Nine days? Is your mother in a remote area?

After Gustav or Ike in 2008 (can't remember which one), my neighborhood was without power for 12 days. And that was in the heart of Northwest Houston. Our neighborhood just had some kind of weird electrical grid design or something technical like that. I believe it has since been fixed/redesigned.

Yeah, when Isabel hit Virginia when I was in law school there were people in between DC and Richmond that didn’t have power for damn near 10 days. Problem, at least around here, is a lot of the infrastructure is old and doesn’t get rebuilt unless it needs to be...and since storms like that one are rare in this area it doesn’t need to be rebuilt for a long time

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
After Gustav or Ike in 2008 (can't remember which one), my neighborhood was without power for 12 days. And that was in the heart of Northwest Houston. Our neighborhood just had some kind of weird electrical grid design or something technical like that. I believe it has since been fixed/redesigned.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Nine days? Is your mother in a remote area?

If it’s like my neighborhood power lines are likely above ground, and in heavily wooded and overgrown areas. If a tree or limb falls and cuts off power to a half dozen homes, we are at the bottom of the priority list. The power company is interested in prioritizing work that brings the most customers up. So, we are first to have power go down, and last to have it come back up. A thunderstorm or ice storm can take us down for 3 days. Isabel had us down for 13. Everyone in my neighborhood has a generator. We should have started a backup power co-op.

We get a lot of repair crews from other states when conditions are bad enough and local resources are stressed. I imagine places like Nova Scotia make that kind of cooperation more difficult.

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The power company is interested in prioritizing work that brings the most customers up.

^^
Yes that is economics. On the other hand, your proximity to crucial facilities ie hospital, police station, hotels that house linemen etc. take priority. Every power company has a plan. The first step is assessment of the damage. Power was out forever for a lot of homes here after Katrina. No house, no need for power. The power company will also not restore your power without a roof of some sort. Typically Asplundh crews come in and clear the lines. If there are limbs on a line, you are gonna have to wait. As a result the ER was nice and busy for the first few days as there were many chainsaw injuries the first few weeks. Citizens took the trees off themselves so they could get power restored. Substations that were innundated with salt water took a lot longer to bring back.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:

Nine days? Is your mother in a remote area?

We are not in a remote area, adjacent to Orlando. I have lived here for thirty-three years and have had power out for nine days or more, several times.

Florida Power, which has gone through a few name changes and now is Duke Energy, typically goes to the hardest hit areas first. We generally don't get hit as hard, so even though the damage is less severe we have a longer wait.

After Irma, my across the street neighbor didn't have power for 8 days. The local news announced how many people were without power on day 6 and it was 7 for our county.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Nine days? Is your mother in a remote area?

Off the beaten track. She's all set and doesn't come off the mountain during the winter.

It was surprising since I don't remember a "Hurricane" hitting Nova Scotia.

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
After Gustav or Ike in 2008 (can't remember which one), my neighborhood was without power for 12 days. And that was in the heart of Northwest Houston. Our neighborhood just had some kind of weird electrical grid design or something technical like that. I believe it has since been fixed/redesigned.

Me too, after Ike. I am in suburban Houston, and it took 14 days to get power restored. There was just too much repair work to get it done faster. As jigray3 says, they prioritize too. A small residential circuit is low on the list. My wife's store came up quick because she was on a circuit with several big grocery stores, and lots of other retail.

I spent a lot of time at my office, and cooked on my Coleman stove.

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Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:

quote:

The power company is interested in prioritizing work that brings the most customers up.

^^
Yes that is economics. On the other hand, your proximity to crucial facilities ie hospital, police station, hotels that house linemen etc. take priority. Every power company has a plan. The first step is assessment of the damage. Power was out forever for a lot of homes here after Katrina. No house, no need for power. The power company will also not restore your power without a roof of some sort. Typically Asplundh crews come in and clear the lines. If there are limbs on a line, you are gonna have to wait. As a result the ER was nice and busy for the first few days as there were many chainsaw injuries the first few weeks. Citizens took the trees off themselves so they could get power restored. Substations that were innundated with salt water took a lot longer to bring back.

It's not just economics, it's how much wide spread damage their is to the power grid, and it's being able to access the power lines. Trees are generally blocking all of the roads etc. The power company has to actually be able to drive their trucks to your area. Cities start clearing all of the major roads first, this takes a lot of time to truck all of the debris to the dump, remove trees, heavy machinery to get there etc. For a few days, the power company can't actually get their trucks anywhere because the roads have too much debris AND winds need to be below 25 knots (something around that number) for use of their bucket trucks. The power company then starts on all of the power on the major roads, because they're cleared first, as that is usually where all of the necessary items are: hospitals, police stations, gas stations, grocery stores, and has to work their way from sub stations outward and check lines as they go. Then there's also the matter of by that time, they're running out of a lot of supplies to fix things and waiting for them to come from out of state.

