest to me wasn't able to use cards during part of this.
Comms were a bit of a problem. Something must have taken the local cell tower offline as for a while I had no reception. It wasn't a big deal this time, as I was able to drive around and contact people in person to coordinate things and also I didn't have to contact emergency services. Figuring out a decent short-range radio setup is definitely on my list. I have a lot of family members within a one mile radius, so it seems like it should be relatively easy. It would also be good to get my ham license again (I'm guessing mine has expired) for contacting emergency services if the cell tower is down. To be honest with myself though, I don't think I want to have radios as a hobby so I don't know if I'll ever get around to that.
I discovered my phone starts having issues at relatively warm temperatures. Like, if I leave it setting on a counter when it's in the 40s it will stop working. I haven't had this problem with other phones. Definitely not a good thing since it can get down to those temperatures here even in the summer.
I need to figure out an easier way to check if the heater in the well house is working. The well house was built several decades ago, and it only seemed to start having issue a couple years ago. I'm not sure why but heat lamps seem to be burning out fairly regularly. This is below ground level, with many layers of insulation on top, a roof that takes two people to move to get access plus the whole thing is usually buried under many feet of snow. So getting to it just to check is a pain in the butt. (I need to ask my dad why he and my grandpa made the lid so dang heavy, maybe there's a good reason that I'm not aware of.)
Quote from: Optimist on January 29, 2022, 10:12:31 PM
A more convenient way to cook (or at least heat water) would be good. I've got some camping stoves that I could dig out and use, but see the above problem with organization. I never bothered partly because they are stoves I would have to use outside, which seemed extremely unpleasant and potentially dangerous given the weather. This problem will eventually solve itself as the place I'm supposed to be moving to has wood and propane stoves.
I keep an alcohol stove in my kitchen. It's very small, so easy to keep handy, and it can use a variety of types of alcohol including rubbing alcohol and even iso heat, so pretty much whatever you have on hand in the moment. I have a lot of rubbing alcohol on hand for resin 3d printing, so that's always available for emergency cooking. I used to prop a metal grate used to elevate meat from the baking tray bottom up over it to put a pot on, but now I have a little folding camp stove that it fits in that can prop up a pot. Since all of that is right there in my kitchen taking up only about as much space as a large soup can, I don't have to go digging through my camping/prep gear for more substantial options. In my experience, it boils water in about 9 minutes, give or take depending on what alcohol you're using. There's videos that test different types of alcohol in these stoves.
Quote from: Optimist on January 29, 2022, 10:12:31 PMI could stand to have more cash in smaller bills. I had about $25 in small bill. I had more cash but it was in $100s. The store nearest to me wasn't able to use cards during part of this.
Quoting this one just to make sure people see it. I learned this in a hurricane that knocked out power for about two weeks. Our dog got into a desperate urgent situation when no vets within a reasonable drive for an urgent situation were open and I ended up getting supplies to save her from a convenience store doing cash-only business. They were not making change, so I was fortunate that I had the smaller denominations necessary to make the purchase without losing a lot of money. I now always keep a sizeable wad of ones and fives on hand.
It used to be that credit cards had raised numbers and could be run through a gizmo that made copies for a receipt and to send to the credit card company for the reimbursement to the vendor, but most cards don't even have that capability anymore even if the vendors did still have one of those gizmos on hand. That kind of threw me when the hurricane hit because we would still check people out with credit card sales when the power was out at my restaurant job about twenty years ago. Nobody does that anymore. Cash only.
Thank you! That is a great after action report.
BTW a suggestion for monitoring the well pump temperature. Put a wireless remote reading thermometer in the pump house. They are battery powered already.
Quote from: Optimist on January 29, 2022, 10:12:31 PM
Comms were a bit of a problem. Something must have taken the local cell tower offline as for a while I had no reception. It wasn't a big deal this time, as I was able to drive around and contact people in person to coordinate things and also I didn't have to contact emergency services. Figuring out a decent short-range radio setup is definitely on my list. I have a lot of family members within a one mile radius, so it seems like it should be relatively easy. It would also be good to get my ham license again (I'm guessing mine has expired) for contacting emergency services if the cell tower is down. To be honest with myself though, I don't think I want to have radios as a hobby so I don't know if I'll ever get around to that.
CB or MURS should work fine for a 1 mile radius, unless there's a mountain in the way. 5.1675 MHz USB is the Alaska Emergency frequency and don't believe it requires a license for anyone calling for help, or to assist someone else calling for help, in an actual emergency.
