This is hard to believe but about one year ago I was writing this blog and telling about the devasting tornado that hit our county. I was talking about the emergency phase of operations here that turned into a "helping" phase where neighbor helped neighbor (even from other parts of the country) and finally the "clean-up" phase which lasted for months as the affected people began to put their lives back together.
Before that task was even completed, in August, the remnants of Hurricane Ike came blowing through here and we started all over again. First the emergency phase finding, identifying and assisting those whose homes and businesses were damaged from the 70+ mph winds and the ensuing loss of electricity. Then neighbor began helping neighbor again as the undaunting task of restoring power began as well as the clean up phase.
Just as we were recovering from that (and some still haven't), here comes the worst ice storm that I've seen in my 62 short years. I have a friend that is in his 90's and he told me the same thing. That alone should give you an idea of how powerful this storm was. It began as rain, then cold rain, then freezing rain and finally ice. Early in the evening we knew there would be problems because trees were nearly bent double. Here in the subdivision we live in, the utilities are all underground. We made it through the first night and had power but mid morning the next day it was gone and it lasted nearly a week. A second round hit on the afternoon of the second day adding to the problem. Our subdivision is surrounded by woods. If you went outside it sounded like the National Guard was playing war games. All you could hear was the snapping of large limbs and the "Ssssh" as they fell to the ground. This happened about every five seconds. It was insane. You could also hear the loud explosions of power transformers as they were ripped from their poles and wires shorted across each other. I've never seen or heard anything like it.
Our house is total electric except for a gas fireplace which is capable of keeping the interior liveable, if not cozy. That evening brought back old memories as we didn't have television and the fire from the fireplace supplied the entertainment. It only took about an hour of conversation before we had used up all our knowledge and ran out of things to talk about so we spent most of the rest of the evening reading books by candlelight. I turned on our portable scanner to listen to what was going on throughout the community and found out that everyone was in the same boat we were. Problem was, lots of folks didn't have a fireplace and no way to get heat. Phone service, both cell and landline were non-existent. The scanner sounded like a replay of the last two similiar incidents.
The morning following the "second round of ice" brought an additional inch or so of snow, followed by temperatures too cold to melt the snow or ice. Getting out and about was all but impossible. I heard someone on the scanner say that virtually 100% of Muhlenberg County was without power and later they included Hopkins and Caldwell counties in that mix. We spent a second night huddled around the fireplace by candlelight. By late evening the power company had managed to get a small piece of the "commercial strip" (the area where the Twilight Drive In used to be for us "ole-timers") some power which enabled Tractor Supply, Peeble's Department Store, Fred's (sorta like Dollar General Store), La Fiesta Mexican Restaurant, Rent-a-Center, Autozone and Save-A-Lot to open. Pat and I decided rather than try to cook in the dark on our Coleman stove, we'd go out to LaFiesta and eat mexican. We eat at LaFiesta at least once a week most of the year and I have never had to wait for a table.
This night was different. There were about twenty people ahead of us and while we were waiting, another twenty or so fell in behind us...and it wasn't even 5 p.m.
After about a twenty minute wait, we finally got a booth. We felt sort of guilty because there were only two of us and there were others waiting in line. I looked up and saw our next door neighbors wander in. Pat went up and invited them to come occupy the other two seats in our booth which saved them about thirty minutes of waiting and gave us some great company to share conversation with. We enjoyed a great meal and were having a good time when the power went off again. The restaurant was equipped with emergency lights over the exits that gave out some light throughout the restaurant. I thought since the electricity was off and that meant the cash registers weren't working that maybe the owner would "forgo" charging us for the meal. WRONG! Since he couldn't use the cash register nor his pocket calculator, he decided to simply "round off" all of the tickets to even money....only thing is he only rounded "UP!" Didn't matter! The food was great and we enjoyed seeing friends and neighbors.
After spending another night reading and conversing by candlelight, we went to bed early. Next morning I made the hasty decision that I was going to get some electricity into the house somehow. My brother and I co-own a generator that we always used to power our travel trailer when we "boondocked" at some of the NASCAR races. We kept it in his garage on the other side of town. I drove over there and asked him if he was using it. He said he used it the previous night as he slept in his travel trailer.
Since the furnace in his travel trailer was on the "fritz," all he was powering was a lamp and small electric heater. He delivers propane for a living and his house is full of propane wall heaters and the like. It was probably eighty degrees in there. He's on Cable TV and since limbs had ripped down his line, he couldn't use the TV anyhow. The only freezer he has in his house (he's single) is in the upper part of the refrigerator and everything in the lower part could be kept cold in a cooler (there was plenty of ice around). We decided it would be in our best interest for him to move back into his warm house, let me take the generator to power the deep freezer we have in the garage and he could send over his Omaha Steaks and frozen meats for safekeeping in our freezer. He worked all day so he could come over to our house to eat and watch TV and the like. We loaded up the generator.
When I got home with it, I rounded up all of our exterior extension cords, which were four. I ran one to the chest freezer and using a splitter plugged in the extra refrigerator we have in the garage. I ran a second cord to the refrigerator in our kitchen. The third cord (again, using a splitter) powered two living room lamps and the fourth cord powered the television and satellite receiver. Voila, we had creature comforts. The gas fireplace kept us warm. We had plenty of light to read by. We could watch television and when needed, we could unplug the TV, move the cord over to the computer and check e-mail, weather conditions, etc. The cord in the kitchen doubled (or tripled) as a power source for the microwave, electric skillet, toaster and coffee pot (just one appliance at a time). We would unplug one of the lamps to plug in our cell phone chargers. Man, I was starting to feel guilty.
The only thing we couldn't do was take a hot shower. Our water heater is electric and is under the house in the crawl space. We were able to heat water on the gas Coleman stove in the garage so we could wash our hair and take a sponge bath. My cousing in Bowling Green invited us up to stay with her but we felt we needed to stay around here, but we did go up there and take a hot shower (and bum a meal off her). Since we couldn't get gas around here to power the generator, we went to Bowling Green about every other day anyway.
We own several rental properties and when we went around checking on everyone we found most of them were pretty resourceful. They had generators or at least propane space heaters and all seemed to be pretty happy. I'm sure there were a lot of people that were miserable but I never found one of them. Most people laughed at the situation and seemed to be enjoying "improvising" to survive. A few left their homes and went to Bowling Green, Hopkinsville etc. and stayed in a motel until power here came back on. I know of a couple of families who went to Florida. I kinda envied them until one called back from Miami where it was thirty degrees last night.
This went on for about a week and finally, Monday night about 10:30 p.m. our power came back on. I gave the water heater about an hour to heat up and the first thing I did was take a nice hot shower, even to the point of running out all the hot water again. As I'm sitting here typing this, the lights "flickered" momentarily reminding me just how fragile the system is. My wife and I looked at each other and simultaneously said "Uh-Oh!" Instinctively she rushed over to the drawer and found the flashlight and placed it beside the couch. That's been about ten minutes ago and so-far-so-good. I finally realize what the "flicker" meant. What seemed to potentially be "bad news" is actually "good news," because the dimming of the lights meant that another section of town just "powered up." Another neighborhood will sleep in warmth tonight.
As I said, this is the third castrophe we've had in a year and each one seems to make us a little stronger. I hope the third time is "charms" though!
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