Ken Weitzel wrote:

Hi Too...

Just a couple of thoughts, if I may?

Assuming that you're preparing for the kinds of emergencies that the
USA has had a few of recently, if it were me I'd be tempted to stay
away from LCD's.

Think I'd like to get ahold of one of those little 5 inch sets of the
type that walmart sells for about 19 dollars (canadian). Emergency's
don't need large screens (power consuming), not colour (power
consuming), nor any of the other niceties. Information is all, isn't it?

And - those little sets also have built in am/fm radios. Far less
power conumption (assuming hydro is gone) and far far more to
choose from. Thinking that the other new "necessities" like cable
and satellite may be gone, you'd have at best perhaps half a dozen tv
stations in a large city; whereas there might be dozens of am and fm
stations within earshot. Surely more radio would survive. And
information is all you need.

And when and if power does become precious, you can even plug in a
little crystal earplug, reducing battery demand to almost nothing.

Finally, I'd get me two or three sets of the best alkalines I could
find; the freshest dated I could find. Leave them in the original
package still sealed so there's no chance that the kids will have
borrowed them for their infernal cd players and put 'em back half
dead. Replace them all once every year or two with new ones, give the
older ones to the teens

Just an old guy in Canada thinking out loud.

Ken



When Ocala was hit last year there was only one weak TV signal
available, and no local radio stations, at first. the land lines were
out, and what was left of the cell system was overloaded by non
emergency traffic. Most of the cell sites have backup generators and
several days worth of fuel, so some sites were available long then
others. Some sites are near priority electrical users, so they had
power before others, but CATV and land line services were spotty for
weeks. Brighthouse sent trucks out with generators to recharge the
backup batteries to restore CATV service where they could, but when you
have hundreds of dead UPS systems in the area it just isn't possible to
do them all at once.

If you are planning for this kind of emergency a shortwave radio will
help a lot more, especially at night. Also, with the grid down for
several miles, the usual blanket of electrical noise was gone so i could
hear stations in other cities on AM, when they had power.

Its more important to keep at least a weeks worth of food and water,
flashlights and several weeks supply of ALL the different medicines
anyone in your family needs. I was without electricity for two
hurricanes last year, for a total of about a month. I had to use
buckets of rain water to flush the toilet, and to take a quick sponge
bath. I was lucky. I had prepared, with extra food and water. I had 2
liter bottles of ware in the freezer so i could have some cold water to
drink for about three days. After that, it was warm bottled water to
was down the food. SPAM, peanut butter and crackers, and some cans of
soup or vegetables. I heated them by putting the can on the dash of my
truck with all the windows up for a few hours. It wasn't as hot as I
liked it, but it was better than eating it cold. I missed the fresh
fruit and vegetables but I had enough food to keep me from going hungry.


--
?

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida