We had a power cut - how could I have been better prepared?

[Dryandirriatble]

It was for approx 9 hours starting at 6am, so mostly during daylight and I was out for a good part of it, somewhere they did have power. It was also during a fairly mild spell so it wasn't so bad.

However, I could literally do nothing! If it had gone to say, 24 hours and been colder, I think we'd have been really struggling.

I have gas central heating that won't run without electricity and electricity for cooking.

I have in a reasonable supply of food that can be eaten without cooking and I have torches and spare batteries in strategic places around the house. I'm at a loss to think what else I can do.

I felt at the time I should pop in on elderly neighbours and I would have if the power had still been out when I got home, but I don't know what I could have actually done for them?

We had a 4 hour power cut on Christmas day, from 7.15am. I felt very glad we still have a gas hob unlike our neighbours (no gas in the village, we have a bottle just for the hob). We sent round a flask of hot water so they could at least have a hot drink and luckily it came on in time to cook our Christmas Dinner.

Storm Eunice last year caused us to be without power for nearly 3 days. The only thing we really glad we had was some lead lights which dh keeps charged up in the shed. They give about 3 h pi ura each of bright light.

We have fairly regular power cuts.

I have a log burner for warmth, that will also heat water & tinned food.
I have battery lanterns, a pre-charged power block for my laptop & phone.
Plus board games, books etc.

When the power is down, we curl up in front of the fire with lanterns, blankets and books. I ordered the paper versions of ds' gcse text books too, in case the cuts were really bad this winter and he couldn't get online.

Just out of interest, and without googling, how much more do you think your car uses in fuel % wise for half a tank extra of petrol?

No idea and it wasn't me coming up with the theory anyway, I was responding to a pp saying their dad talked about it, and I said mine did too. Nowhere have I stated my own personal view.

My dad would have known the answer to your question though, he was in the Royal Engineers. Shame he's dead really.

@stellarspiral
at no point has the user said they’re planning on using them indoors, please credit people with some common sense.

It's a fraction of a percent, about 0.2, so for every 100 quid you spend on petrol, you save 20p.

I would rather have the reasurance of a full tank than 20p extra once a fortnight.

We have them fairly frequently. I have a lot of battery operated torches and headtorches which are always kept charged anyway. Apart from that, nothing. Keeping the freezer full so it defrosts more slowly?

We were without power for nine days after Storm Arwen. I moved out to a hotel. I could cope without the lights, and even the cold (it got down to 4° in the house) but I needed a warm shower, and the power company were paying.

What we needed/used before we moved out - power banks, battery operated lanterns and blankets, lots of blankets!

We have a woodburner that we can boil water on. As long as I don't need the big desktop pc for anything I don't worry about power cuts. If my phone dies I charge it in my car.

The equivalent of 10p a week mounts up over decades, I've had a car since 1981!

If your electric went off, of course you can use the gas hob.

We’ve got a gas cooker and, although the oven won’t work without electric, we can still light the hob with matches. I’ve got a spare kettle (one of those whistling ones that goes on the hob), hot water bottles, torches & batteries, a million tea lights and tea light holders, matches, a stash of packet food (smash, pasta etc) that can be made with boiling water, a couple of bottles of water (constantly rotated) and a couple of disposable bbqs. Also, I live two minutes away from my mum, who has one of those old cookers that don’t use electric at all, so if it’s off for any length of time, I can take freezer stuff down to her to cook rather than lose it.

Another advantage of the priority service register is that I get texts informing me that Powergrid know of an issue and approximate time to fix. I discovered this morning due to a power cut that luckily wasn’t too long.

If you have children that use crossings to get to school remember that traffic lights may not be working and they need to be careful. I was lucky that a couple of drivers saw me waiting to cross.

I just lost mine for 36 hours, got it back 6.30pm Christmas eve. The irony is we had just bought a generator that runs on either petrol or propane and will power the whole house but it had not been delivered yet.
We have a wood stove so the house was warm. I also have a butane gas ring, safe to cook in doors with it ( my house is all electric and the heating is oil that need electricity to spark the burner). I also have a solar powered deep cell battery that DH rigged up with a car battery and a cheap solar panel and some other bits I have no idea what they do. That runs a load of LED strips for lights and keeps the phones charged. For extended outages I have a joolca camping shower, runs on propane and cold water from a hose/river whatever and is FABULOUS. ( better than my regular shower). So apart from the worry of my very large, very full freezer defrosting everything I would be all set.

Nope. It's a safety feature, apparently. No electricity, no gas either on this hob. Bugger.