A non-political (for a change) big wind (1 Viewer)

The_Doc_Man

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Looks like Hurricane Ida is heading our way. My wife and I have discussed the matter and have decided to ride it out. We got some canned meat and bread plus two new LED flashlights with high-intensity beams. Also a bunch of batteries. Ida's path is trending west of us, which is either good or bad depending on just how far to the west. We might get a fringe of it, but the weather wonks are saying the moment it makes landfall it will drop in intensity.

As long as the neighborhood doesn't flood, we should be fine. Just as a note, if I go silent for a few days starting Sunday, you might guess we at least got hit with a power outage. That happened last year with Hurricane Zeta.

I know I'm glad I've got a chain saw. Last time we had a storm, I filled over 30 lawn-n-leaf bags with debris. Oh, my achin' back!
 

AccessBlaster

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Good luck with the hurricane Doc, we'll keep you and your wife in our thoughts.
 

bob fitz

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Good luck and stay safe Doc.
 

Steve R.

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Have an emergency generator, for when the power goes out?
 

jdraw

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Keep safe Doc!
 

The_Doc_Man

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Wife and I talked about a generator but haven't gotten one yet, @Steve R. When we went to Lowe's yesterday for some flashlights and batteries, we saw not less than a dozen people carrying small generators, presumable for fridges and stuff. The store had several pallets loaded with different sizes, and all of their flat-bed carts were in use. To say that Lowe's was a madhouse somehow just doesn't cover it.

I've gone through named storms and know how they run. Heck, my first storm of any consequence was Betsy (and the curious can look it up in Wikipedia.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Betsy Me and my folks stayed through Betsy. The flooding was shallow and brief, but due to downed trees, we were out of power for 11 days.

"Miss Ida" is veering slowly westward for its projected landfall point, which is good news for us. The farther away it veers, the less trouble we will have from it. I have a stack of lawn bags and some good rakes, and the small chain saw works pretty well. I think we will just end up with some downed branches.

I'm sorry for the folks in Lafayette and Baton Rouge because they are the two closest decent-sized cities to the storm track. I'm even sorrier because when Katrina hit, the roads north were clogged like an old country toilet. Linear parking lot, almost - except there was some movement. But it took us almost four hours to reach Lafayette, which is normally not more than about 90-100 minutes on Interstate 10.

We just had a lot of exterior repair work done on the house such that it should be relatively safe, and it has been through hurricanes before. In fact, last year's Hurricane Zeta went directly over the house. I went outside while the eye was overhead so I could clear out the street's storm drains. I don't know, I might be a bit jaded by now, but this one looks like a near miss for us.

Appreciate the good wishes, gang. If I'm off the air, it could be many reasons, but the two most likely would be power loss or me having to pick up another 30 bags worth of branches and leaves. That usually takes a couple of days at least. I'll check back in. If you see me posting Monday, the worst is over 'cause the storm is supposed to hit late Sunday afternoon.
 

pbaldy

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Good luck Doc!
 

Isaac

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Best of luck sir, I hope that no more back aching backyard content gets generated. Sending a prayer your way!

I have a brother in Texas that was hit with that long power outage during the cold spell. He used his generator to good avail, but then again, you're probably the foremost storm expert right now due to all your time in the area.
 

NauticalGent

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Best of luck Doc, we will be waiting on the rain here in VA.

20210828_162617.jpg


Had it installed about 3 months ago. 3rd best decision I have ever made. The neighbors have lost about 2 days of power since then, but my house was just fine!

Let us know how you two fare...
 

The_Doc_Man

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Well, "Miss Ida" has jogged just a smidge to the east overnight. We will definitely get stronger winds and heavier rain because of that job. But this is an example of "damned if you do and damned if you don't." When my mother-in-law was still alive, we took her out of harm's way to different places depending on the storm track. That wasn't a question because she was a "nervous Nellie" type and actually cried during storms. She passed a couple of years ago, though, and we stayed through storms.

As a matter of safety, we could easily leave. Except if we choose to leave, the nearest states that are potential safe havens are Texas and Florida, which have anti-mask rules in place because they are strongholds of the "mask infringes my liberty" viewpoint. And oddly enough, they are also places with high death rates and overloaded emergency centers. A "public shelter" would be a hot-bed of COVID-19-delta cases waiting to exhibit themselves. My sweetie and I have been vaccinated, but as we know, the vaccine doesn't stop you from catching the virus, it just mitigates the effects associated with the disease.

