Copyright 2010, Lea, the Traveling Novelist

Tip #5 Expect the unexpected and prepare accordingly.

Whew! After 4 nights in subfreezing temperatures, it’s great to have power! I’m hoping everyone has managed well in the snow storm. We buried frozen food in the snow, isolated refrigerated items in our garage at 40 degrees, and huddled around a gas log fireplace with candles and oil lamps strewn throughout the house. Strange how “attached” we become to electronics. Down the road, we may get a generator. Usually our power outages last less than twenty four hours, and that’s not enough to cause much discomfort. Fortunately we had hot water and could take warm, steamy showers which felt great as cold ice-ghosts wafted inward through the exterior walls of our home. But four days without a shampoo (could not blow my hair dry) was a little distraction.

The next few posts on the blog will deal with personal safety. Although it is after the fact, I’ll start with comfort and survival in the midst of storms. Always refer to the American Red Cross, FEMA, and the Department of Homeland Security as your first reference. I will hit some highlights of my experience, but I always defer to the pros for the final say.

Please remember, this blog does not ensure your personal safety in any situation. The responsibility to use common sense and careful planning rests on your shoulders. In other words, stop blaming others for your bad judgment. Take responsibility.

Just a few thoughts on storm emergencies:

A. Water. Store a case of bottled water in a pantry or closet and recycle it periodically. When traveling, keep the water in the front of your car. I buckle my water bottle filled cooler under the passenger side seatbelt. Keep two weeks of bottled water available at all times, in the house AND on isolated road trips.

B. Heat. Candles and oil lamps will emit sufficient heat to keep you safe. You should have a large emergency candle and farmer’s matches in your vehicle at all times. In an emergency, vent your car properly so that oxygen moves through the vehicle windows. A few years ago one of my college students did a speech on winter safety and brought his car emergency kit to the classroom. As a final point of emphasis, he showed us a tuna can in which a black wick and small frozen puddle of candle wax lay. His sister had used her emergency candle in a blizzard. She had been stranded in a mountain pass overnight and was rescued the following morning. Visual aids like that stay with you!!! I have had super, intelligent students through the years. I am not sure they realize that I have learned as much from them as I hope they learned from me. If you use the car heater for warmth, remember CO POISONING is a REAL possibility. Run the car for ten minutes. Then turn it off for twenty minutes, airing out the vehicle with air through cracked windows. Store an abundance of candles and lamp oil in your home.

Use gas flame fireplaces and stove burners WITH CAUTION! We did make an interesting discovery with the gas stove. As I cooked chicken in a large spaghetti pot, the steam poured into the kitchen, dining room, and living room. The themometer continued to indicate a significant rise in temperature. So, we put three large pots and a tea kettle on the stove, allowing steam to fill the front rooms of the house. It kept us VERY VERY cozy. But we only boiled water pots when we were wide awake. Even trying to be as safe as possible, I inadvertently let one of my good cooking pans boil dry. On my next trip to town, I'll be shopping for a heavy duty two-quart cooker!

Back to the bedroom fireplace. I regularly open the window to allow fresh oxygen into the room. (The same applies for kitchen concerns about open gas burners.) We keep TWO carbon monoxide detectors in our bedroom and test them regularly. We have two detectors so that one will serve as backup in case the other one malfunctions. REMEMBER: Carbon monoxide is odorless, tasteless, and colorless. You will never know you are in trouble when this diabolical killer comes for you.

We keep the door open, even when the pilot light is all that is burning. Normally we only use the pilot light when we sleep, but during the storm we had to keep the valve wide open for maximum heat. Some professional dealers absolutely refuse to install gas fireplaces in bedrooms. The liability is too risky. A word to the wise …. Study everything you can find about CO poisoning. Every winter people in cars and homes die because they simply go to sleep under the luring comfort of warm heat and gas asphyxiation.

Be particularly careful with space heaters. Before spring breaks, the news reporters will apprise us of some lovely family members who were asphyxiated from a faulty furnace (another compelling reason to have a CO detector) or space heater. Kerosene heaters and the like require extensive ventilation. Read ALL of the precautions that come with equipment that generate heat.

