So we have lost power again. Probably the 10th time since christmas. We have lived here 23 years and have never lost power until this winter. Saw numerous people warning about upcoming power outages in the fall, but sadly didnt take it serious. We are getting a gen installed, but that wont be for a little while yet. We have heat taken care of, so all good there. Questuin is, can anyone confirm that these power issues are now the new norm with this f uc k stick of an illegal government we have now? Ive read they are killing coal fired power plants and the grid is taking a serious beating. Surely someone here has some knowledge on this

Stands to reason.
Not sure of your area,but here in NewYorkistan they are pushing electric everything.
W/o massive upgrades,doesn't seem like it will work.

Check out what is going on in Cape Town.... The lose power 3-4 days a week these days.... But thst has nothing to do with who is managing things down there these days...


You might try calling your Senator.....if you can find him that is...it seems that his staff keeps blocking anyone who asks about him.

Grid stability is very local. Talk to your lineman and find out what's going on.

I know the linemen hate the area we live. Power is out all the time. NG generator is about mandatory.

Someplaces are worse than others.

Interesting guys. Thanks for the comments. Last nigth was the last straw. Finally got the wife on board. Starting the process of getting a gen installed

We lost power last night as the storms rolled through. It was restored in about 5 hours. Spent the night eating ice cream and drinking Bourbon. Ya gotta do what ya gotta do!

We spent $10,000 installing a Generac this fall. Hope to never use it. Last week, we had ice forecast with the possibility of losing power. We wound up on the edge and just had enough of a glaze to make driving/walking an adventure. I know full well that the only thing that spared us from more ice and a power outage was the fact that I had bought the generator. Since the population of the town is right around 2500, I think that a "thank you" donation of $4 per person would not be a financial burden on anyone and would reimburse me for protecting the town.

I lost power for 4 days last month due to an ice storm which uprooted trees, broke branches, and even caused a large TV antenna to collapse(onto a power line). This is the second time in 3 years that we've had a major power outage. After 2021, I bought a small 2KW generator that really helped out. I wish I had spent more time on wiring but it was good enough.

The problem is directly related to power companys skimping on right of way maint. that is they aren't trimming & cutting enough tree's. When the dericho hit here some years ago, many including me were without power for a week or more, during a heat wave, 100*. Hell, it hasn't been that hot since. The power Co., APCO caught so much heat they have been prunning every since. The POLICY before that don't do any prunning, even if a tree was leaning on a power line, until power was lost !!! I was able to buy a 9000 gen at Northern tool the next day. They were shipping in gen's from Warehouse's down south in violent weather territory. Hell 9000 watts is nothing trying to power a modern house. That won't run central air. Anyway I poured gas in the gen night & day, running several fans, toaster , coffee maker frig's & freezer. I figured I would spend $1,500 a month on that noisy bitch without AC. Gotta say that makes The electric bill seem like a bargain

I should go out and look, but I think we've run about 90 hours on our whole house gen since first of the year. It fires every Monday evening for 5 mins to make sure everything is working. It's not cheap, but it's nice to have.

Most of our outages are 18 hrs plus.

We never lost power for 23 years of living here and we have had much worse storms than what we have been dealing with this year. Hell, its been an easy winter here. Our power company has called twice this winter already with a recording to start reducing power use or they were going to do rolling black outs. None of this has ever happened here. Eye opening for us and has forced us into other ways to power our home. Not sure when the electrician is going to make it here, but it wont be soon enough.

Where you at Champ?

Never had outages that lasted here in 23 years, but we used to get flickers and
brown outs. Reseting clocks almost daily.

Bedford REA. We are at the end of a loop, I can see the circuit breaker fron the living room window. A few years ago they put up new lines, and ended the problem.


Not sure what you need or for how long, but you can run house good enough for
me on a 5-8k generator. For awhile.

It takes 12 or 18 hours before we even consider firing up the generator.

Commyfornia is pushing everyone here to get Solar.

I have received 5 calls form contractors in the past month and I received a letter from Edison power Company.
almost demanding that I get Solar this past week.

One of the Contractors that called me. I really screwed with her.
I told her that I already have partial Solar and that I am not hooked up to the Grid so Edison can not suck all of my power during the day and leave me in the dark at night.

