We’re dealing with some stormy weather here (Vancouver for me, but it covers a wider area) and so a patchwork of homes across the region are having power outages. Crews are working to restore it
So on that note, what do you like to do?
- ways to prepare, what to buy, a favourite flashlight from !flashlight@lemmy.world?
- how you pass the time
- any stories that come to mind?
I don’t remember when the last one happened. We have like 5 minutes of downtime per year in Germany on average
Also German here, that seems a high estimate. The only downtime I had this year was when the workers building our sidewalk grazed a cable bug I can’t remember any over the last few years…
Longest I’ve had was 2 days. But that’s because I had work done on my electrical panel. 😁
The worst I had was when the heating for our building failed… on Christmas Eve. No hot water or heating until January 5th because they couldn’t find the part, it was more complex than they expected, another part needed replacing etc. etc. etc. Fuck me, was it cold, and I like my flat cold! Had to got the gym every morning for a shower. At least I got a rent reduction.
We only have the big transmission lines above ground, so our grid is not that weather sensitive. A week would be insane here
The area out here on Canada’s west coast is tricky to power, and expensive; and we’re as far from our nation’s capitol as Tehran is from Berlin, with I imagine similar feelings of disconnect. It’s a lot of overhead power-lines, nestled in among beautiful, thick, tall trees that really catch the wind during winter storms like the one now (go see on windy.com!). Those wires come down, maybe start a fire in the forest for the lulz, and teams of people in their trucks and cranes repair the breakage. It’s planned and operated as well as our flatlander conservative opposition will permit (the cruelty to plebes is the point).
It should be noted that one of the biggest projects for power in this metro is the remediation of overhead power lines to underground cabling running alongside water and sewer service, much as Germany has done. It’s trickier to fix, and thieves keep stealing it for the copper, but every time the ground was opened for any significant pipe work, our hydro-electricity supplier was there to use its access and string new cabling alongside whatever else was going in. Wiring that last-hectometer has been a challenge with the WWI-era homes, but even trenching up to a bungalow and running the cable up the side - so ghetto - gives us something unlikely to put people like Otter in the dark for so long.
But long-range power connection is still via strings of thick cabling up on the steel - or often wooden - poles, for long trunk-lines into the wilderness (so pretty!, and see how long that line runs), same as Germany will do. Then it’s just the cost of accessing the transmission line to safely get there and fix it. With the vast distances they’re traversing, breakage is both more likely and also more expensive to fix.
I’m in a new section of the metro, and the power infrastructure is solid aside from the blip and blinks caused by construction - for new buildings and for upgrades - in the area. It’s been solid, so far, and 30 min drive probably from Otter’s house could get her to mine. So the upgrades are happening, but it’s slow, costly, and stymied at every stage.
Read books. Go to bed early as soon as it’s dark. Empty the fridge if it’s going to be a while longer.
The longest I was without power was as a kid. A winter storm knocked out power lines all over. It was a week before we got power back on, the longest it took for some was 12 days. We had a wood burning fireplace so my parents invited all the elderly neighbors to stay with us. I wasn’t happy about sleeping on the floor while some weird-smelling old person slept in my bed, but looking back now I’m glad my parents modeled civic-minded behavior.
Us kids played a lot of cards and picked fights with each other. Dad had us scooping driveways in the neighborhood and eventually the streets by hand just to keep us active and out of the house. It was not a fun week.
Nope, no special name that I am aware of. Other than “that bad storm in October that one year”
The storm itself wasn’t abnormally bad, it was the timing and sequence. It was very early so some deciduous trees still had leaves. The storm started with rain, then slush, then it all froze. So tree branches were overloaded with weight and tore down. Oak trees that had survived for a century were downed. Older neighborhoods and towns with power lines on poles instead of buried lines like newer communities would have now had pretty much all lines and poles torn down. Lineworkers from all over the country were brought in to help. I was too young to really follow at the time, but I’m told some of the delay was simply supply chain; getting enough new wires and poles there quickly enough to keep the crews supplied.
Hilbernate. The other half uses the e-reader. Anything e-ink should have incredible battery life.
Contemplate how close to total collapse we are every day
Go to bed early because it’s dark.
Worry about all the food in the refrigerator.
Be hot (or I guess in your case, cold.)
Read books in the daytime, go for walks.
Cook stuff using the grill, drink cold brew.
Take dreadful cold showers.
Count how many socks and underwear are left, do I need to resort to hand washing some?
