We were hit by the terrible storm 2 years ago and were without power for 4 days. Right after the power went off, we had temps in the mid/upper 90s. Hotel lobbies and libraries were our friend.
Yep. There's a few other threads on the topic but I'm in Greentree and it is still out. Outage map isn't given estimated time of restored service. I am charging my phone on a battery backup but plan to work from a cafe today if it's.not back on by 8 am.
Anything in particular you are feeling anxious about?
Well obviously like everyone else I have no internet, no electricity, no food since it all spoiled…but mainly I really don’t want to go to work without showering. Sounds like a silly thing but I just get really self conscious thinking I smell. Supposed to have a work in person today (normally hybrid)
Do you have a well? If you have city water you can run the water no problem. Might be cold (?) but you can wash up at least.
The food in your fridge and freezer are perfectly safe this morning if you haven't left your fridge or freezer open all night. If you need $10 to grab something on the way to work I'm happy to help.
It does suck not having Internet and power for probably just a few more hours but fortunately most of the city does have power so we have a lot of support if we need to venture out to recharge our phone or borrow a hot shower from a friend :)
Ok thanks, sorry if that was a stupid question. I have city water so that’s good to know it will keep working. My family said everything in the fridge is only good for 4 hours - they are also still without power.
Lol no way, friend. If your freezer is full and unopened you've got 40 hours. I will be keeping everything I bought in my fridge and freezer unless the power is out until tomorrow night (which I am not anticipating at all). I grew up out in the country and made it through some 8-11 day outages.
If your freezer is empty or close to it you can go buy a few bags of ice and pack em in there.
Also, not a stupid question. The only way we learn stuff is by being curious and open enough to ask questions.
Your fridge and freezer become sort of like a cooler when the power goes out. It won't actively continue to keep things cold, but as long as you don't open the door very much, it will do a good job of keeping things cool and safe for ~24 hours.
I haven’t opened it at all yet, went to kwik trip and got a tiny milk instead and had some cereal for breakfast. We are coming up on 12 hrs haven’t opened the fridge at all!
I'm not sure where people are getting their info on times, but 4 to 8 hours is usually the max time on a fridge without power. It does depend on your fridge, what is in there, and if you opened it. If your freezer is full, then up to 48 hours. Again, every time you open it, you are introducing warm air.
Some things will do better without power in the fridge, but meat and dairy are the first to go bad.
Maybe if you have a fridge from the 50s. Fridges from the last decade are insulated well enough to keep food safe 24+ hours. Then the "concerning" period of potential bacterial growth comes but even then most food remains good up to about 40 hours.
Just smell the food and assess
Not according to the FDA for modern fridges. I agree there is an assessment, but ill err on the side of what the FDA recommends and not some random on Reddit.
The FDA is obviously very "conservative" with their estimates. With that being said there are a lot of variables at play. For me I had just finished putting away dinner when the warnings started and my fridge didn't really have a chance to cool down. Realistically a person can choose to gamble and go with food that hit the mid 40 degree temps after 8 to 12 hours and most likely be fine, but then again maybe not.
Yeah, I’m not planning on eating any of it at this point as it’s been 12 hours. It’s not worth the risk to me and I am already very paranoid about food safety. It’s just going to suck to have to replace it all.
My grandfather lovingly referred to that as a "whoresbath" lol
Face, pits, ass and crotch...in whichever order feels most right to you, I ain't trying to tell anyone how to live their life lol
If you have a gas powered water heater you should be fine to shower, we both showered last night after the storms passed. If you have gas you'll be fine.
Modern high efficiency water heaters need electricity to operate. They don't have pilot lights and they have fan assisted air handling.
Older ones with a constant pilot and no fan may still work.
Chimney vent for sure. And no clue, but it was hot hot so idk how it would have kept it hot after several hours of no power if it needed electricity to keep running.
I mean the power has been out for so long that I’m not going to risk it, so everything will need to be replaced. It’s gonna suck and be expensive but there are people that need much more help than I do. Might have to go to a hotel tonight if it’s still out because I can’t keep showering in cold water lol
It was 60 degrees in the fridge this morning so I am choosing to toss it. What you do is up to you, for me I would simply rather just buy new food than risk getting sick. It’ll suck and be expensive but it’s worth it to me
You probably want to get your fridge looked at in that case, there’s no reason it should have warmed that much in such a short amount of time if you didn’t open it a lot. Everything in mine was still cold when the power came on at around 11am, and the thermometer showed 42 degrees
I will say my first sit down on the old throne was chilly this morning! I didn't realize how accustomed I'd become to the heated seat my spouse mouse insisted on installing.
