Hope you guys out east are hanging in there

[Hanko]

Wow, ice storms are no fun. Be safe and stay warm. Help your neighbor if you can

 

[drewboy]

Hey Hanko, Got some pretty nasty stuff last night into today... basement is still taking on water
as I type this. It rained...and froze... like it was it's job - a good paying job at that!!
I know we didn't get it here in central N.H. as bad as a little south but it was pretty bad still -
limbs snapping and some good, loud transformers blowing - scared the hell out of me as I was
loading the stove at 4:30 this morning. I had no power for half the day - not too bad, I ran the
genset for coffee early this morning and the wood stove kept the house nice and comfortable.
Heading for 10 degrees and wind tonite...

That's my central N.H. update...now back to you Hanko


Rob

 

[drewboy]

Oh, I almost forgot - My neighbor hates me.

I have no idea why... :cheese:

 

[BJ64]

I can feel for those people. We had two ice storms in this area in the last year. We was with out power for 6 days the first time and only lost power for half a day the second time.

Seeing one inch think ice on a barbwire fence was impressive to me.

Anyhow I think the current situation is worse than ours because of colder temps and the much larger number of affected people. Just keep the stove going, spring is a few months off yet.

 

[chad3]

Sure you can feel bad for those people, but they could have done the same thing as you did. Buy a stove, pipe, and go get wood. It's work, but you made sure you did it. Too bad for them, you will be alright.
Chad

 

[mayhem]

I had a bunch of 4-6" thick tops drop in my driveway in a radius around my truck and the wife's Audi...not one scratch on either.

On the down side though, I had a really big one drop right on top of my 64 Spitfire. The top of it is right on the car and fortunately the trunk isn't...cause its a good 8" thick.

 

[begreen]

Ouch! I worry about this with every big windstorm, like today.

 

[gibson]

I was at Lowe's in Woonsocket RI today. The salesman was saying that they sold out of generators via phone order by 9 am. People were driving down from NH to pick up. Woonsocket is 90 min from the NH border! Best of luck to all those "iced out". If you are reading this at least you have a stove...

 

[trailblaster]

We have been running our house generator since yesterday and power won't be back till next week some time. it powers the essentials in the house including the fish tanks, tv and insert fan blower. I'll have plenty of firewood for next year once we finish cleaning up.h

 

[cricco]

My power is still out. No electricity to power boiler pumps. Heating with just a zero clearance fireplace. It's 58 degrees in my house.

 

[cmonSTART]

We just got our power back early this AM. We cooked dinner in the 30 last night. Oil lamps and candles. Lots of down trees around here.

 

[Hanko]

about once a year we get an ice storm in Mich. I keep 30 gal of gas on hand for that. We have been out of watts for as much as 5 days. Edison is real slow around here

 

[begreen]

Good to hear you are starting to come back on line. When you get a chance, check on your neighbors, especially the elderly.

 

[woodconvert]

Just saw some video taken from helicopter flying somewhere over NH....CRIPES. That looks devistating. Trees are just flattened like they were stepped on.
Hope yall get through it unscathed and there better not be any posts here next year from NH asking "anybody know where I can get firewood?"

 

[ControlFreak]

We have been without power here in Holden, MA, for close to two days. I'm sitting here in my T shirt, typing on the laptop with the UPS running the routers. NICE. This is the first time I have run the Napoleon 1401 without the blowers. Surprisingly, it has done a very nice job keeping the house cozy. It's 15 degrees F outside now. I have been keeping the other end of the house warm with an Enviro gas insert, which runs fine without the blowers as well.

Thursday night we all woke up to the sound of branches breaking off trees. About every 5-10 seconds you could hear another branch cracking off and falling through the other branches because of the heavy weight hanging all over. On Friday, I measured the ice at the tip of some twigs on the ground 3/4" diameter ice. We had one tree where the only thing left of it was a 10 foot ragged trunk with all of its branches hanging down on the ground.

As for no power, we have candles, a propane camp stove, a gas camping lantern, and no TV or video games. We're better off with a bit of quiet. We have town water, so that's been going well, but our water is cold, except for what we heat up on the stove. It's healthy to have a bit of a struggle now and then.

We went around on the ATV with the chainsaw and cleaned up trees that were partially blocking the road and helped a neighbor who was going after a tree with a handsaw.

We had some friends spend the night with us last night, and drained the pipes at another friends place before they went to stay with family.

EDIT: Thanks to the workers who restored power last night on our street.

