Hurricane Arthur Just Left - Here's What We Learned
The wind was rising on Friday night when we went to bed, and was a roaring monster by dawn when we lost power. The top of one of our poplars broke off and smashed part of a neighbour's fence. Next door, part of an old oak came down and caught the corner of the front porch. Across the street, a 60-foot pine fell with a huge crack and landed on the corner of the camper-trailer next door. And another house opposite lost two huge birch trees that didn't hit the ground because they landed on the main power lines.
All told, Fredericton lost more than 2,000 mature trees, some that have been standing for the better part of a century. Garden plants were shredded. About 95 per cent of the city was without power by Saturday evening when the rain continued to pelt down. Fallen trees, and downed power poles blocked large and small streets. Sirens blared non-stop. Live wires were everywhere and whole neighbourhoods were closed by yellow emergency tape. Some trees caught on fire. We saw a lawn smoldering where a fallen powerline lay across it.
So what did we learn?
It's time to do some serious trimming of our large, gorgeous, but somewhat dangerous trees.
Having an Internet-based home phone is great, till the power goes out. (We still have one lowly landline that costs us dearly every month, but sure came in handy this weekend.)
The radio doesn't work without power.
Cell phones help, but they need to be charged and when everyone moves from wifi to the mobile network, loading up the power company's outages page - where you can find out when you're likely to get back to normal - takes forever.
Neighbours who are inclined to help will come out of the woodwork.
A lot of people here don't know how to drive when the traffic lights go out: the rule of the road is that a four-way intersection becomes a four-way stop. Saw a few near accidents thanks to the occasional idiot. (No, everyone wasn't stopped so you could blow through the intersection without stopping.)
Very few gas stations have backup power. The ones that did, had lineups of up to two hours before they ran out of gas. Not so much for cars, but for home generators.
We can easily live without power for a few days - but that's in large measure thanks to years living in the country where almost any serious storm was pretty much a guarantee of evenings spent with candles and flashlights, and cooking and making hot water on the BBQ.
A hot shower after several days without feels absolutely fabulous.
-g
