February Ice Storm

[Headhog]

Well central Virginia got hit yesterday with an ugly ice storm. A lot of trees and wires down and many customers without power. Our power went out yesterday about 1:30 pm and still no word on when it will be returned. We are fortunate in that we have a back-up generator and can run a good part of the house. I have power for the furnace which uses propane. We also can run our well pump for water and have electricity in about 1/3 of the house. This morning I ran the water heater for about 20 minutes so we had hot water for a shower.

I'm sure power crews are very busy and I understand there is a crew working about a mile and a half from us, so maybe we'll get lucky. I know there are a lot of folks with no power and no back-up. I just count my lucky stars we were prepared.

Paul

[Vaquero]

Good to see you are prepared, we have both gas, and wood heat.
City water but no generator, so hope he don't lose power, but if we do we'll just have to deal with it.
We can cook on the wood stove or the grill so we'll survive.
Lived through the one in '94 the same way, think we were only out of for 5, or 6 days.

RP

[fortyshooter]

We were lucky this time being in the half of the city that the power stayed on. Lost several limbs in our magnolia tree and that was it. Very lucky
the big old pines on side of lot lost no limbs. The storm of Christmas 1998 was much worse. Had my small generator ready to go though.

Standing joke on our street is a neighbor few houses down invested in a Generac house generator almost 2 yrs. ago and since then the power on our street hasn't gone down.

[cooperhawk]

You should all buy shares from him. His luck has helped.

[Grunt67]

Supposed to be here late this evening. 9 or so.
Should have got some vanilla flavoring, so I could make some homemade snow cream. Yum.

[2ffat]

In Southside Virginia, we lost power several times over the weekend. Saturday we watched the same firetruck drive up and down US 1 as it went from emergency to emergency. Heard lots of sirens. We also heard lots for BOOMS as transformers blew. As we were getting into bed, we heard a loud BOOM to the south of us. The lights went out and a few seconds the power came back on. A fews seconds later, BOOM to the southeast of us. The lights went out again then a few seconds later the power was on. BOOM to the west if us and the power was out until about 8:30 this morning.

I didn’t sleep very well. The power workers were shining spot lights everywhere, the police had their lights going as they blocked the traffic. And all night I could hear branches cracking as the broke.

At some point the linesman gave up but the ice kept coming down and breaking branches and trees.

Today the powers was up and down again. We even lost phone and internet service until late in the afternoon.

[fortyshooter]

Where abouts in Southside Va. 2ffat ? My range neighbor down in Stony Creek said it could be a week before he gets power back.

[Grunt67]

I now have ice, don't know how much, too dark outside. One of our deputies hit some black ice today going to work, went off the road, rolled down an embankment, destroyed the car, but he's ok. Back at work tomorrow.

[dave77]

Rarely get freezing rain here and when we do it's not more than a thin coat, makes the roads very slick but not enough build up to take down tree branches or power lines.

I was day custodian/maintenance at an elementary school for over 30 years and hated when we did get it, I still had to get to work very early to put down lots of de-icer and sand, had to do it by hand from a 5 gallon bucket until I finally got a nice tractor that had a platform that would hold a couple of buckets. Still had to throw it by hand but at least I didn't have to carry the buckets.

I've often thought of getting a medium sized propane/gas generator but power outages here are very rare. I've been living at my current location for 35 years and once lost power for a little over a day due to a big windstorm and once for a few hours. Probably helps that there's only one pole between the power sub-station and my transformer. Did lose half my power once due to a bad connection between the transformer and my meter box but the PUD was out to fix it within a couple of hours.

[PatientWolf]

We consider ourselves lucky the ice went north of us. While I hate cold rain, I hate ice worse.

I’d much rather have 20 degrees with snow than 40 degrees with rain.

[GunnyGene]

Freezing rain/snow here all day today, then the bottom drops out down to 9* early Tues. am. Roads will be treacherous, so staying home till it warms up.

[rugrat]

Woke up to snow on the ground and sleet falling from the sky. Roads are already being closed in the area due to hazzardous conditions. It is 25* and supposed to be 16* tonight.

[Vaquero]

Not even an inch of white dirt here as of this morning 14°, and 18° for a high, then 5° tomorrow morn.
Colder here than at a buddies place in Maine.

RP

[Grunt67]

No snow, just freezing rain & sleet. Roads covered, along with everything else. Temp holding at 25, W/C 20. More on the way they say.

[Vaquero]

Just a kittle over an inch here, road on driveway covered.
Nothing at the moment, but they say more coming.
Up to 16°, my guess is that will be the high.

RP

[Headhog]

We still don't have power here and the best estimate is tomorrow evening. Fortunately I was able to get out and get gas for the generator and now have enough to get thru Wednesday. Thats the goods news, bad news is more freezing rain predicted for Thursday. Ugh!

Paul

[RanchRoper]

Just happy our -60 wind chills have moved out. 15F is beautiful....

[Vaquero]

FB_IMG_1613435103209.jpg (67.31 KiB) Viewed 822 times

RP

[Hatchdog]

Got about 3.5” of that “white dirt” as Vacquero so appropriately called it. (Never heard that one before, I like it)

3.5” of white dirt is nothing compared to you guys and your ice storms and power outages. Best to all.

[Travlin]

It was 82 here today and now it's 70 and raining. Central Fl. West of Tampa.