Twitchell - What to Do When the Power Fails

Mary Twitchell

It may be romantic to eat by candlelight, but the romance quickly dies when the power fails and stays off, especially when it includes frozen pipes, a flooded basement, and the loss of a freezerful of food. Such catastrophes cost thousands of dollars. If electric service to your home was interrupted, would it be a calamity or an adventure for your family? Would you have a source of heat? Light? Would your pipes freeze? Would you lose all the food in your freezer? If the sump pump stopped working, would you have a basement full of water? Do you have the necessities for surviving a power failure?

The frequency of power failures varies with different geographical locations; sleet, ice, snowstorms, tornadoes, floods, volcanoes, hurricanes, lightning, and earthquakes can quite unexpectedly cut your electric lifeline. Recent natural disasters have included Hurricane Andrew in Florida, the Los Angeles earthquake of 1994, and the New England ice storm of 1998. There have also been man-made power outages, such as the 1977 blackout in New York City. Now, with computers running so many of our utilities, large-scale power failures seem almost inevitable.

When the lights go out, dont be left in the dark. With a little planning, you can reduce the inconvenience or calamity possible from a brownout or blackout. This bulletin tells you what to do before, during, and after a power outage to safeguard your family, your appliances, your heating system, and your water pipes.

The best way to prevent a power outage from becoming a catastrophe is to plan ahead. Assess the potential disaster, natural or man-made, that you might face, and plan to eliminate or minimize its impact on your household. Start by considering your needs. Physical survival comes first. Can you provide your family with adequate food, water, and heat until power is restored? Can you guarantee the familys safety? Are there infants or elderly people in your home whose health would be threatened by loss of heat or cooling? What about animals and family pets?

After physical safety is ensured, think about your home and furnishings. Will your pipes freeze in a prolonged outage? Do you have an alternate source of power? Do you need one? Do you know what to do to prevent ruined appliances due to power surges and spoiled foods from lack of refrigeration?

Educating yourself and your family is the first step toward surviving a power failure. Start with the infrastructure of your house.

If you do not know how your plumbing works, you will be unable to drain your pipes to prevent a freeze-up. Before the next power failure, locate the main-supply shutoff. Usually it is a large blue handle located near the water meter in your basement, but it could be near the hot-water tank, under the kitchen sink (in a house with no basement), hidden behind some paneling, outside the house near an outdoor spigot, or in a curb box. If you cannot locate the main shut-off valve, ask your plumber to locate it for you, then label the handle with a tag and make sure all family members know its location and function. If a wrench is needed to close the valve, be sure you can find it quickly in an emergency. You may want to practice draining the system if your heat comes from circulating hot water. Details for draining a hot-water system are given on pages 1819. Dont wait until an emergency to discover you have a basement full of valves and no idea what they connect. If you find there is no easy way to drain your system, talk to a plumber about other solutions, including installing additional shutoffs.

Using the illustrations in this book, your owners manuals, and information from professionals, take several hours and go through your entire house to learn where all your plumbing and heating equipment, pipes, drains, and shut-off valves are.

Label everything with tags and indelible marker and assemble an outage emergency kit consisting of any wrenches and other tools you will need to protect your home.

Locate your main electrical box and make sure everything is clearly labeled. Know which appliances should be unplugged during an outage to prevent damage. Keep a list. Choose a lamp as your tell-tale and label the switch, if possible, so you will know which position is on and which is off when a power outage occurs during peak hours, you may not remember which lights and appliances were on. During an outage, leave on this lamp at all times. It will tell you when power is restored.

Emergency Supplies

Battery-operated radio and extra batteries

Bottled water

Camp stove

Candles

Can opener

Cooking and eating utensils

Emergency blankets and/ or sleeping bags

Fire extinguisher

First-aid kit

Flashlight and extra batteries

Household essentials (detergent, towels, etc.)

Jackknife

Kerosene or gas lantern

Masking or duct tape

Matches

Medications

Nonperishable foods

Personal care items (soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo etc.)

Pet food

Sanitary supplies

Spare fuel

Warm clothing

Water purification tablets

Store supplies that are essential for survival: food, water, and fuel (in winter). When gauging quantities, figure that an outage may last two to four days. You can stay in your home during longer outages (two to four weeks) if you have an alternative heat source, adequate water, and a well-stocked pantry.

If you have the space, dedicate a kitchen drawer or other convenient area to emergency supplies. Always keep flashlights, batteries, candles, matches, a can opener, first-aid kit, tape, and other small necessities in the drawer. Make sure your family knows its location and also knows not to borrow (and forget to replace) the contents. Make sure you use and replace the batteries so you always have fresh ones on hand.

Ideal foods for an emergency are items that your family enjoys eating but that require little or no water or heat for preparation. They should have a long storage life. Foods that contain water, such as canned fruits and vegetables and canned or bottled juices, are especially valuable. At least part of your emergency supply should be edible without any cooking at all.

Wander through stores that supply campers with food. Many packaged foods can be prepared without heat, refrigeration, or water. Remember that water and fuel may be scarce, and you do not want to open the refrigerator or freezer more than is absolutely necessary. Dried fruits and nuts are especially good for quick energy, as are the energy bars popular with athletes.

Eat the food in the refrigerator first. Refrigerators will stay cool for many hours, although much depends on the season and the house temperature. Open the refrigerator as infrequently as possible; know what you will be retrieving before opening the door. Then use freezer foods, eating first what has thawed.

Canned Foods. Canned foods available from supermarkets are meant for a shelf life of a year (or the amount of time it takes to grow and process another years crop). However, canned foods are generally safe as long as the seal isnt broken; to be certain, rotate the cans by using and replacing them regularly. Determine can size by the amount the family will eat in one meal. If a can shows any signs of damage the ends of the can bulge, the can leaks, liquid spurts when the can is opened, or there is mold or an odd odor discard the food without tasting.