(Continued from Part 1. This concludes teh article.)
DURING THE POWER OUTAGE
Fortunately, my cell phone service remained on during the entire event. That allowed me to directly access the internet from my phone or connect the phone to my computer and smarty TV for outside access.
After the first day the electric company updated the “outages” page on their web site and showed the extensive outages that they were dealing with. The system had both “grid” issues of downed power poles and system components as well as individual properties and businesses who had service lines damaged or disconnected on their properties. The outlook wasn’t good but they were rising to the occasion. Apparently they had called on mutual support power companies from all over the state and beyond.
The first thing that I did was grab whatever battery operated lights that I could find (of course they weren’t all in one convenient place!). Next, just to be safe, I shut the off the main breakers in the house electrical panel. My emergency electrical systems are not connected to the house wiring but I just wanted to be sure in case anything in the house electrical system may have been damaged by the storm.
Now finally being able to see around inside the house I hooked up the solar battery cables to the inverter. The batteries were still strategically located next to the refrigerators in the kitchen. I hadn’t moved them into their permanent location after testing because I wasn’t yet sure where that was going to end up. I ran an extension cord through the garage door out to the freezer. Finally, I went back to bed knowing that the inverter and batteries were up and running and that the cold and frozen foods were now safe for the night.Continue reading“A Power Outage Experience – Part 2, by Big D.”