Haha yeah, I think I lost 2 chicken breasts, a boca burger, and some frozen veggies. I drank all the beer before it got warm though. I’ve got my priorities.
JayS how big of an inverter did you use on the 1/6HP pump? I grabbed a 750mA thinking it’d be enough for my sump pump but it was not. Thankfully I found out in time to run to the store and get a DC sump pump and not need an inverter at all.
So yeah, I survived this storm with only 3 things: A DC sump pump, a boat battery, and in-laws that live on grand island in a house with plenty of room for me, my dogs, and my fiance and drive AWD wagons. :tup: I’m actually posting this from their basement right now. :tup:
Just got my power back a few hours ago Town Of Tonawanda. Lost it on Thursday at about 6:00 PM. Stood in line on Kenmore Ave for about 4 hours in the cold rain to buy a generator on Friday. Ended up getting a 5500 watt. Then went to Home Depot bought a extra 2 pull breaker and wired the 240 line directly into my breaker box in the basement so I had everything but Cable and internet, but I did have TV with my DirecTV.
Thursday night me and (RedConquestTSi) were out in that shit in my car, it was a bad day to say the least, but AWD FTW or I would have been screwed. Hit a large chunk of snow in the middle of Union Rd, which put 4 new cracks in my freshly fixed bumper while driving him home, and on the way back, power lines came down on my car while I was driving, narrowly missing the pole that they came down on. I had to attempt to swerve through 2 feet of snow on my summer times in my near 4000Lb car to avoid the pole. Then got stuck at the edge of a ditch, lucky me, I did not end up in the ditch. Dug through 2ft of snow with my bare hands about 20ft to get back to the ruts in the snow to get back on the road, which took a long time.
All that started at about 10:30PM I live in Tonawanda, he lives in Pembrook,and we visited (84_Supra) in Cheektowaga at about 9:00PM, at which point I got stuck in his very soft driveway (and I will have pics up of that as soon as i can) then his dad had to pull me out with his truck.
At the end I got back to after dropping off (RedConquestTSi) at his house at about 12:30. I got back to my house at 3:45AM. Got to walk into my nice 50 degree house and freeze myself to sleep.
LOL yeah Justin pretty much summed up my Thursday nite above since I spent all of it with him.
Friday morning, WOW what a surprise outside. INSANE amounts of snow outside. I couldn’t believe it. Got my power back Friday nite, and Cable back this afternoon about 430pm.
Im sure alot of people have some crazy stories so ill start.
I work nights so i go to work at 8pm.i work electrical so shit starts losen power everywhere and all of our tops supermarkets are going to lose everything i drive to deleware sherdian tops help pull out cables to run the generator.They turn out to weight 200-250lb. a piece.I think this weekend i picked up about 35 or so.
We drive back to north french tops at 5 am.It took an hour and a half!My boss in front of me in his work van hit a service line to a guys house and ripped the ladders right off his roof.Oh yeah and he ripped the guys service line off too.Power lines down everywhere,dodging limbs, and sliding everywhere in my bald summer tires on my quest.Well it turns out we didnt get done doing other jobs until about saturday at 1am.So that was a 29 hour shift.I went home slept got called in at 3pm saturday.Got finished at 3:30pm sunday,so that was a 24 hour day.
-worked 2 24+ hour shifts
-crazy driving
-lots of fun
Most eventful part of friday, was trying to find an exit on the 190 at 2am that wasn’t clogged with stuck cars. The William St. was the lesser of all evils as it only have 3 cars stuck on it.
-Had to help push two cars out before I could blow though it with my pimptastic station wagon.
-Was insanely low on gas so I couldn’t stay and help the last one. I felt bad mostly because she seemed really nice, and was damned cute to boot. Then again it was a NA/SS colbalt so I doubt she could have been to bright.
-Made it to the corner of William and Harlem, with no visable street lights, but as luck would have it the Mobil still had power. Got gas, proceeded home. Passed a car stuck in the middle of the intersection. As I drove away the rest of Union went completely dark.
-Made it to Walden passed a 4x4 Jimmy that was unable to make it up a hill under a bridge.
-Took a left on Walden, at the time everything had power. Made it just to the Target, saw a bright green flash followed by a bang, and all the lights going out on Walden.
-Probably about a 1/2-1 foot of snow on the ground with 3 more intersections to go. Stoplights were out, and didn’t even bother stopping no way in hell I wanted to stop on a slight incline in those conditions.
-Got to My street, not a single car had been down it. So it have a foot of wet-snow in it. Swung into the opposing lane got a running start at the street. Spotted a tree down, went around it best I could. And kept going right into my parking spot on the street.
-Admired all of the snow piled up in front of the car after parking.
That was probably the only time I’ve completely hated driving in the snow. About 15 minutes later the street was entirely blocked by trees. Power blinked once or twice, watched the transformers blow down the street. Good times. :tup:
I bought a 400 watt inverter, and it was enough to charge our cells, watch our 19" TV (DirectTV), run a few lights, but not enough to run my computer, it would power on, work just long enough for me to get ready to post ONE picture (DSL worked fine) and it would cut out. With a laptop it would have been fine. That inverter would have run a sump pump or a small fridge (but not my big one) I live in the city and don’t have a sump so I didn’t need it for that, the basement drains right into the storm sewer.
I don’t think I have anything that needs to be reimbursed, I don’t have a medical need for a generator, I hauled the 5000lbs of tree crap to the curb by myself, insurance will cover the damage to my van, there was no damage to my house.
Maybe if we need the 80ft Maple removed? That would be EXPENSIVE, about $4000. I can’t afford that and I’m not sure this tree is safe anymore.
