The Power of Electricity and Weather

Some photos from the last couple of days chaos in New Jersey. On Saturday it rained huge amounts, and then the wind came. Soggy grounds couldn't keep the trees up, so they fell. All roads to our house were closed for about 24 hours, and we still have no power, phone or internet, and it is now Tuesday. They estimate that they will manage to get the downed electric lines up maybe Thursday, but I doubt it. It is so many places that needs to be fixed, and at least 50 000 houses still have no power in NJ.

The photos are of a tree on our road (the only road to our house that has been opened, two roads are still closed). The damage in the vegetable garden when the cold frame glass tops flew up in the air, the fantastic gas-powered generator we were allowed to borrow from our wonderful neighbors (thanks DL and JL!!!! you are the best!).

Using siphon lines out through the basement door to drain the sump pump by gravity - it works!!!! (at least when it only rains moderately..) Our battery backup for the sump pump only lasts for 7 hours, and without this and then the generators our basement would have been flooded. Never mind that we live at 350 ft above sea level, we get flooded too. The ground is so soaked and with the clay soil, no water goes anywhere except into our basement, into our driveway and so on... Our juryrigged tarp to protect the sump pump generator (also borrowed from our fantastic neighbors). My boots...

This is the longest we have been without power ever. Next time we will be more prepared. We have already bought a crank-powered radio, and we will get our own generator and setup for it. We will have enough gas on hand so we don't have to try to get out and drive under half-fallen trees only held up by a powerline about to burst. We will have some bottled water, just in case.

The problem is that when the power goes we have only our cell phones and the gas stove - no heat, no water, no phone, no internet. It has been an interesting couple of days, but we have managed to cook some great dinners and our frozen food supply is safe, nobody got hurt, the basement didn't flood (much), and we even got to take hot showers after two days due to our wood furnace and the generator powering the water pump. But tonight we are going out for dinner!!! (I am at work writing this).