Rookie night

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In Missouri the municipal utilities band together in an alliance. Mutual aid agreements are signed that cover all the legal bases and determine insurance coverage etc in advance. Required a vote of the city council and signature of the mayor. Once in place, the agreement may not be used for years, then one day....

Working arrangements are so good that when we had a mid morning tornado, two towns had utility and road crews on scene within two hours. By the end of the day, the streets were cleared of trees. Within a couple of days, all broken poles were replaced and we were able to take over and string the conductors. Although the outage was several days for some, without mutual aid we would have been screwed. The agreement is you only pay overtime and consumables. But for our ice storms and tornado, we voluntarily paid the salaries, overhead and supervision of the straight time. Well worth the good will and some small compensation for them dropping their work schedule to come to our town. Working together is where it is at out here in the boonies and everywhere for that matter.

There are fire and police mutual aid agreements that provided the security for our damaged neighborhoods, enforced the curfew, and manned roadblocks. It warms your heart to see a volunteer fireman from some far away district drive over to pull a shift helping out. Those guys are the backbone of many communities, ours included. USA USA USA
 
Flatbedford said:
I was at my father's house clearing some downed branches for him and on the way home I couldn't believe how many smoking chimneys I saw. There are lots of homes with out electric and it was in the high 20s last night. Lots of fireplaces going for the first time, and lots of wet wood getting burned. My sister and her family gave up on her fireplace and found hotel room. My across the street neighbor told me that bought bundles of wood at Home Depot. I brought a tractor cart load over for him. I also gave some wood to my other neighbor for his fireplace. It was nice to share my wood with my non wood burning neighbors during a tough time. maybe now they'll understand what all the noise and wood pile s are about. Lots of very cold people out there again tonight. My wife does women's imaging at a hospital and she said that lots of her patients made appointments today just so that they could warm up. I sure am glad that I have a good stove, good wood, and I know how to use it. This is the first time we've been without power at my house for more than a couple hours since we bought it in 2003.

Oh yeah, you also got to love those LED headlights!

Steve, good for you for helping out some neighbors. That is what good people do. You are a good people.
 
BrotherBart said:
Stop tomorrow and shake a lineman's hand. Those brave hardworking souls have a mess on their hands.

But watch the newspaper. Lots of stuff will be written bitching.

+1

To me linemen are true heroes . . . firefighters often get the good press and hero status . . . but the linemen are the ones who make things safe so we can go in and fight the fire or rescue the folks trapped in the car with lines on it . . . and they are the guys who are out in the worse weather so we can stay nice and warm and continue to watch our favorite TV shows while they're out in the rain, snow and sleet.
 
An out of town crew arrived at about 4 yesterday, but left about 1/2 hour later. A local Con Ed crew showed up at about 6:30. All the neighbors gathered to watch. We offered them coffee or water and they declined. The guys were happy to be making the rare OT working 16 hour days. My power was restored last night at about 9 pm.

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