--Dan

 

[jdemaris]

Power's been out for two days now - but I've got solar, battery bank, etc.
Sun came out today and it's beautiful outside, although there are trees down all over the place. I took these photos this morning here in central New York.

One photo with the tree on the road is a couple hundred feet from my house. The tree on the 4500 volt power lines is a 100 feet from my house, and those damn lines run right over my house.
Note also that my solar panels look a bit frozen-in. Those photos were yesterday when it was dark and gloomy out. Today, the sun is out as you can see in the brigher photos taken from my land near my house.

 

[cmonSTART]

Wow. Well, because work has a generator the past 2 days we've been the only place open around here where you can buy general supplies, like lanterns, propane, kiln dried firewood, etc etc. I've sold more equipment I never thought I would sell in the past two days than I can believe. Generators, heaters, stuff that's been sitting around for a while has been flying out the door. We're trying to do anything we can to get more stuff in people can use. It's been a zoo. A lot of dropping what I'm doing to try to fix someones saw or generator. They're now saying some folks won't get power around here until the end of the week.

Lots of trees and power lines down all over the place. I'll be carrying a saw in my truck at all times for a while just in case. Yee ha.

 

[thinkxingu]

Hey Y'all,
It's 6 o'clock Saturday night--we lost power about 45 hours ago and have been running on Hitachi cordless lanterns and the Englander 13! We still don't have power, but we found a Wendy's that has power and free wifi! Funny, across the restaurant some guy's playing Call of Duty with his Alienware laptop and a headset!!

Anyway, wanted to give some 13 feedback: we've been heating the whole house (2,200 square feet) with no blower. Getting about 4 hour burns and the house is 70 down, 65 up. Temp is 15 outside. Gotta say I'm pleased to discover that.

Oh, and it looks like a few more days sans power. I knew I shoulda bought a generator!

SML

 

[Hogwildz]

We got all rain here, and it finished off with freezing rain and some light snow.
Sunny today, 30 degrees for a high, cut & split some wood and now waiting for the Percocet & Skelaxen to kick in.
Not near as bad as you guys further Northeast.
Calling for 40's and a day in the 50's in the next few days. A cutting I will be.
Summits cruising along at 650 and the house is 75, gonna check the posts then play some Fallout 3.
Keep warm my brothers.

 

[pyro68]

WOW, just think of all the trees down, all that firewood available. . . Seriously, hope you guys make it through up there. Don't worry about sharing, feel free to keep all that ice stuff up north!! Pics are incredible

 

[colebrookman]

Yup no power till Monday 10:30 P.m. or so they say. Just got the phone back after 24 hours. The streets and forest look like a war zone. FD spent most of our time pumping cellars with a Chimney fire thrown in. Says he just cleaned it in the fall. We took out 8/ 7gal buckets and 8/ 3gal pails but he just cleaned it, honest. Typing this while I run the freezer and fridge . Also charging all the FD radios and pagers. 15* so far but when it starts melting we will be back in the cellars. Another day in God's country, but it's 80* in the living room; wood heat rocks. Be safe.
Ed

 

[cmonSTART]

One coworker is on a local FD. He hasn't been into work the past 2 days needless to say. Lots of basement pumping and chimney fires.

 

[drewboy]

I got a phone call this morning from a friend of my wife thru work - no power since yesterday morn...
can they borrow my genset?? Hell yeah, I'm just glad it can help someone in need. That thing has only
run about 3 hours since I bought it 5 years ago. I started thinking it may have been a waste of $$$$...
but it is a good investment. They are keeping they're house from freezing with it right now - run it hard!!
Anyways... it's 10 degrees right now , hopefully everyone without heat right now makes it with minimal
damage thru till tomorrow afternoon's warm - up...

That's my Sat. Eve. update, Hanko

I love my woodstove.

Rob

 

[velvetfoot]

Hey Hanko, how do you store that 30 gallons?
10 degrees here also well.
My friend drained his boiler's pipes.
We've been using our gen once a day for 45 minutes for showers (well).

 

[Brian VT]

Lost power for only about 18 hrs. I couldn't believe they took care of us out in the sticks so quickly. I figured 2-3 days. We would've been fine.
My 72 yr. old MIL down in Fitchburg, MA has 12"+ of water in her finished basement. My wife drove down and brought her up here.
No firewood trees down on my property. There should be some good scrounging to be had around town, though.
Bright moon tonight on the snow and ice is beautiful. Went for a walk in the woods and could see fine with no headlamp.