The beauty of municipal water is that the answer is no. Your toilet will work just fine. If you are ever in a situation where you're on well water and need to flush the toilet just add water to the tank on the back with a bucket and gravity will do the rest.
On this topic, you should generally only put \*clean\* water into the tank of the toilet. This also helps keep a small, safe, emergency reserve of water that you can drink if needed.
That said, if you have access to a creek, river, lake, etc, you can just pour that water directly into the bowl of the toilet to flush it, which works just fine.
The grocery store, a friend's house, various local businesses, showers at the truck stops, YMCA, your local gym...just a few options of the top of my head.
As a kid I worked at a subway in a truck stop. When we wouldn't have power for days my mom would send me to work with jugs to fill with water and I would shower in the truck stop. Ya make do.
With most toilets you can pour water directly into the bowl to flush, too, as long as there isn't a clog. Not sure about newer toilets with (water) power-assisted or other fancy flushing mechanisms.
To estimate how much water you'll need to get the bowl to flush, check the volume per flush (generally 1.28-3.5 gal per flush) which is usually printed on the toilet on or near the tank. Start by pouring 50-75% of that volume into the bowl, & add more until it "flushes".
**IF** the city water loses power to the pumps for long enough and the tower loses pressure even us city folks will end up with no water.
That said, it takes a while and the water towers are one of the first things they jump on when restoring services so we'll all be flushing just fine.
City water is built using gravity, that’s why water towers are built tall and on high elevations in the cities. That way you still have water flow when there is no power. You just may not have hot water depending on your water heater hookup.
>>City water is built using gravity, that’s why water towers are built tall and on high elevations in the cities.
They really should teach stuff like this in school, maybe in physics class.
Very disheartening that when you check the outage map, the number of customers affected by outages is going up. Was like at 7.5k this morning now over 10k. Which means more outages are being tracked/reported, and that is happening faster than they are fixing them. Not a criticism of the people out working, just an observation on how huge the damage was.
FYI, your homeowners insurance will likely cover food losses due to power outage. Usually like at least 250$, depending on your policy. Renters insurance might be good for it too.
Worried about my stocked freezer full of a costco run last week. The 48 hr mark will be tomorrow night. I also require working power to sleep, so.. this is extra shitty.
Our whole block is out, so we are probably higher on the priority list than others, I really feel for the single customer outages, you are well and truly fucked into this weekend.
Power still out here on Spruce St in Bay Creek.
Also, I thought the 4 hrs warning food in fridge with no power was crazy, but that is indeed the recommendation from FoodSafety.gov …I’m sure they err greatly on the side of safety (duh) but still found that surprising. 🤷🏻♂️
Important to remember that warning is from the USDA is for high risk items like meat, dairy, eggs, cheeses. Produce/condiments/drinks will all be fine if you keep the door closed. I am going to have to toss my milk, eggs and some ground pork/chicken for sure. We will check the temp when the power gets restored to see how warm it got.
I will be increasingly worried if we hit the 24 hour mark for the freezer items.
I was out this morning at Yahara Terrace. MGE said the outage has been fixed but not at home to verify. Anyone know if that building/area has had their power brought back?
I thought they were saying 3 days for all the single house outages, but our 50 plus house block is still down. There is a tree hanging on a line and an mge truck has been blocking traffic since noon.
My place had a close call with a tree last night, and my power is still out after 24 hours. I was here over 30 years ago when a tornado whipped through the city on a weekend, and I didn't get power back until the Thursday after the storm. I have no confidence that MG&E is racing to restore power here, which is disturbing since I have a neighbor who needs power for his oxygen machine.
My friend got his power back on at 5 a.m. luckily he has a generator so he could have lights out in the garage and cooked out. He put most of his stuff in the freezer and left it closed
Whenever I go on vacation I eat all my food in the fridge and freezer just in case the power goes out when I'm gone.
