I drive by this sign every day. Every day, the date is progressed by one day. These people are surrounded by homes with power, but they are doing without. Ouch.

Still no power is brought to you by j.ronald.lee - photography / journal

On Blueberry Road (in Raymond, NH), a pine tree over 60 feet tall went in the back yard. It could have been catastrophic. A tree that large ways several tons, and it would have pushed through the house like a knife through butter.

I took this photo while it was snowing (thus the white blur).

New Hampshire power outage update: We were restored to power late Sunday, so it was a three day outage for us.

Near Miss is brought to you by j.ronald.lee - photography / journal

Along Chester Road in Raymond, New Hampshire, a line crew sets about their work to repair downed lines. You can see that the top of the power pole snapped off (it’s what is lying at their feet).

It’s been an interesting few days. The power went out after the storm Thursday night. We have a generator, one I purchased at the end of the power outage caused by the ice storm of 2008. Back then, I got home from the store with the generator fifteen minutes after the power turned back on. We debated taking it back to the store, but kept it. This weekend I have really been glad of that.

We’ve been able to keep the house reasonably warm with a space heater in the room we’re using. We have light. Today at 3 PM Eastern, there will be USA v. Canada hockey. Life is good… but the best part came late yesterday afternoon.

You see, we have a well. If there’s no power to the pump, there’s no water. Also, while our hot water heater is oil fired, and oil doesn’t require electricity, the pump to push the oil into the burn chamber does require electricity. Both of these items are hardwired into the house’s electrical system. What to do?

Yesterday I completed bypass circuits in the basement. It took several hours and a trip to Lowe’s in Manchester for parts, but I’m pretty happy with the results. The only negative is that the generator doesn’t quite supply the same amperage to the well that it normally gets, so the water pressure is not that high. All in all, if that’s as bad as it gets, I’d say we’re in pretty good shape.

Our utility company, PSNH, says that as of 11 AM, 2/3s of their customers have power. They start with the highest density areas, and work steadily to less populated areas. I saw a line crew less than half a mile from the house yesterday, but so far our neighborhood is still dark.

Line crews repair damage from NHwind2010 is brought to you by j.ronald.lee - photography / journal

It’s to the point that the flooding is worse than the trees. The first thing that gets fixed after a storm like this is the trees get removed. Flooding, you just have to wait.

Making Waves after the NHwind2010 event is brought to you by j.ronald.lee - photography / journal

When I got to the Exiter River, I gave up and went home. The river hasn’t just jumped its banks, it’s over to bridge, too. Must be what the weather service was talking about when it said to keep humans and livestock away from all moving water due to the potential “immenent loss of life.”

Now there’s no electricity or Internet, but I have cell phone service.

So now I’m blogging from my cell phone. Ain’t technology cool?

Tree down is brought to you by j.ronald.lee - photography / journal