On Tuesday, July 22nd at around 7 am. gale force winds lashed through the Memphis, TN area. These winds (estimated in the 90mph+ range at times) dropped power lines and trees, lifted roofs, crushed cars, and even temporarily stopped our water pumping stations. When the storm had passed (in a matter of minutes) we were left with 300,000 + power customers out of service. As of this morning (July 28, 2003) 95,000 customers are still out of service. Trees are down everywhere. 1,000 power poles down. 30 to 50% of our traffic lights were knocked out. Many grocery stores and gas stations were closed. THANK YOU NATIONAL NEWS SERVICES FOR YOUR COVERAGE AND SUPPORT (NOT!).

As daytime temperatures climbed into the mid 90s and overnight temperatures in the many power-less homes climbed too, so did frayed nerves. For the most part, local news stories are about people helping people. Some people helping themselves, too (dramatic increase in burglaries). For the most part, people learned how to safely get through large intersections with no signal lights. Some by cooperation, some by idiocy and intimidation. Ice supplies dwindled for a time, and there has been a significant loss of food stored in freezers and refrigerators. But more and more I heard stories of neighbors making "ice runs" to nearby towns and bringing back hundreds of pounds of ice to share.

We're climbing out of this mess now, but I've learned a lot.

My emergency supplies in the future will contain much more water. Didn't need it this time, but lack of water would have turned misery into a serious life threatening crisis around here.

I'll have tarps, duct tape, hammer, and nails very handy. People here are going to wait WEEKS before someone can even get to their roofs for temporary repairs.

I'll keep serious self-extraction equipment in a cache in my yard, not in my house or garage. Chain saw, or at least a large bow saw. Hand powered winches and cables. Crowbars, axe, and shovels.

I'll increase my supply of lantern fuel. I had depended on being able to siphon some out of my truck for use in my multi-fuel Coleman lantern. Siphoning ain't as easy as you'd think with a modern gas tank.

Cooking fuel wasn't a problem. There's plenty of wood everywhere. Local restaurant owners have been great, and I don't think anyone went hungry. But I am not going to count on that in the future. I'll increase my larder of food that doesn't need cooking, from a 3 day to a 7 day supply.

LED flashlights were lifesavers, because of their long battery life.

Going armed became a better-and-better idea after day 3. However, after day 5 I was going to shoot anyone who blew through an intersection without following the rules: perhaps I should have had a bandoleer of valium, too.

I learned that dry ice can cause as much damage as it can save. Hard to scramble 18 ruptured eggs frozen into a block

I learned to ask for help. I don't like doing that. I also learned to offer help: that made me feel much less helpless.

[SOAP-BOX WARNIG]

This is probably the single best experience anyone can have. This poigniantly highlights why mankind lives societally rather than individually. Think about it, people working together is what it takes for us to have anything like a comfortable life. Without society we live hunkered down in our caves with improvised weapons defending our little stash of usables until the environment, disease, entropy comes to claim it's rightfull due.

Dreadful, aint it?

The more who realize our interdependance on each other and work to facilitate it the better off we will all be!

Thanks for sharing.

Understanding a little about your experience helps keep us all grounded in reality.

I'm sorry for what you've gone through, but each person that hears about it, and learns a little bit from it, may add a little to the plus side of the equation.

You mention the things you didn't do, or would do differently, and that helps us a lot- but it sounds to me like it could have been a lot worse if not for your foresight. Maybe you should take a second to give yourself credit for the preparations you did make. Congratulations. You made it. Your preparations may not have been perfect- no way they ever could be- but they worked.

This is a great post. Thanks.

Do you need anything? I don't know if you guys have sortage of building materials such as tarps, rolls of foil or nails but I can pick it up here and ship them to you? Let me know.

Matt

Thanks all, for the comments. I'm personally doing fine. Power was restored to my home and my office. Unfortunately, some scum bag took the opportunity to burglarize my office building. But NOTHING HAS BEEN LOST THAT CAN'T BE REPLACED. I have NO COMPLAINTS.

Matt, thanks for your kind offer, but no needs at present. At this point there seems to be enough of everything but electric power. Still 80,000 customers out of service. And believe it or not there seems to have been no price gouging on plywood, nails, etc. That is a surprise.