Quote from: Anianna on January 29, 2022, 10:38:48 PM
I keep an alcohol stove in my kitchen. It's very small, so easy to keep handy, and it can use a variety of types of alcohol including rubbing alcohol and even iso heat, so pretty much whatever you have on hand in the moment. I have a lot of rubbing alcohol on hand for resin 3d printing, so that's always available for emergency cooking. I used to prop a metal grate used to elevate meat from the baking tray bottom up over it to put a pot on, but now I have a little folding camp stove that it fits in that can prop up a pot. Since all of that is right there in my kitchen taking up only about as much space as a large soup can, I don't have to go digging through my camping/prep gear for more substantial options. In my experience, it boils water in about 9 minutes, give or take depending on what alcohol you're using. There's videos that test different types of alcohol in these stoves.
I do have a camping alcohol stove (somewhere). I forgot that they can be used inside. I'll have to go digging around to find it and put it somewhere more accessible.
Quote from: Raptor on January 29, 2022, 11:43:59 PMBTW a suggestion for monitoring the well pump temperature. Put a wireless remote reading thermometer in the pump house. They are battery powered already.
That is a good idea. Being underground I was worried that it might not have the signal strength to reach inside, but on the other hand they aren't expensive and if it doesn't work there are plenty of other places it would be handy to have one.
Quote from: Crosscut on January 30, 2022, 09:03:08 AMCB or MURS should work fine for a 1 mile radius, unless there's a mountain in the way. 5.1675 MHz USB is the Alaska Emergency frequency and don't believe it requires a license for anyone calling for help, or to assist someone else calling for help, in an actual emergency.
I didn't know about 5.1675 MHz, thanks! I haven't looked at MURS in years. I knew that it was one of the most "free" frequency ranges in terms of what people were allowed to do with it. but I also thought it was slowly dying off due to lack of popularity. Is it making a comeback? No hills between the houses thankfully.
Quote from: Optimist on February 01, 2022, 05:19:17 AM
Quote from: Crosscut on January 30, 2022, 09:03:08 AMCB or MURS should work fine for a 1 mile radius, unless there's a mountain in the way. 5.1675 MHz USB is the Alaska Emergency frequency and don't believe it requires a license for anyone calling for help, or to assist someone else calling for help, in an actual emergency.
I didn't know about 5.1675 MHz, thanks! I haven't looked at MURS in years. I knew that it was one of the most "free" frequency ranges in terms of what people were allowed to do with it. but I also thought it was slowly dying off due to lack of popularity. Is it making a comeback? No hills between the houses thankfully.
I rarely hear any two-way voice comms on MURS around here, but some local bear hunters do use it for their dog tracking collars. They use CB in their trucks for staying in touch with each other so it's really a pretty effective use of license free bands, but wish they didn't have the 'ping' of the dog collars set to every 2 seconds since it ties up an entire channel nonstop. But other than during bear season it's almost like we have our own private channel. One mile is easily do-able on MURS, we get over a mile using a Dakota Alert hand held to the base with a telescoping antenna on the second floor near a picture window.
Quote from: Optimist on February 01, 2022, 05:19:17 AM
Quote from: Raptor on January 29, 2022, 11:43:59 PMBTW a suggestion for monitoring the well pump temperature. Put a wireless remote reading thermometer in the pump house. They are battery powered already.
That is a good idea. Being underground I was worried that it might not have the signal strength to reach inside, but on the other hand they aren't expensive and if it doesn't work there are plenty of other places it would be handy to have one.
My pump house (wooden structure) is above ground but the thermometer does carry through the structure. I am not sure about an underground sensor though.
An alternative you can also get a remote reading thermometer like these with a wired sensor and remote read out. Mount the dial outside and at least you will not have to pick up the lid unless you have to deal with a problem.
https://www.amazon.com/Comark-RF60A-Reading-Tension-Thermometer/dp/B0721C2TLX/ref=sr_1_11?keywords=remote+reading+thermometer&qid=1643733115&sr=8-11
I assume you have something like this to keep the pipes unfrozen. Maybe you could double down on this in addition to the heat lamp.
https://www.amazon.com/Heating-Automatically-Thermostat-Protects-Freezing/dp/B098KG6KH8/ref=sr_1_8?crid=1UBTT1WK6UYM2&keywords=pipe+heat+tape+with+thermostat&qid=1643733209&sprefix=pipe+heat+%2Caps%2C84&sr=8-8
I hope the wireless one will work, as with the remote one it would still involve a lot of shoveling to check it.
We had heat tape along the pipe. My brother was working on it last summer, I should ask him if he replaced it.
Quote from: Optimist on February 02, 2022, 04:13:06 AM
We had heat tape along the pipe. My brother was working on it last summer, I should ask him if he replaced it.
And if he plugged it back in.