A Power Report
Elayne Riggs reports that her power is finally back on but she is putting off trying to get any gas until things calm down a bit.
Riverdaughter at The Confluence is still without power in New Jersey. There are large trees that have to be removed from major supply lines before there is any hope of restoration. The downed trees are also blocking roads. She has a generator, but getting gas for it is not easy. The local stations are not being resupplied yet, and those that have power are running out of fuel.
Decades of ignoring the infrastructure that started in earnest under Reagan are seeing the predicted results. Things are much worse than they need to be because the infrastructure hasn’t been maintained, much less modernized, to withstand a storm like Sandy.
6 comments
Having your own generator seems to have become a “thing” while I wasn’t looking. Is it just ignorance on my part, or didn’t that used to be reserved for construction work, island dwellers and the like?
I’ve been seeing frequent hiccups in the power supply since returning to the Panhandle three years ago — don’t remember anything like that in years past, outside of the occasional thunderstorm outage.
Several things have contributed to it, but it is a function that they were seeing more use on construction sites, so the cost came down and you could buy them at the building supply stores instead of having to special order one. Then you had the extended outages of the storms like Opal, Ivan, Dennis, etc. Throw in the failures of FEMA under the Shrubbery when ice was hard to come by and people were tossing out hundreds of dollars in food from their refrigerators and freezers.
The generators got more powerful and could power the refrigerator, a small AC window unit, plus some tights, and people bought them. People don’t like living without AC, and when the gas stations started to use them so you could get fuel, they became easier to justify.
Powered tights?
Damn, I really am behind the curve!
Every recovery I’ve been in, I was ready to go to bed when the sun went down, but some people feel the need to stay up and stare at their blank television. Hell, after Ivan a lot of people went with Dish because it took the local cable company several weeks to reestablish service. That’s why I won’t get ‘Net access from them – their cables are on utility poles, while the Phone company buries its cable.
Give me a Coleman lantern and some books and I’m good for the duration.
I have a hat with LEDs in the bill that is perfect for reading, but after cutting up trees and hauling stuff to the curb all day, I’m ready to sleep as soon as it gets cool after the sun goes down. Normally I take my phone and laptop to the car and rest in the AC while they are charging after working outside.