9. Stuck in Your Home During a Disaster
Well, it rained really hard. You clung to God’s promise to never flood the entire world again. You prayed He wasn’t going to flood your home. The rains caused flooding in places that had never flooded before. Water came within three feet of your front door, but thankfully it didn’t actually get into your home.
So what do you do while you are stuck at home? Chances are very good that you will not be able to use this down time to catch up on things you need to do around the house. Everything runs on electricity and you may not have any! It is hard to read those good books by candle light or even the light of propane lantern. The silence is deafening. There are probably howling winds from some sort of storm.
A Personal Experience during an ice storm
A few years back we lived in area where ice storms were fairly common. They would hit hard and usually knock out power lines for a few days. The roads could become totally impassable. So, when a storm warning was issued a lot of people took it very seriously and went straight to the grocery store. The grocery stores were always full of an assortment of people ranging from the very elderly who had been frightened out of their home by the threat of being stuck in their home to the very young and rash who were terrified of running out of beer. This was evident by the shopping carts. Yes, I am telling you the truth. There would be people with two buggies loaded up with beer and one box of baby diapers. They would buy cigarettes as they went through the check-out line. The elderly would have a lot of pharmacy items and a few cans of something. Other people used the shotgun approach and just grabbed something off every shelf. Smart people got someone in line with an empty buggy when they first went in the store. Then the rest of the people in the shopping party ran to different parts of the store and grabbed specific items on a list. A short list of items to purchase for an impending disaster is a good thing to have in your car. While you are shopping don’t hesitate to grab something that you see that wasn’t on your list if you know you will need it. Hopefully you will have already set up a working pantry at home that will help you avoid that mad rush to the grocery store just before a storm hits.
The comforting thing about the ice storms was that we could make a pretty sound prediction regarding how long the inconvenience was going to last. The weather would tell us when the storm would pass over, when the roads would thaw, and then we could guess how long the power companies would take to get everything back on track. The record for us was two weeks without electricity. That was AWFUL but we did manage. It was certainly easier because of the many things we did have on hand in our home.
In this case we were the family member with a wood heater, so other family members came to our house to stay a few days. Other people came in with enough stuff to feed an army for a month. They were prepared also. It was still bad because there were no lights, no TV, no video games, no nothing. We had a few books to listen to on CD – and we had to sit in the car to do that. I guess we could have been better prepared in that area. We needed more batteries for stuff that uses batteries. We got weather reports from the car radio.
A potential way to prepare for a ‘no electricity’ disaster is to just turn off the lights for a few hours and see what you can figure out. Pretend the roads are impassible and you can’t get out of the driveway. Also, the pizza delivery guy cannot get to your house. If you use something that runs on batteries then you need a good supply of batteries. If you have one of those generators that hooks up to your electric box then check and see if it actually starts. If it starts that will be nice providing you have enough fuel to run it for at least a few hours. If you actually have a power generator for electrical outages, then you may have to use it selectively instead of continually.
Do you have a way to cook or just make coffee and warm up canned spaghetti? Try out that camp stove, gas grill, or light some charcoal. If you have a fire pit in the back yard you might even build a small fire and see what you can do there without too much trouble. (More to come later on how to cook on an open fire or using a dutch-oven.)
Clean clothes can be a problem. If something comes up like a prediction of weather that might throw the electricity out for a while start doing laundry and dishes immediately. The last thing you need to begin a no electricity day (or week) is a sink full of dishes and a stack of dirty laundry. That reminds me that a nice stash of paper plates, plastic forks, and things like that is a good idea for anytime. You can use them on days you just don’t feel like cleaning. Open a can of chili and eat off paper plates. Never be afraid to use some of the things you have stored for a disaster even if the disaster just happens to be ‘I don’t feel like doing anything today’.
Something to understand well in advance is that a few hours, days, or even weeks without electricity ranges from a minor inconvenience to a monumental inconvenience. In most instances it is not going to be more than that. To spend the money required to set up back up power is a very big expense. Even the cheapest power generator will cost you nearly $1000 plus the fuel to operate it. Fuel may or may not be available for purchase. You have to either have fuel on hand or have a way to travel to purchase fuel.
There are various solar power generators on the market that range from supposed to run one light bulb up to making a large home free from the power grid. During storm there probably won’t be a lot of sunshine to generate power. These systems are expensive and cost a lot to operate once they are in place.
For me personally a back up power plan is just not in the budget. If you have a family member in construction they may have or have access to a portable power source. These cost thousands of dollars, but they are generally reliable. Of course then you also have to have someone who actually knows how to hook up a generator safely.
The bottom line is probably going to be that when the electricity goes down you will just have to manage as efficiently and cheerfully as possible. Personally I am probably one of the biggest cry-babies around when the power goes down. I just try to get through it safely, and that is probably going to be all you can do as well. It isn’t the end of the world. And, in the world in which we live today, it is not going to be permanent. It may feel like permanent, but it really isn’t.
By the way, power may be back on in stores, shopping malls, and restaurants long before it is restored to you home. Don’t be bashful about charging cell phones, kindles and even your lap top while you slowly sip down that drink at the local coffee house. Remember which places are kind and helpful to you during times like that and patronize them later. If they are rude to you then don’t use them later. That said, do remember to be polite. They are probably a lot of other people in the same situation who will need to charge up their electronics.