Another JohnyMac short story...
We had a line of tornadoes and such roll through northern Pennsylvania and southern New York this past Monday night. Our electric finally bit the dust after a half hour of blinking on and off at 2010 Hrs ET. Walked into the bathroom and grabbed a couple of Aladdin lamps where they are stored and fired them up.
Once that was accomplished I turned on my BaoFeng HT to find out if this outage was local or farther reaching. At 2100 Hrs the county ARES (Amateur Radio Emergency Service) leader came on a local repeater asking for all ham operators to report in on damage and if they were in an emergency situation and needed help.
I tried to hale her to let her know that we did not have electricity. She could barely hear me because the repeater was running on battery power only. So she asked me to check into the southern New York repeater just north of me. I did and was answered immediately by a ham from our NY amateur radio club.
We chatted for awhile in between other hams checking in to report on their condition around their AO.
In the end, we determined that the brunt of the front came east following the Susquehanna river; Consequently, the cities and towns along the river went dark. Along with those cities and towns so did rural communities south and north of the river lost power too which included us.
Armed with information I texted our bible study friends in town to find out how they were doing. They responded with, "Fine. The generator is running." I also asked them to turn there HT to monitor the NY repeater.
The next morning found us with no electricity still but no worries as we are prepared for it. I started to get a little worried with all of the food we have in our two chest freezers and refrigerator so I went out and started our generator.
Lets talk generator: When I am done using a generator I either let it run dry of petrol or drain it. I also only use NONE ETHANOL gas in it and all of my gas powered equipment. After I put gas in the generator it only took 3 pulls on the starting cord for it to start. Pretty good as we haven't used that generator in four years!
As I stood there I noticed that the roar of my neighbors generator was none existent so I texted them asking if they needed any help. I got a quick response explaining that the generator they had was loaded on the back of their pick-up and was taken into town to their small pub to power lights, parts of the kitchen, and the walk-in where the barrels of beer are stored. So I ran an extension cord across to their property from my generator so they could keep their freezers running.
Tuesday found us without power till 2100 hrs. All in all we did not have power for 25 hours. It was no big deal. It gave us an opportunity to try out our lighting and power preps.
Our friends in town did not get their power back till Wednesday morning however.
Observations & Comments in no particular order1) We went out to dinner with our friends in town Thursday night. The major topic of discussion of course was the
power outage. One thing they told MrsMac and I was that there were people going up and down the village streets
looking for houses that had lights on and hence a generator. They would knock on those peoples doors and ask if
they could charge their cell phones. Once they determined this they turned off all of the lights in the house and just
used the generator for the freezer and refrigerator. Interesting huh?
2) I only had 6 gallons of ethanol free gas on hand - Should of had more. Tuesday I had to drive quite a distance away
to buy more because....Since the electric was down no gas stations were open near my AO.
3) Make sure your oil lamps are full. Keep in mind that as a oil lamp sits your oil will evaporate over time. I had filled/
topped off all of my lamps in October. The oil level in the lamps ranged from half too three-quarters full. There was
plenty of oil in the lamps for the night but something to keep in mind. I also went through 2 mantles the first night as
well. If you move Aladdin lamps too much the mantle will start to come apart. I had extra's of course however I
ordered ten more Wednesday.
4) If you monitor your local 2 meter repeaters, keep in mind that many run on 120 volts or just a battery bank back-up.
Know which ones will work after the juice ends and how long they will stay up. The NY repeater we eventually went
to, used a diesel generator to stay powered up. In a more serious lights out scenario a question to ask is: How long
would the diesel last? Because my counties main repeater was down, I am going to talk about a simplex channel we
all could go too. Maybe 146.520Mhz as it is a universal simplex channel. Depending on where we are and the height of
your antenna, probably the farthest you would be able to communicate would be ~ 14 miles. So relaying info would
play a part in your communications.
5) That Baofeng HT at 5 watts of power worked great however, I realized that to be fully operational without lugging a
deep cycle battery to the shack, was run a 12 volt dedicated line from the solar battery bank to the shack. This would
call for a ~50 foot run of wire. I will probably have to use 8 gauge wire to be able to use full power of my HF radio.
6) I learned from my friends in town at Thursdays dinner, they didn't have a battery operated AM/FM/SW radio in the
house. This surprised me as they are avid preppers. I suggested they go on ebay to buy a Grundig S350 or S450
radio. My wife and I had our Grundig on when I wasn't using the HT. This kept us in the loop besides my local ARES
friends.
Well there you go a rather uninteresting story of us living without electricity for 25 hours. Everything worked as planned and because it did it gave MrsMac and I a lot of confidence in all of our planning.
Funny conclusion...Our electric went out again early last evening around 1700 Hrs local. We knew what we had to do and did it minus starting the generator. Woke up this morning to electric.