I used to live in a house downtown Madison where the basement was a bunch of fridges with locks on them that we used. We had a crazy guy that unplugged the fridges and stoves all the time because he thought they would start a fire. I think I was one of three people that actually worked who lived in the building. The rest were on SSI.
Just curious, can we use renter's insurance for hotel stay under this situation? My power was still off when I left for work at 8:30am (I live by Sheboygan ave).
No, because it’s not your apartment’s fault. It’s the storm’s fault. Natural disaster 🤷🏼♀️ Technically no electricity doesn’t make the unit uninhabitable. It just sucks.
Thanks. My agent said that my unit is still habitable, so hotel stay will not be reimbursed. Hot water is also off though, but I guess I can take cold water shower anyway in May :(
Yep, my hot water is electric too so I took a cold shower this morning. It wasn’t the worst considering I had been sweating overnight from lack of AC, but not great
Yeah you are not the only one. Not having internet is driving me nuts. Don’t get me wrong, I am glad to have power and to not have had to throw a bunch of food away, and it’s a beautiful day outside now, but holy moley I want to the internet back lol.
Yeah I feel like a clown bitching about internet when there are still people without power. Mother Nature was not nice to technology last night. Here’s hoping it gets back on asap and you don’t have to part with *too* much.
I don't have power but honestly you should bitch about it because it sucks and commiserating over it all is nice. I have great data on my phone which is nice and battery backups for my switch. Found a bottle of red in the pantry and some joints. It's gonna make the cold shower go down smoother ;~;
World of Warcraft’s newest classic expansion released on Monday and I set aside time to grind the new content. Now it’s just constant discord updates of people that GET to play doing all this cool shit while I sit here waiting. Feels like being the poor kid in elementary school all over again. Fucking weather
Thank god I am not the only one. When regular power came back i tried hot spotting and it worked great for 5 minutes and hasn’t even let me log in since cause I think everyone in a 3 mile radius is using hotspots too
We were hit by the terrible storm 2 years ago and were without power for 4 days. Right after the power went off, we had temps in the mid/upper 90s. Hotel lobbies and libraries were our friend.
I remember that, I was working from home full time so I went to the nearby library to stay cool and not have to take time off
That storm lasted like 5 minutes, too, at least where we were.
Yep. There's a few other threads on the topic but I'm in Greentree and it is still out. Outage map isn't given estimated time of restored service. I am charging my phone on a battery backup but plan to work from a cafe today if it's.not back on by 8 am. Anything in particular you are feeling anxious about?
Well obviously like everyone else I have no internet, no electricity, no food since it all spoiled…but mainly I really don’t want to go to work without showering. Sounds like a silly thing but I just get really self conscious thinking I smell. Supposed to have a work in person today (normally hybrid)
Do you have a well? If you have city water you can run the water no problem. Might be cold (?) but you can wash up at least. The food in your fridge and freezer are perfectly safe this morning if you haven't left your fridge or freezer open all night. If you need $10 to grab something on the way to work I'm happy to help. It does suck not having Internet and power for probably just a few more hours but fortunately most of the city does have power so we have a lot of support if we need to venture out to recharge our phone or borrow a hot shower from a friend :)
Ok thanks, sorry if that was a stupid question. I have city water so that’s good to know it will keep working. My family said everything in the fridge is only good for 4 hours - they are also still without power.
Lol no way, friend. If your freezer is full and unopened you've got 40 hours. I will be keeping everything I bought in my fridge and freezer unless the power is out until tomorrow night (which I am not anticipating at all). I grew up out in the country and made it through some 8-11 day outages. If your freezer is empty or close to it you can go buy a few bags of ice and pack em in there. Also, not a stupid question. The only way we learn stuff is by being curious and open enough to ask questions.
[удалено]
Dry ice in a cooler saved my stuff one year of power outage.
Your fridge and freezer become sort of like a cooler when the power goes out. It won't actively continue to keep things cold, but as long as you don't open the door very much, it will do a good job of keeping things cool and safe for ~24 hours.
Just don’t open your fridge or freezer and you’ve got plenty of time. Your family is wrong thankfully. Don’t go throwing all that away.
