Ice Storm

[#59]

With all 77 counties now declared a federal disaster area due to Monday AM's ice storm most everyone around here has either been trying to keep warm (~700K electric customers w/o power) or has become intimately acquainted with a chainsaw.

Will post some pics up later today.

Reckon the SF are sitting in a warm cave somewhere w/ESPN on?

[pattymac]

Glad you surviving the storm. Is everyone accounted for here?

[#59]

The following are some of the (insurance company) pics of what our place looked like...

The east side of the house...



Looking off the laundry room toward the shop/garage...



Looking out the back deck door off the mud room...had to hack a tunnel through this "SF shelter" to get out the door...




From the street out across the east lawn...the back 3 acres didn't look much better either...

[Ray Ford]

Just for the record, it is Saturday and we still do not have power to our main residence (my wife's house).  We went to our secondary house (my house) to take baths and watch some local TV a couple of nights ago--and I'm there now on my computer.  (My wife and I don't live apart--by the way.) I have an indication that our main residence might have power by the end of the day, I'm sincerely hoping for that.  The secondary one, which is a block away, had power restored on Wednesday. 

My house now has a wall-mounted, ventless gas heater that will stay in place in case this kind of weather event returns.  I went out last Tuesday and bought nipples, tees, elbows, and a shutoff.  I broke open a union in my furnace/water heater closet, took out an elbow and replaced it with a tee.  This gave me a place to add a street elbow and run a 1/2 inch line w/shutoff through the wall into my living room.  (DO NOT try this unless you know what you are doing!  Gas and electricity are dangerous and dangerous.  On Wednessday, I went to the Atwoods store which had had the wall heaters in stock.  The store was without power, but personel would meet people at the entrance, ask them what they needed, and retrieve it from the dark store.  They required cash or checks since credit card devices were not operative without electricity.  The guy I talked with told me that they had no heaters of any kind left in the store.  On Thursday, I called a Sutherlands store in a nearby town.  They told me that they had one such heater--a small one.  I rushed over there, and, low and behold, they had the one but also 6 or 7 larger ones.  (They might have been delivered to the store after I called.) I bought one, mounted it on the wall, and started looking for a flex gas connector--which I found in a store on Friday.  The heater has been lit since.

People bought every generator, chainsaw, flashlight, battery...  It is amazing how warm a tight, well-insulated house with stay with candles!

What does this have to do with Bigfeet.  One day this week--the days have just flowed together--I called Telahnay's G-son and asked him, "I don't suppose that you want to go Bigfoot hunting tonight."  He informed me that Bigfeet were, he was sure, too smart to be out in such weather.  I hope that Bulletmaker had his firewood laid in.

I've passed my time transforming downed limbs and trees into firewood--since I couldn't go Bigfoot scouting.

[Teufelwald]

Ice storms suck.....we had 3 last winter....lost power in all 3 storms....no fun being without heat in Michigan.

We are under a winter storm warning right now.....12 inches of snow expected by tomorrow morning.....radio said even heavier amounts in some area's...blizzard white-out conditions expect....35-45mph winds blowing the snow....but I will gladly take snow over ice any day....Ive got huge maple and oak trees hanging over my house....and when we have ice storms...I'm always afraid them big trees are gonna fall on the house and crush us...the tree removal services quoted a price of $2000 each to remove them......cain't afford that!
Heres hopping to survive this winter....