Power Out for last 4 days...

[sandyut]

OK, so high wind red flag warnings bla bla bla, if you live in it you know. So our power has been out for 4 days. We have a Generac, but Comcast dies without power. Cell signal here is absolute s**t. texts and calls maybe but thats it. so no updates etc. Living in the info darkness blows. Hot water lights and cooking is great but lacking the last piece. Starlink will be ordered and set up ASAP! What an experience to go through. No gas stations open, no restaurants on and on. Could be worst, could be better. Next step is Starlink. With our gen, we will be unphased next time. But wow! I had to drive a couple miles down the road to use my phone for anything. If this was a snow storm that wouldnt be an option.

 

[pc farmer]

I get where your coming from but we didn't used to have cell phones. Nice to have but we can survive without them for a few days.

Edit. We actually can't, the world runs on Internet nowadays.

 

[JLinza]

Dang man. We lost power four 4 days one time on Thanksgiving a few years ago. It can be such a pain in the rear. Hope the wind dies down, so they can turn your power back on.

 

[sandyut]

Winds are subsiding, issue will likely continue. Not having freaking internet for 4 days and not know what is happening is not acceptable, I just ordered the Starlink start up package. D U N done with no connectivity, I dont want to share how much the generator cost, but it starlink is nothing by comparison. so its a no brainer.

 

[pc farmer]

Winds are subsiding, issue will likely continue. Not having freaking internet for 4 days and not know what is happening is not acceptable, I just ordered the Starlink start up package. D U N done with no connectivity, I dont want to share how much the generator cost, but it starlink is nothing by comparison. so its a no brainer.

I have priced them. Not cheap. I have a 9k watt one that will run the well, coal stove and all the freezers and fridges and lights. We have cell service here. That's all we need.

 

[sandyut]

the crappy part of our location is cell is 1-2 bars of LTE which wont do anything, I can send short texts and make calls but anything internet is a 100% no go. It had to be fixed.

 

[Brokenhandle]

Reminds me of the days growing up... with 4 channels on the tv... and the president is on... and he's on every channel! Time to go play with the hotwheels! Lol!

Ryan

 

[DRKsmoking]

4 days suck, and yes it would drive me crazy, just knowing that I have no cell or internet. Even if I did not have to use. Just knowing it is not there to use in this day and age.

And I know all about the Generac generators, as a few of my customers have them, very costly.

Hope the Starlink works out for you, and gets you what you want it to be.

David

 

[radioguy]

Big Starlink user here. Send me your email and I can send an invite. You get 1 month free and I get 1 month for referral. Many easy going plans available.

RG

 

[seenred]

I feel your pain, David!

I think it was 2006, we had the worst ice storm that ever hit this part of the country. We were out of power for 6 days - in a total-electric house. No generator, no wood stove or back-up heat of any kind, no hot water, no way to cook except my propane gas grill moved to the front porch. Worst part was, the temps stayed well below freezing for the duration - so no driving anywhere on ice-covered roads. We had candles, flashlights, and a kerosene lamp for some light, but I'll tell ya, that was a long 6 days.

Red

 

[Brokenhandle]

I feel your pain, David!

I think it was 2006, we had the worst ice storm that ever hit this part of the country. We were out of power for 6 days - in a total-electric house. No generator, no wood stove or back-up heat of any kind, no hot water, no way to cook except my propane gas grill moved to the front porch. Worst part was, the temps stayed well below freezing for the duration - so no driving anywhere on ice-covered roads. We had candles, flashlights, and a kerosene lamp for some light, but I'll tell ya, that was a long 6 days.

Red

Losing power for a short time isn't so bad... except when you get power back you need to go turn all the lights off that you turned on and they didn't work.

So dumb question... how many days out of power does it take before you stop trying to turn light switches on?

Ryan

 

[seenred]

So dumb question... how many days out of power does it take before you stop trying to turn light switches on?

Ryan

Well...

We were out 6 days that time...so clearly, it takes more than 6 days!

Red

 

[chef k-dude]

I was out for 8+ days once. The snow was starting to fall when my electrician (RIP) came with the final breaker for my add-on breaker panel for my new Generac 10,000 I had to wait months for because hurricane Sandy had all the generators from our region diverted to the Northeast for months. Wanna cry about no power? Talk to those folks.

Wife had gone to North Carolina to spend time with her mom (thankfully I am spared those trips) so I was "Home Alone". I was dancing around in my underwear ala Tom Cruise when the power went out and my new genny was running like a top. I had my dish network and a wood stove and the fridges were good! I think I was getting internet on a USB modem back then. Cell AND land lines (we still keep a land line partially for this reason) both went down for a while though. I was a proud prepper. Plenty of food and I had also started keeping upwards of 50 gallons of gas in prep for the genny arriving. I didnt even need to dig out for several days. We had just gotten back to back 18" snows, rare for Central VA, but shiznit does happen here.

It was actually nice bieng disconnected from the world (in a way) for a while. I work from home and can actually work offline if my job has fed me the work prior to "going dark"...as long as the genny is running (I'm salary anyway, but back then getting my checks was the issue). As somewhat of a prepper, I usually have plenty of food for weeks. I've actually cooked on my wood stove and made coffee and breakfast on my turkey fryer burner before I got my propane ported 6 burner cooktop for the garage and the genny (I also keep four 15-20lb tanks of propane at all times). I can actually use my range now with the genny if I want. Costs a lot of gas but will work. I dont like it when the power goes out, but "an AG district boy can survive"!

This kind of stuff goes to show how close we are to societal collapse. A few EMP's popped over us and this would be our permanent condition for quite some time...