I live in the middle of a very large city (Fort Lauderdale) and county (3.5 million people) that's only 10 miles wide and 20 miles long approximately. I was without power for 21 days after Wilma in 2005, and 14 days after Irma that passed 100 miles South of here. Generally in my area, the home owners clear 90% of the fallen trees on the neighborhood roads and put the debris on the swale before the city can even get there, some trees are just simply way too big without heavy equipment.

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Originally posted by V-Tail:


Florida Power, which has gone through a few name changes and now is Duke Energy, typically goes to the hardest hit areas first. We generally don't get hit as hard, so even though the damage is less severe we have a longer wait.

Florida Power and Light (FPL) is NOT Duke energy. Duke Energy Florida is a separate company and in St. Petersburg,FL. FPL has 4.8 million customers and Duke Energy FL has 1.7 million customers

Duke energy is North Carolina's power company and a NC based company. Duke Energy Florida is a subsidiary of Duke Energy. Florida Power and Light is subcontracting major upgrades to their electrical grids to other companies rather than doing it themselves. They're using Duke in your area. In my neighborhood, they have Pike Energy changing all of the light/electric poles and electrical lines throughout my entire neighborhood and have 12+ Pike Energy bucket trucks there. Same with repairs after a major storm, FPL does what they can but also has companies from other states lined up and staged to come in as soon as the storm passes.

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Originally posted by jimmy123x:

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:

Florida Power, which has gone through a few name changes and now is Duke Energy, typically goes to the hardest hit areas first. We generally don't get hit as hard, so even though the damage is less severe we have a longer wait.

Florida Power and Light (FPL) is NOT Duke energy. Duke Energy Florida is a separate company and in St. Petersburg,FL. FPL has 4.8 million customers and Duke Energy FL has 1.7 million customers

I never mentioned Florida Power and Light (reading is FUNdamental!).

I said Florida Power, not Florida Power and Light.

When I first moved to this area, 33 years ago, the power company that served us was Florida Power, not to be confused (as you seem to be doing) with Florida Power and Light. Two different companies, not related.

There have been name changes, mergers, and acquisitions, and the company that used to be Florida Power (not Florida Power and Light) has become, or has been absorbed by, Duke Energy.

Do you really think that I'm so fucking dumb that I do not know what companies I have been writing checks to, for the past 33 years?

St. Petersburg Electric Light and Power Company was founded in 1899. It went through some name changes and in 1927 it became Florida Power Corporation.

in 2000 there was a merger with Carolina Power & Light; the new company was called Progress Energy Corporation.

In 2012 Progress Energy merged with Duke Energy.

So for fourteen years, from 1986 (when I bought the house in which I currently reside) I wrote checks to Florida Power. Not Florida Power and Light, which is a different company.

Then for the next twelve years, I paid Progress Energy for my power.

For the past seven years, I have been paying Duke Energy.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: V-Tail,

We were without power for 4 days during the 04 Hurricanes from Hell Tour, featuring Charley on Drums, Frances on Vocals, Ivan on Bass and Jeanne on Lead.

Prior to them hitting us, just happened to go to Lowes to pick up some supplies as they set out two pallets of generators, by the time I got back one pallet was empty the other half gone, figured, someone knows something, so I bought one, with the caviat that if it came back in the original box unused unopened with receipt I could return it.

It sits in the Garage 15 years later...

We've had the occasional power outage, and yes we are now Dook Energy Customers, our grid is on the same as the city water reclamation plant, and the VP of DOOK lives just up the street, other than being out after Charley for a few days, we've only experienced short outages, ie Hours...

Get a generator and a transfer switch, learn how to run it, what to turn off and leave on.

Costco has a nice generator with electric start and gas/propane ready, 9000 whatever watts..

May sell my 5500 and buy a 9000 from Costco it will run the AC...

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Originally posted by HRK:
and a transfer switch

This, please.

I found a gas station hidden behind a nearby hospital. It can pump gas when the others can't because they are on the hospital's grid, and I'm able to keep my generator humming during outages.

I also purchased a natural gas conversion kit for the generator, but haven't installed it yet. It'll be more convenient to tap into the natural gas line, and laying up the generator will be easier.

Anybody here convert their portable generator to natural gas or propane?