E-Mail 'Hurricane Preparedness in the Sunshine State- Part 2 , by D.H.' To A Friend

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1. Speaking of power lines and flooding. Clearing drains is great, but not if the flood water is energized. Be very careful when entering water after a storm.

   1. Clear the drains and surrounding area before the storm

2. Buy oil lamp for boats. I have used them for year when I was in Alaska. They are not cheep.Perko were the best when I was building boats.

3. Just to add a extra bit of perspective to our new residence of Florida. As your post here lays out the importance of preparation and more importantly the realities of those ‘preps’. Living in deep southern MiamiDade, South Florida gets all supplies from the North of us. Typical hurricane pass West-East or East-West. Irma came straight up the peninsula. This perfect storm scenario changed many ‘prepared people’ and was a wake up call for those who do the minimum. If Irma had maintained her strength, goods and services would have been months rather than a week. Irma had ALL of Florida in her grip not just a couple of unlucky cities. Real quick on the typical Generator mistake. All of the consumer, HomeDepot, Lowes, BJs, Costco etc, generators are rated @ 120v. In simple math when you buy that Mac Daddy 10,000Watt with a whopper 60Amp plug, you are actual only able to get 30Amps @240. We all want the generator to run a AC in South Florida. ACs are 240V and range from 34-50Amps. The air conditioner compressor will not be able to work its magic. Bottom line be ‘prepared’ with knowledge when you make high cost preps.

4. Good post. I’m a native Floridian so Irma wasn’t my first rodeo. Having several young children, we felt the need to be well prepared for the storm and aftermath. What I learned was A – Florida is probably hard to habitat long term without electricity (the heat, lack of air conditioning and mosquitos), and B – don’t underestimate post hurricane injuries. My then 9 month old took a fall the day after the hurricane which was bad enough she needed to be taken the hospital due to concussion. This ended up being a real pain due to the downed trees, power lines, etc as well as the overloaded hospitals. We simply weren’t prepared for that situation.

5. The small,5000 btu window units are 99$ at wal-mart(or were).They will usually work from the smallest gennie or solar set-up,even an inverter off the car.Not life saving,but after working all day clearing trees,fences,etc…post Irma…to get a few hours rest in a cool,dry room made me more alert and efficient the next day.

   I also had a older”trimline”corded phone..never lost phone service when other people couldn’t get cell service.Was able to show a few people they still had internet,they just needed to power the modem and router/wi-fi…which I could do with a car inverter and extension cord.

6. Some thoughts on a generators:
   1. Don’t forget a grounding wire. Figure out where you are going place the generator and where your grounding rod is to determine its length.
   2. Always secure or its gone. Obtained one of those large ground screws for tying you huge dog in the backyard. Screw it into the ground and place the generator on top of it. Secure the generator to the ground screw with the shortest piece of heavy duty chain and a heavy duty lock. Forget anything with the word “MASTER” on it the idea is to be unable to maneuver the generator off of the ground screw with out unlocking it.
   3. Buy one of the adapter cables which converts the 220 volt outputs to three 120 volt outlets.

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