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Power wipeout in the DC area


LarryC

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Unbelievable urban stretches of DC, MD, and No VA are completely without power, following sudden 80-mph winds that burst through the area last night. I'm apparently in the center of all this. Pepco, the local utility, has a map on the internet that is virtually solid red (power out) in all directions from here. It says out-of-state crews won't even arrive to start work until Monday (this is Saturday), and estimates this outage will last a WEEK.

This in the midst of 95 to 100-degree highs.

I haven't heard anything from Gary, who hopefully escaped the worst and is cooling off in Delaware. I just spoke with Lucky Thebes, who lives in a sliver of NoVA that kept its power.

My trusty generator kicked in, so I've been cool and practicing microwave cooking (the range is excluded from the generator). BUT, I'm lacking in constant stimulation and/or sleep-induceing news, punditry, Homes and Gardens TV, Alaska wild flying, and Ice Road Truckers. Oh, yes, and the ARTS channel. Marty jiggered his FIOS (Verizon fiberoptic) to get TV. Like I say, lucky.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-thunderstorms-knock-out-power-across-region-leaving-2-dead/2012/06/30/gJQAB9MbDW_story.html

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Good to hear you are ok. We had mid 100s here today, but fortunately, still have power. I remember as a youngster how we had summers around 100 (central Illinois), and no aircon. My dad was remodeling our 1850s house. My folks never had a house with aircon...

Hope they can get folks power back on sooner than expected. Most folks houses aren't designed to cool naturally anymore. They get all sealed up and you can't even open windows on some.

Bruce

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Most folks houses aren't designed to cool naturally anymore. They get all sealed up and you can't even open windows on some.

In some places and cases, about the only answer is a generator, but only the larger ones can do AC, and at a cost. A bit OT here: a next-door neighbor's gas entry is located on the other side of the house from from his electrical service, which may be too far apart for a natural-gas powered generator. I was probably lucky in having them closer together.
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On the houses that are so tight you can't open a door you have to install an air transfer device with your funace/AC to let in fresh air while exhasuting old air. And if you tend to be a bit gassy you might want to open a few windows or you will be consumed by your own flatulance.

JJK

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My trusty generator kicked in

Good for you for having one.

I wanted to put one in our house (located 15 miles outside of town) and the wife almost turned beet red laughing at my idea.... how silly!!!

Then, one Christmas Eve, during the middle of her shower all soaped up, the power went out.

No power = no well = no water = no shower = no rinse = soapy wife standing there crying out, what to do? (I melted some ice cubes on a kerosene heater to give her about 2 gallons of 'rinse' water. She wasn't a happy girl.

I love poetic justice.

Still don't have one though, wish I did.

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For sure it's a major mess around here. Probably worse than after a major ice storm or hurricane, or in this region, over an inch of snow.[:D]

I was in Maryland, DC and Virginia yesterday and the loss of trees and power is something to see. Happened to be in Home Depot today getting some work supplies and generators were flying out the door. Saw one idiot with two of them. Overheard an employee say a whole truckload arrived today and they were almost out already. Gotta love panic and a credit card. I call it Crazy White People Syndrome.

Everytime it snows around here all the shovels, bread, milk and toilet paper sell out. Go figure.

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I gather that Dominion Power in VA, which had TWICE as many customers without power as Pepco in MD, promises to get theirs back on line by TUESDAY NIGHT, while Pepco is saying getting theirs back on line won't be done until after the next weekend. They've barely whittled down the number of affected customers. So far, no explanation of why the District's MD suburban area is always behind everyone else in getting its power back into operation. This is not the first time, either.

Lots of silly excuses, like they need to do more tree trimming. They've finally done serious trimming for the first time over the past few weeks, but it didn't do much good. I suspect a smoke screen, and wonder if the area has seriously underinvested in the Bethesda-area electrical grid, making it impossible to re-do things quickly. Just a suspicion. But Pepco has always been cowardly about openly discussing realities. Maybe rates are too tightly controlled here in MD, leaving the utilities little option but to limit investment.

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Dee, local hotels fill up quick and charge high in things like this, so people have to stick it out or find friends to "visit." I used to drive an hour to hole up in Hagerstown, but couldn't take the cats.

Lots of generator hum around here right now, usually limited to powering a fridge, TV, computer, and cellphone charger. Very pricey new homes (one's on our street) have large whole-house generators built in, but that's rare in Bethesda.

Some drag the neighborhood to cool off in the car and see if the power is creeping any closer to where they live.

Interesting that the AT&T golf tournament in Bethesda never once mentioned the heat or power outages today after I tuned in. I gather they played yesterday in PA silence.

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My daughter and son-in-law are in Huntington WV. Power is still out at there house, his parents got power back on late Saturday; so they have been staying with them since.

The kids got home from his graduation from nursing school Friday evening to find the power out at the house. Our daughter said the power was off and on during graduation but they managed to wrap up before the lights went out.

We were there 3 weeks ago for a week long visit/vacation/speaker road trip; weather was great then, a little warm in the day time but great at night.

We feel for everyone that is suffering thru this heat wave; we have had record temps here in Center Arkansas, most of the state is under a burn ban.

Bill

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Still no power at our house. It seems the entire area went down at 11pm on Friday. Thanks for your concern Larry. You guessed correctly and we're holding up well here at our beach house in DE. We don't have cable or internet here but Redbox is full of movies we haven't seen and I managed to find a weak signal to steal. My generator won't run AC so we packed the important stuff and hit the road early yesterday.

Looks like I'll be taking vacation a little earlier than anticipated.

Good luck to everyone still waiting it out.

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I hope yours will be back soon. Mine was on this morning, so Pepco is making conservative estimates. Area residents are furious at its glacial response -- no power trucks to be seen, lines on the ground not being picked up, etc. I'd like them to come clean about what's wrong in Bethesda, but underresourcing looks like a large part of it. At least 7-11 had both power and milk, while some larger groceries had no power and closed down. All are dumping their perished perishables.

Although the Post had an article on neighbors who have sharing power with those who don't, the neighbor I could help didn't ask for some reason. I would have been glad to run a cord.

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No power for 8+ days and 100+ degrees after hurricane Rita promped me to get a whole house generator. Not having the gas near your electrical service is no big deal, just run some 2" pipe. I think minimum for a 20kw is 1 1/4" for the supply but I didn't want to take a chance. I also have a 400k btu gas heater on that line but they never run at the same time. I did have to have a larger meter installed though.

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All of the electric companies have been cutting maintenance to the bone for years now and rely on out of state maintenance to come to their aid in case of a disaster. Your electric companiy is not your dad's company. They don't even mow the grass or cut the trees in the high voltage line right of ways anymore.

JJK

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I went reading to find out how many are still without power and can't seem to get a number, last I read it was 1.8 million.

Hope they get everything up and running soon, I'm kind of surprised it's taking this long. We were out for 2 weeks, but there was no power for over 200 miles from here so we really expected it to take longer than it did.

The repair people really did an amazing job considering they had to even replace 90% of the poles. We live 10 miles from a small town and there were 3 poles left standing over the 10 miles.

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