She went on to do the hard sell.
And I told her that if Edison and the Contractors did not stop the Harassment about installing Solar.
I would upgrade my system and tell Edison to come take the meter off of my house.

The lady did not know what to say.
I was the one that had to hang up because I think she was looking threw her little book trying to find what she was supposed to say in response to what I told her.

While I live in south west Mississippi we have similar problems. In times past the regulated utilities which thankfully we still have were more concerned about reliability so spent more on transmission and distribution systems. Now they put off O&M costs as long as possible so that they can charge those expenses off to storm damage which they can do as a capital expense and make more money on those repairs than they are allowed to do on regular O&M operating expenses. So - reliability suffers. I retired from the generation side of one of those utilities and saw what they did to transmission and distribution. Your outages are probably due to problems with the distribution lines servicing your area which doesn’t help as you are still without power.

I put in a whole house natural gas fueled standby generator before I retired after seeing a small town ~ 13 miles from me go without power for a week because the utility did not have the parts required for repair anywhere within their system…. This isn’t going to get any better. If you can afford a generator, get one - you won’t regret it.

Im close to prince gallitzin

How long do you guys think chest freezers could sit without power in a fairly cool garage before the food begins to thaw? I understand this would just be opinions. 12 hrs no power and mine were still froze solid. Im figuring a day maybe?

I'd be firing up LP and pressure canning before waiting for someone to have an answer....

Days. If you don't open them.

Never, ever, check until the power comes on.
A friend was a boss with REA. Folks would be calling during an outage
complaining about their freezers. Stuff thawing after a day.

It was because they were worried and kept opening the door.


If it concerns you for the future,put a pint jar of water in there.
After it freezes, put a coin on top the ice.

If the ice ever has melted the coin sinks.
If it's not on the bottom, things haven't totally thawed.

Lol not a bad idea. We are fiixng the issue and going with an lp gen set. Just was curious

As a retired Lineman I will comment on this if I may. In my opinion it will get worse. For one thing the electrical system is getting older. For another thing the load on the system is growing. More new houses, bigger houses, more convenance stores, ect.
The public wants dependable cheap power. You can't have both. Material and labor in the electrical utility business if frightfully expensive. In some places it cost $100,000 per mile to rebuild a line. Tree trimming is not cheap either. So, its a happy medium keeping the rates affordable and keeping the lights on.
Please understand I'm just trying to add some insite, not making excuses. For what its worth I bought a generator when I retired.

Might as well get used to it. Get the generator set up. Let's go Brandon.

On the Plateau.
No wonder the power went out!
It was windy as heck here.
Only someone from around here would understand what that means.

Daughter's boyfriend lives on Pleasantville mountain.
No power until Tuesday for them.

Since Hugo came through SC in 1989 I've had a generator big enough to run a portable a/c and lights. Switch it off between the fridge and freezers. I now have a Honda 2000. Costco had a sale on the Firman 2000 gens a couple of years ago and I picked up two of them. Can tie them together like the Hondas for 4K. I'm old enough I don't need to have one that will last twenty years.

We have power out at least twice a year. Too many lines running through areas with trees that are not in good shape.

Installed a Generac with automatic transfer switch after the 2010 hurricane. So far it hasn't ever come on.

Used to lose power all the time. For more than a week after hurricanes. Finally gave in and installed whole house generator. We seldom lose power now , go figure. This hurricane season could be a bit#h though and I'll be glad we spent the money.

We couldn't operate here without generators our power goes off regularly, it's usually some drunk Mexican drives off the hi-way and knocks down our power line, or a fire burns the poles down, and we are the last ranch on this grid. Rio7

Had the same problem for the last 15 years. Ours was due to building remote and being the last house on the line.

Before you buy a home stand by generator. Do lots of research. I ended up going w a 20kw Kohler.

Can run everything in the house

You got it and yeah ill consider us lucky. Some around us were told no power for a few days. At least ours was back on in half a day

Good advice.
Not gonna turn generators into a power saw/pickup thread, but there is a well known,
well advertised brand that everyone wants. Research them well. You will find a long
list of unhappy customers. It seems that instead of sourcing engines from established engine companies, they build their own engines. Not very well.