"how many days out of power does it take before you stop trying to turn light switches on?"

Isnt it funny?! I have flipped light switches WHILE holding a lantern! My electrician (RIP) put in an always hot (gonna be a probem for inspection if we ever have to sell) light and switch over my breaker panels to let me know when the power is back on. He had done this before! If you have powered down, off the grid responsibly so as not to backfeed the lines, you dont know the power is back on if runnung a genny!

 

[sandyut]

Dang man. We lost power four 4 days one time on Thanksgiving a few years ago. It can be such a pain in the rear. Hope the wind dies down, so they can turn your power back on.

Took 4 days, but we are up, some folks are still without. Bad wind storm for sure.

4 days suck, and yes it would drive me crazy, just knowing that I have no cell or internet. Even if I did not have to use. Just knowing it is not there to use in this day and age.

And I know all about the Generac generators, as a few of my customers have them, very costly.

Hope the Starlink works out for you, and gets you what you want it to be.

David

The power goes out quite a bit up here. The cost of replacing everything in the refer is huge. Many left town for hotels for the duration, those combined cover the majority of the cost after a couple outages.

Big Starlink user here. Send me your email and I can send an invite. You get 1 month free and I get 1 month for referral. Many easy going plans available.

RG

Still on the fence with SL. I snagged a used cell signal booster that will stream TV with our crap signal. might give that a run next time.

I feel your pain, David!

I think it was 2006, we had the worst ice storm that ever hit this part of the country. We were out of power for 6 days - in a total-electric house. No generator, no wood stove or back-up heat of any kind, no hot water, no way to cook except my propane gas grill moved to the front porch. Worst part was, the temps stayed well below freezing for the duration - so no driving anywhere on ice-covered roads. We had candles, flashlights, and a kerosene lamp for some light, but I'll tell ya, that was a long 6 days.

Red

Ugh, sounds rough. 2 years ago we had a 5' snow storm and were out for 3 days, I spent most of my time clearing snow and was exhausted so no connectivity was not as bad. 6 days sounds aweful!

Losing power for a short time isn't so bad... except when you get power back you need to go turn all the lights off that you turned on and they didn't work.

So dumb question... how many days out of power does it take before you stop trying to turn light switches on?

Ryan

there is not enough time to stop flipping switches. its such a habit it cant be stopped HAHA

 

[sandyut]

We are gonna give the signal booster a shot first, its free to use and I just tested it and could run YouTube TV with 8mbps. good enough and free. I like not paying more every month on the somewhat rare chance we have a multiday outage. If the outages get worse, it will be time to reconsider.

 

[Fueling Around]

We've only had 1 multiple day outage in MN since 2001. Gen got a workout. Lived in a townhouse and shared power with neighbors to keep their fridge and freezers cold.
Got the gen when we lived in Puget Sound area and the power was out frequently.

We are gonna give the signal booster a shot first, its free to use and I just tested it and could run YouTube TV with 8mbps. good enough and free. I like not paying more every month on the somewhat rare chance we have a multiday outage. If the outages get worse, it will be time to reconsider.

Will a digital antenna work for you?

 

[DEERMAKER]

OK, so high wind red flag warnings bla bla bla, if you live in it you know. So our power has been out for 4 days. We have a Generac, but Comcast dies without power. Cell signal here is absolute s**t. texts and calls maybe but thats it. so no updates etc. Living in the info darkness blows. Hot water lights and cooking is great but lacking the last piece. Starlink will be ordered and set up ASAP! What an experience to go through. No gas stations open, no restaurants on and on. Could be worst, could be better. Next step is Starlink. With our gen, we will be unphased next time. But wow! I had to drive a couple miles down the road to use my phone for anything. If this was a snow storm that wouldnt be an option.

Man I hope it all gets better for ya, thats rough. Longest for me was 6 days.

 

[schlotz]

Talk about timing David. Whew, you got the Genny up and running when you most needed it. Being in God's Country does have its benefits but unfortunately there are a few bumps that come along with the experience. Glad to hear the outage went reasonably well. Assuming you've got clear access to Starlink satellites that is an option to consider but if the free signal booster can get ya by then that's the way to go. SL access is not cheap!

 

[bmudd14474]

Dang that sucks. So I had starlink and it works wonderfully. But once I got fiber I cancelled. They then emailed offering me to keep it as a backup for $10 a month. Might be worth doing for you as well for when comcast goes out. That being said you could also keep it as your primary internet.

 

[radioguy]

Starlink has changed plans. I used to be able to suspend the monthly access fee for my camper. Now Starlink has a $5 / month standby plan. When in Standby Mode it provides unlimited low-speed data capped at up to 500 Kbps (0.5 Mbps) for both download and upload. This is usable data for WiFi calling, and security devices (IOT).

My access when we travel is $165/mo. A bit pricey but this thing will work anywhere on the North American Continent. We have traveled to a few places where cell phones do not work. This will work provided I can "see" the sky. Never know when you might need to make a 911 call.

Do you have a "look" at any cities, dense population areas from your elevation? A decent TV antenna and pre-amp would bring in a lot of free channels.

I run this pre amp hooked to an outdoor antenna in my attic. Don't be fooled by all the digital/HD hype. Any style TV antenna will work, best to use combo UHF/VHF for simplicity

RG

Antennas Direct ClearStream JUICE Plus UHF VHF FM Preamplifier for TV Antennas

Antennas Direct | The JUICE Plus TV antenna preamplifier ensures peak performance when boosting signal quality for UHF, VHF, and FM frequency bands without signal disruption. Learn More.

store.antennasdirect.com