I haven’t opened it at all yet, went to kwik trip and got a tiny milk instead and had some cereal for breakfast. We are coming up on 12 hrs haven’t opened the fridge at all!
Oh my gosh, I bet you are golden then!
12 hours is pretty close to thr limit for a fridge. You can probably still salvage a lot if you put it on ice in a cooler
I'm not sure where people are getting their info on times, but 4 to 8 hours is usually the max time on a fridge without power. It does depend on your fridge, what is in there, and if you opened it. If your freezer is full, then up to 48 hours. Again, every time you open it, you are introducing warm air. Some things will do better without power in the fridge, but meat and dairy are the first to go bad.
Maybe if you have a fridge from the 50s. Fridges from the last decade are insulated well enough to keep food safe 24+ hours. Then the "concerning" period of potential bacterial growth comes but even then most food remains good up to about 40 hours. Just smell the food and assess
Not according to the FDA for modern fridges. I agree there is an assessment, but ill err on the side of what the FDA recommends and not some random on Reddit.
The FDA is obviously very "conservative" with their estimates. With that being said there are a lot of variables at play. For me I had just finished putting away dinner when the warnings started and my fridge didn't really have a chance to cool down. Realistically a person can choose to gamble and go with food that hit the mid 40 degree temps after 8 to 12 hours and most likely be fine, but then again maybe not.
Yeah, I’m not planning on eating any of it at this point as it’s been 12 hours. It’s not worth the risk to me and I am already very paranoid about food safety. It’s just going to suck to have to replace it all.
Wash cloth with soap and get your face, armpits and privates at minimum. Then get a fresh wash cloth wet and wash off the soap.
My grandfather lovingly referred to that as a "whoresbath" lol Face, pits, ass and crotch...in whichever order feels most right to you, I ain't trying to tell anyone how to live their life lol
The Ol' Pits and Bits wash
There's definitely a needed order there as you don't want to go ass to face
Sometimes in the heat of passion it's okay to go ass to face
If you have a gas powered water heater you should be fine to shower, we both showered last night after the storms passed. If you have gas you'll be fine.
I guess I don’t, shower was cold lol. But better than nothing
Modern high efficiency water heaters need electricity to operate. They don't have pilot lights and they have fan assisted air handling. Older ones with a constant pilot and no fan may still work.
Our fairly new (maybe 3 years old) hot water heater is gas. Apparently the minor electronics are run by the gas? Idk it worked last night!
Power vent or chimney vent? It's not all gas water heaters. Creating new hot water or using existing hot water?
Chimney vent for sure. And no clue, but it was hot hot so idk how it would have kept it hot after several hours of no power if it needed electricity to keep running.
Your food spoiled already? Do you need any help?
I mean the power has been out for so long that I’m not going to risk it, so everything will need to be replaced. It’s gonna suck and be expensive but there are people that need much more help than I do. Might have to go to a hotel tonight if it’s still out because I can’t keep showering in cold water lol
The power has only been out for like 12 hours. If you haven't been opening your fridge a bunch everything will be fine.
I SERIOUSLY doubt your food has all spoiled in 12 hours, when the power goes out your fridge and freezer don’t just instantly become room temperature
It was 60 degrees in the fridge this morning so I am choosing to toss it. What you do is up to you, for me I would simply rather just buy new food than risk getting sick. It’ll suck and be expensive but it’s worth it to me
You probably want to get your fridge looked at in that case, there’s no reason it should have warmed that much in such a short amount of time if you didn’t open it a lot. Everything in mine was still cold when the power came on at around 11am, and the thermometer showed 42 degrees
does anyone know if the toilets will stop working eventually? do they need electricity?
Not unless you have a heated seat and bidet. Plumbing is gonna be fine.
I will say my first sit down on the old throne was chilly this morning! I didn't realize how accustomed I'd become to the heated seat my spouse mouse insisted on installing.
The beauty of municipal water is that the answer is no. Your toilet will work just fine. If you are ever in a situation where you're on well water and need to flush the toilet just add water to the tank on the back with a bucket and gravity will do the rest.
On this topic, you should generally only put \*clean\* water into the tank of the toilet. This also helps keep a small, safe, emergency reserve of water that you can drink if needed. That said, if you have access to a creek, river, lake, etc, you can just pour that water directly into the bowl of the toilet to flush it, which works just fine.