Never leave an open flame burning while you sleep. I have lost count of the number of local home fires that were started by candles in my lifetime. Never leave a room in which there is an unattended open flame burning. During the storm I woke up chilling and went to the dining room table where I lit 15 or so candles and oil lamps. I sat at the table and watched the thermometer of my weather radio go from 60degrees to 68 degrees. It was tempting to lie down on the couch--------but TOO dangerous! Once the chill dissipated, I blew out the lights and wrapped myself in the warmest, thickest blanket we own.

Never put open-flame devices anywhere that children, pets, or careless adults can knock them over. Keep all combustibles and flammable items far away from open flames. A puddle of lamp oil on the floor with an open flame spells disaster.

Wrap yourself in layers of clothes, and do not forget the toboggan. Keep thick, warm socks on your feet. Wool hunting socks or synthetic warm ski socks are the best to have on hand. Wool gloves will help cool fingertips (in the car or in the home) and if you get a chill in your fingers, do what my eighth grade science teacher taught us to do: stick your bare hands in your armpits. Thanks Doc! If you are isolated in a vehicle, protect core body temperature with layers of clothes, and particularly protect fingers and toes where frostbite begins to eat away at flesh. Cuddle with loved ones in your car. Even if you don’t love the other person in the car, recognize the intrinsic value of body heat and share! Always carry a subfreezing designed sleeping bag in your car for travel---year round. If you never need the bag for yourself, you may need to throw it over an injured traffic victim who may go into shock without adequate first aid.

If any of your clothes are damp, even from sweat, remove them immediately and replace the damp clothes with clean dry ones (another reason to always carry a change of clothes in the car. One time I came onto a two-car wreck during a rainstorm. One person was standing, shivering in the open air. I had extra “throw-away” warm clothes in the car I could offer her for comfort and safety.

C. Light. Store emergency, battery powered lanterns, flashlights, and lamps so that you will have adequate light if you lose power. I am going to invest in the
now-affordable self generating flashlights. You shake the handheld lamp thirty
seconds and an LED light will provide sufficient light for fifteen minutes or longer. NO batteries needed. Remember: you can also use light from cell phones and I-Phones (keep this in mind if you are ever in a crowded theater or elevator if emergency lighting fails during an outage). Battery powered laptop computers will cast a glow too. But don’t play on the computer while the lights are out. Save the power for necessary lighting when the sun goes down.

D. Food. Store lots of nonperishable food in your pantry and recycle it on a regular basis too. If you buy canned food, don’t forget to get pop-tops OR have a manual can opener in your kitchen drawer. Same for the car. In this Great 2010 Storm, we had a good supply of food and used our stoop and garage as the refrigerator. We placed butter, salad dressings, milk, meat, fresh vegetables and fruit in plastic tubs with lids. Pretty handy.

We buried food from the freezer in the snow in a large lid-covered plastic box. (NOTE: We put the food in two clean plastic kitchen garbage bags, so when I retrieved them this morning, it was just a matter of pulling two bags out of a plastic bin and transferring the goodies to the freezer.

Be imaginative. Normally, i.e., when we have POWER, we bake chicken or slow-cook it. But with only gas top burners the last few days, I threw a chicken breast in a pot of boiling water and later chopped the well done fowl into yummy chicken salad for sandwiches on whole wheat bread. We had a spinach salad with cheese, finely chopped carrots, pecans, chicken salad, and a touch a sweet poppy seed dressing. Scrumptious, nutritious eating was not compromised by a lack of electricity. We dined by candlelight (!) and it was lovely.

E. Keep a battery powered radio on hand at all times. Store alkaline batteries galore in a plastic shoebox. Not only did we need to replace batteries over the four-day blackout, we had extras we could share with our neighbor.

F. Confer with the web sites of the American Red Cross, FEMA, and the Department of Homeland Security for additional guidelines on storm safety.


I shall post more ideas down the road. Think about what you will need if there is no electricity, no water, and no communication with the outside world. What do you need to make it through the storm?