So.... damned if we go away, damned if we stay. We made the rational decision that the house stood up through Katrina in 2005 and has been made stronger by fixing some bad wood just last year. We will stay and hope that things remain stable enough to continue to live here. We will keep away from the public shelters and just shelter in place.

I don't know if this kind of rumination helps anyone, but if you ever face a natural or other disaster with evacuation potential, this is the kind of thinking we have been doing.
 

Dick7Access

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Looks like Hurricane Ida is heading our way. My wife and I have discussed the matter and have decided to ride it out. We got some canned meat and bread plus two new LED flashlights with high-intensity beams. Also a bunch of batteries. Ida's path is trending west of us, which is either good or bad depending on just how far to the west. We might get a fringe of it, but the weather wonks are saying the moment it makes landfall it will drop in intensity.

As long as the neighborhood doesn't flood, we should be fine. Just as a note, if I go silent for a few days starting Sunday, you might guess we at least got hit with a power outage. That happened last year with Hurricane Zeta.

I know I'm glad I've got a chain saw. Last time we had a storm, I filled over 30 lawn-n-leaf bags with debris. Oh, my achin' back!
We got some canned meat and bread. What no Cajon food?
 

The_Doc_Man

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I am down for a while. A big tree fell across the power line, took down the ISP line too. It is a pain in the toches to post from my phone so I will go silent until the local power company comes by with some big chainsaws. Wife and I are OK, will post pix when I can. Gonna save my phone battery for family calls. Based on past storms I will be down for more than a day or two... more like a week.

Ps- the tree was my neighbors from across the street. House is OK, we are OK, Street is blocked solid due to the 50 ft. Tree in the roadway.
 

pbaldy

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Good to hear you're okay Doc!
 

bob fitz

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Have been seeing reports of the hurricane and have been thinking of you. Pleased to hear that you are unscathed. Stay safe.
PS
Sounds like more backache is on the horizon, once you get started with clearing up 😉
 

The_Doc_Man

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OK, here is the latest. We rode out the storm on 8/29/21, lost power 12:45, tree fell at 15:20, and for the next couple of days we stayed around with no power, no fresh water (but we had bottled water to drink so OK there), no A/C, no NOTHIN' to speak of. Some minor roof damage, probably needed a new roof anyway but this pushes up the priority.. H. Ida hit us as a category 4 storm and a slow-moving Jezebel at that. Here are a couple of pix. If you look, you might see power lines under the branches off to the left. That was a 60-year old "white oak" tree. It stayed up through H. Katrina 16 years ago, stayed up after a direct hit last year by H. Zeta (including that the eye of Zeta passed directly over us). But H. Ida with sustained winds of 150 mph and gusts of 185 was more than it could take.

Moral of the story: A category 4 hurricane is NO JOKE. We are looking at a solid two weeks and maybe more before power can be restored because one of the main 300-ft tall transmission lines from the Entergy (power provider) blew into the river. They are working on rerouting but apparently it is going to be non-trivial. Until the work crews can clear that tree that is on our power lines, though, it won't matter if anyone else has power. We won't.

We found a safe haven to wait out the repairs with some family in central Alabama. Won't be cheap but what do you do?

I will be working on unpacking in the motel so my posting will still be limited, but wife and I are OK and in a building that actually has a working air conditioner. You don't realize just how much you miss that until you don't have it any more.
 

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Eljefegeneo

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Best of luck Doc, we will be waiting on the rain here in VA.

View attachment 94002

Had it installed about 3 months ago. 3rd best decision I have ever made. The neighbors have lost about 2 days of power since then, but my house was just fine!

Let us know how you two fare...
I got one about six months ago to combat PG&E's constant outages here in Northern California. It has worked! No outages since it was installed.
 

Steve R.

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Great that your OK. Seems that the Ida, as the news evolved is/was worse than expected. Glad that you will be able to "camp out" with family in Alabama. We spent nearly two weeks with our daughter in Georgia after Hurricane Florence in 2018 before being able to return to Morehead City, NC. Thanks for the update.
 

Dick7Access

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Sorry for your hardship. hard on me also, I will miss my Cajon food on my way to Texas this week.;)
 

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