This isn’t a picture of me but the photo by iamSherise on Unsplash gives you an idea of how I felt yesterday . . .
After all the furor yesterday, at the end of day I received this notice from the Public Works department at the city about the now infamous planned power outage. (The notice came after I had spoken to two different city offices, leaving messages but never actually talking to this person who ultimately responded.)
Read carefully. The key word is in the second line . . .
Hello Virginia,
I contacted the utility regarding the planned outage and they have informed me there was an error in the notifications. The duration of the outage will not be 24 hours. Instead there will be two 30 minute outages affecting residential customers and one 8 hour outage overnight that will impact only commercial customers. They will be sending corrective notifications to customers regarding the planned outage.
Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Can you believe it?!
Perhaps you can. In our experience, utility companies do not always operate efficiently. (Joe and I have worked with utility companies a lot, on the East Coast and on the West Coast!)
In this case, I had contacted 3 different utility representatives earlier in the day and each of them had a different answer to my questions. I hung up totally dissatisfied. That’s when I switched gears and aimed my calls at the city to “raise the level of awareness” a bit more!
Later, the city Public Works person told me, “We have a direct connection with the utility because we work with them all the time on infrastructure projects. So I just called my contact there and she got it straightened out.”
Moral of story: “You gotta know who to call!”
Second moral: “If you don’t know who to call, keep calling until you get to the right person!”
Thank you for giving me the chance to unload about this power outage “error.” It truly created upset and even panic among some of our neighbors. Now we have the job of reassuring everyone while reminding them that an extended outage could still happen and they need to take steps now to be ready!
Please consider your own level of preparedness for an outage. According to my trusted sources, a power outage — local or extended, planned or unplanned — is the most common emergency that businesses face — and that means all of us.
Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide team
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You are so right: unless you need electric for medical reasons losing power is not an emergency in summertime. If the heat is extreme (here in Maine we just had 3 days with 100 degrees, which last happened 25 years ago) there will be cooling stations. If you have a medical condition you need to let someone know if you are alone. Same if you are elderly or alone with a baby.
We lost power for a week in 2017 in late October. Trees came down on either side of our street and we were blocked in. I think I told you before how little time we had to decide to stay or go: because of our dogs we chose to stay. Had no idea the power would be out a week as the whole state was affected.
Our fridge food spoiled, as did the freezer, despite our moving food to our camping cooler chests with block ice (dry ice is better if you can get it). Our insurance covered food—FREEZER only! The fridge did not count, and we had to replace much more there, things like condiments, mayo, jams; just open your fridge door and count up how much is in there! Plus we got so little from the claim: I think it was $150, which in no way replaced the food we lost.
What we learned:
How quickly we all got bored, despite being in our own home. We went to bed early (7pm) to save our propane and batteries. One of our neighbors had a generator but not enough fuel for a week. Our car full of gas did us no good with 200 year old downed trees blocking our exits. Leaving on foot was dangerous due to downed power lines.
Because of all the downed trees and power lines the stores (which aren’t plentiful in rural Maine anyway) had issues with delivery trucks. Trucks could not supply stores, and perishables in stores ran short for the next TWO weeks. Once you disrupt distribution it takes a while for them to get back on schedule.
We had no problems with food since we had camping foods like shelf stable milk (go to the Dollar Store), canned goods, dehydrated foods.
We couldn’t shower or bathe. That got old, fast. We worried more than we needed to, about our jobs, money, neighbors homes damaged by the storm (ours was spared damage). All those things sort themselves out with time and worrying didn’t make them happen any faster.
The least helpful emergency item: my special radio for camping and power outage, crank and battery. Radio stations were affected by the power loss, either because staff could not get to the station or towers were affected by the storm: we could only get in Boston stations, so that was frustrating. Maine has since upgraded the radio towers and emergency systems. Unless our lives were in danger the government was no help.
What we changed: I now stock twice the propane, sterno and drinking water I did before this experience. I now rotate my camping food on a regular basis and mark the “use by” date on most cans and packages when I purchase them. Same with batteries. I keep more cash at home than I did; a modest amount in small bills and useless in our 97 storm but gives me peace of mind.
We upgraded our sleeping bags and bought a small camper with propane appliances (we long planned to do that anyway). We now keep tools in multiple locations, in the house, camper and tool shed. When you need and axe or a hammer you don’t want to be fumbling with a flashlight.
Basically, we became more aware of what was important in this kind of situation, and what was not important.
Clare, thank you! What a USEFUL commentary — everyone will get an idea or two, for sure. As I write this, power is reported out in New York (mostly Brooklyn), Kauai, and of course there are local outages across the country from accidents, breakdowns, etc. It’s only a matter of time before the next one hits, wherever you are!