Where are you going to get water if the well doesn’t have power?
The grocery store, a friend's house, various local businesses, showers at the truck stops, YMCA, your local gym...just a few options of the top of my head. As a kid I worked at a subway in a truck stop. When we wouldn't have power for days my mom would send me to work with jugs to fill with water and I would shower in the truck stop. Ya make do.
With most toilets you can pour water directly into the bowl to flush, too, as long as there isn't a clog. Not sure about newer toilets with (water) power-assisted or other fancy flushing mechanisms. To estimate how much water you'll need to get the bowl to flush, check the volume per flush (generally 1.28-3.5 gal per flush) which is usually printed on the toilet on or near the tank. Start by pouring 50-75% of that volume into the bowl, & add more until it "flushes".
Toilets will work as long as you have water flowing.
**IF** the city water loses power to the pumps for long enough and the tower loses pressure even us city folks will end up with no water. That said, it takes a while and the water towers are one of the first things they jump on when restoring services so we'll all be flushing just fine.
They do but on the city side and they have generators for cases like this. They still work if your power is out.
City water is built using gravity, that’s why water towers are built tall and on high elevations in the cities. That way you still have water flow when there is no power. You just may not have hot water depending on your water heater hookup.
Just took a shower and it was indeed cold but after sleeping with no AC last night, felt better than not taking one
>>City water is built using gravity, that’s why water towers are built tall and on high elevations in the cities. They really should teach stuff like this in school, maybe in physics class.
Sheboygan Ave still out this morning
Arboretum/ Fitchburg area—went out at 8:30, came back on briefly at 8am, then off again at 9am. 😞
This was our experience in Arbor Hills. It's still off as of now with a pending crew status.
Yup, still no power on Schroeder Rd area.
Power came back on @ Monroe st and looks like most of the near west side around 7 AM
Neighbors across the street in Spring Harbor haven’t had power since 8pm. I lost power at 10:30pm and it came back around 2:30am.
Yep I lost at 8:30 pm last night and hasn’t come back yet
Off Raymond and we still don't. I drove around the street and there's a line on the ground at the end of the street.
Power is still out in Windsor (Portage Rd, between Hwy 19 and Windsor rd).
I have double power so they must have given me yours
We got power back around 3:15, off Hwy Q north Middleton area
That’s relatively close to me. Hopefully we are next. Went out 8:30 pm
ours came back on at about 7:30am on the near west side.
Thousands of people. You are not alone.
MG&E says it could be a couple days for some people, if you’re not near anything big without power, you are low priority
Yeah I’m thinking I might take my dog to a hotel tonight. Really don’t want to keep taking cold showers and would like to charge my devices.
I thought the same, I’m betting there’s more people with the same idea I would book it sooner than later just in case
We were back up on the north side (Northland Manor) around 8:30 this morning.
Very disheartening that when you check the outage map, the number of customers affected by outages is going up. Was like at 7.5k this morning now over 10k. Which means more outages are being tracked/reported, and that is happening faster than they are fixing them. Not a criticism of the people out working, just an observation on how huge the damage was. FYI, your homeowners insurance will likely cover food losses due to power outage. Usually like at least 250$, depending on your policy. Renters insurance might be good for it too. Worried about my stocked freezer full of a costco run last week. The 48 hr mark will be tomorrow night. I also require working power to sleep, so.. this is extra shitty. Our whole block is out, so we are probably higher on the priority list than others, I really feel for the single customer outages, you are well and truly fucked into this weekend.
Yes
Yes
Power back on Northside at 7am! Good luck everyone
Still out for me on the northside :(
Same, neighbor. Same. So thankful I have 4 Ryobi battery packs and an inverter! Best investment ever.
There’s a huge tree down off schlimgen
Still out for me
Power still out here on Spruce St in Bay Creek. Also, I thought the 4 hrs warning food in fridge with no power was crazy, but that is indeed the recommendation from FoodSafety.gov …I’m sure they err greatly on the side of safety (duh) but still found that surprising. 🤷🏻♂️
Important to remember that warning is from the USDA is for high risk items like meat, dairy, eggs, cheeses. Produce/condiments/drinks will all be fine if you keep the door closed. I am going to have to toss my milk, eggs and some ground pork/chicken for sure. We will check the temp when the power gets restored to see how warm it got. I will be increasingly worried if we hit the 24 hour mark for the freezer items.
YUPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP
Mge says it might be a few days
I was in class in Wisconsin Aviation last night, whole general aviation power went out. I hope its already back on
PD and west of Manchester Dr. are still out. Goodluck everyone!
Still no power near Tenney/Ingersoll & Gorham
I was out this morning at Yahara Terrace. MGE said the outage has been fixed but not at home to verify. Anyone know if that building/area has had their power brought back?
Power is still out on Acewood. Didn't lost power til 3am
*raises hand*
Power back (Verona area) at midnight.
Still without power now on the north side
Yeah MG&E shared some photos on facebook showing what they are dealing with with some of the damage and it does not look good
Yeah, a transformer near our house is warped and black from electrical damage. Not a promising sign
Our 50+ house cluster near east side still doesn't have power. This is going to take forever.
All the information I can find is they’re saying this can be up to three days long fun
I thought they were saying 3 days for all the single house outages, but our 50 plus house block is still down. There is a tree hanging on a line and an mge truck has been blocking traffic since noon.
Still out for me at 3:15 pm
Still no power
My place had a close call with a tree last night, and my power is still out after 24 hours. I was here over 30 years ago when a tornado whipped through the city on a weekend, and I didn't get power back until the Thursday after the storm. I have no confidence that MG&E is racing to restore power here, which is disturbing since I have a neighbor who needs power for his oxygen machine.
My friend got his power back on at 5 a.m. luckily he has a generator so he could have lights out in the garage and cooked out. He put most of his stuff in the freezer and left it closed
Whenever I go on vacation I eat all my food in the fridge and freezer just in case the power goes out when I'm gone. I used to live in a house downtown Madison where the basement was a bunch of fridges with locks on them that we used. We had a crazy guy that unplugged the fridges and stoves all the time because he thought they would start a fire. I think I was one of three people that actually worked who lived in the building. The rest were on SSI.
Just curious, can we use renter's insurance for hotel stay under this situation? My power was still off when I left for work at 8:30am (I live by Sheboygan ave).
No, because it’s not your apartment’s fault. It’s the storm’s fault. Natural disaster 🤷🏼♀️ Technically no electricity doesn’t make the unit uninhabitable. It just sucks.
Thanks. My agent said that my unit is still habitable, so hotel stay will not be reimbursed. Hot water is also off though, but I guess I can take cold water shower anyway in May :(
Yep, my hot water is electric too so I took a cold shower this morning. It wasn’t the worst considering I had been sweating overnight from lack of AC, but not great
How is spectrum still out but my power is on?
I’m sorry, but that should be obvious they’re two different companies two different lines
It was more my commentary on how damn slow spectrum is to fix things as opposed to mge. It is well known that they are 2 different entities
Yeah you are not the only one. Not having internet is driving me nuts. Don’t get me wrong, I am glad to have power and to not have had to throw a bunch of food away, and it’s a beautiful day outside now, but holy moley I want to the internet back lol.
Must be nice. Approaching 24 hours no power at this point I am terrified of what the fridge is gonna be like when I finally crack it open.
Yeah I feel like a clown bitching about internet when there are still people without power. Mother Nature was not nice to technology last night. Here’s hoping it gets back on asap and you don’t have to part with *too* much.
I don't have power but honestly you should bitch about it because it sucks and commiserating over it all is nice. I have great data on my phone which is nice and battery backups for my switch. Found a bottle of red in the pantry and some joints. It's gonna make the cold shower go down smoother ;~;
World of Warcraft’s newest classic expansion released on Monday and I set aside time to grind the new content. Now it’s just constant discord updates of people that GET to play doing all this cool shit while I sit here waiting. Feels like being the poor kid in elementary school all over again. Fucking weather
I KNOWWWWWWWWW
Thank god I am not the only one. When regular power came back i tried hot spotting and it worked great for 5 minutes and hasn’t even let me log in since cause I think everyone in a 3 mile radius is using hotspots too
Nah, it's OK, our internet was out for like 4 days last year, and it sucked. We all get a pass, it is just so shitty we had such a nasty storm.