Author Topic: longest PG&E power outages?  (Read 5454 times)

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Offline disasterguy

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longest PG&E power outages?
« on: January 17, 2008, 03:38:33 PM »
There have been a record number of power outages lately... recently here in Sonoma County we had people without power for 3 or more days...  what's the longest you've ever been without power?  What does your family do to pass the time and get along?

Happy new Year

Offline edpnjax

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #1 on: January 17, 2008, 03:52:40 PM »
Not PG&E, it's JEA & FPL here...

Hurricanes of 2004, Charley - 1 day; Francis - 11 days; Jeanne - 3 days

Have a generator that runs the whole house, A/C and all.... what did I do, tried not to think about all the propane that generator was sucking down running 24/7!!!  :shock: & clean up the mess in preparation for the next mess...  :?
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Offline NoQuitters

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #2 on: January 17, 2008, 04:21:28 PM »
8 days for me. January 29th 2002 ice storm. High temp for the 8 days I had no power was around 25 F, low teens at night. Never want that experience again. :shock:
« Last Edit: January 17, 2008, 04:46:53 PM by NoQuitters »

Offline racenet

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #3 on: January 17, 2008, 07:45:20 PM »
Thus far, the longest is only 2 days. Have a generator that keeps everything running.

What to do to pass the time? Watch people drive by, wondering why we have power & feeding the generator fuel. It is an old gas powered commercial unit.



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Offline George Richardson

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #4 on: January 17, 2008, 10:04:19 PM »
About 15 years ago we (my wife and I and 3 kids and at least 1 dog) were without power for 5 days. We live just over a mile from a main road and an ice storm took out the power and made our road impassable for 3 days so we were without new food too. Only heat was a kerosene heater. Don't remember too much about it so it must have been bad, but I still have 3 kids so it couldn't have been too bad!

Offline disasterguy

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #5 on: January 28, 2008, 12:45:20 PM »
well it just rained for 30 straight hours here again, but no power outages... just water, water, water...

Offline Mark / Ohio

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #6 on: January 28, 2008, 09:14:46 PM »
We are in an all electric home on AEP.

It was Dec 22, 2004 7:30pm through Dec 24, 2004 6:30am , then another 6 hours off on Dec 25 due to an ice storm.  I just checked my records.  Console temperature in my bedroom got down to 52°F and that was with an old kerosene heater in the living room upstairs and a wood stove in the basement going.  People with no other source of heat were down into the 30'sF inside since it was in the lower teens at night with some wind.  I knew we were in for a long wait when I looked out the door during the night and watched all the lights as far as I could see slowly all go dark. 

Good thing about the cold is I used the garage as the refrigerator and the back porch as the freezer so we did not loose any food.  I was surprised to hear how many people lost their food never giving thought to moving it outside.   #-o

Since then I've bought a new larger kerosene heater for the upstairs that should keep it much warmer.  Also bought a 400 watt DC to AC converter so I can run small stuff and charge batteries either off my riding mower or the truck battery.  The next thing on the list is to change out our old Franklin wood stove with something that I do not have to sleep in front of and reload with wood every couple of hours all night long.  Still want to get a generator at some point as well.

I don't mind being without TV and we do have oil lamps to see by.  But I did miss my computer.  Really I worry about extended power loss more during the heat of the summer than I do the dead of winter.  That's mainly what I want a generator for is to keep refrigeration and some form of AC going even if it is only in a room or two.

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Offline WeatherBeacon

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #7 on: January 28, 2008, 10:59:42 PM »

Four days. It was late spring after we moved into the house. We had t-storms packing 100mph straight line winds. Ironically the houses on the block behind ours (a stone's throw away) never lost power, nor did the street 1/3 mile the other direction. I don't recall the exact number, but almost a million customers lost power across southern Michigan. They had to bring power crews in from other states to help repair the many downed lines. Because the outage was so widespread, the power company suggested that if you saw a utilities truck, just ask them to come to your block, because they couldn't keep the repair records updated. In fact, my family and I had hopped into the van for a drive to get out of the house and I saw a crew from Ohio and asked them to come to our street, so they did. Otherwise who knows how much longer it might have been since ours is a small neighborhood. When the power came on, you could hear people cheering along the entire street.

Thankfully we had had little rain up to that time, so I didn't have a problem with my sump crock filling and the basement flooding. The worst part about having no power for us was that because everyone around here has well water, we had no water whatsoever -- so no showers, no toilet ... you got the picture. Thank God for friends.

This was the first time either my wife or I lived in a house that had well water, so after that we learned to fill the tub whenever severe storms approach. I also installed a battery powered backup sump pump shortly after that.

Ironically, I grew up in South Dakota where the winters are far worse than they are here, yet I don't recall ever being without power for more than a few hours there.

Kevin...
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Offline GregJ

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #8 on: January 28, 2008, 11:12:02 PM »
My wife and I were married in 1977.  I bought our little beach cabin just before we were married.  We both grew up in Seattle.  During our first winter, as newlyweds, I came down with pneumonia, mono, asthma and bronchitis all at the same time.  While at home sick, I had the privilege of watching one of the MOST incredible storm fronts come in.  The temperature dropped 15 degrees and a black wall of weather came at us.  It was black except for the water which was white with whitecaps.  It was the classic calm before the storm.  When it hit, I thought our old little cabin was going to blow over.  Before it was done, we had 8-10 foot snow drifts on the north side and in sheltered areas 30+ inches of snow. 

This is a long intro to the original question... We were without power for 10 days.  At that time our area was VERY rural.  Of course my new wife was wondering what the @#^% she just got into.  Our only source of heat was a leaky heatilator fireplace that filled the house with smoke.  It burned your front side and your back side was freezing.  Of course I was no help at all because of the pneumonia.  I still have the visual of my wife trying to move a wheelbarrow down a narrow path in the snow, filled with firewood.... so we could survive.  Ahhh.... what great memories.

What did we do to survive?  Well obviously the activity that most newlyweds partake of in times like this was out, because of my "germs".  I was probably game, but she has always been the responsible one.  As I remember, we talked and talked and talked.  That is my fondest memory of power outages.  We did not have all the modern distractions.  We were "forced" to be with each other and talk.  Now we have a good generator, transfer switch and UPS's on all critical electronic devices in the house.  Two weeks ago the power went out and my wife... yes the same one 31 years later.... didn't even know the power went out while she was watching our big screen TV.  The TV didn't even flicker.  I had time to go out, start the generator, come back in and flip a couple of switches and we are back in business.  Most importantly, my website never missed an update!

So, while I enjoy all the modern conveniences of today and definitely would not be without them.... I still have very fond memories of the creative moments we had years ago....

Greg
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Offline Fox_Of_The_Wind

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Re: longest PG&E power outages?
« Reply #9 on: February 08, 2008, 04:43:26 PM »
Sorry about replying a old message I just wanted to give my thought......

As for the longest I have been with out power I must say it was just only a day. But for the longest without cable=no internet I was down for a week. (talk about going NUTS)

Anthony