November 19-20, 2024

These are my thoughts concerning the wind and rainstorm that ravaged the Seattle area and severely damaged the electrical and networking infrastructure. The cities closer to home on the east side of Lake Washington were hit especially hard including Redmond, Kirkland, Issaquah, and Sammamish some of which do not expect to have power restored until sometime after November 25th. The storm forced stores, gas stations, restaurants, and other businesses to close as well as cutting off the residents from the outside world. We lost traffic lights, and it seems, a degree of sanity as people panicked and rushed gas stations and grocery stores looking for food and fuel for their cars and generators. The storm also crippled or cut off the cell towers and phone service on landlines that had been “upgraded” to cable TV or FIOS. Those who had kept their landlines, thinking the old copper-wire connections were more reliable, soon discovered that these had long since been converted to fiber or coax connections subject to failure when the power failed. They too were down.

Before the Storm

Several days before the storm, social media had several posts that alerted us that something massive was approaching the coast. These posts were backed by considerable science and the satellite imagery was (frankly) frightening. It was like nothing I had ever seen. We’ve had storms before, like the one in 2006 that took out over a dozen trees on our street and caused us to lose power for ten days. After that storm, considerable work was done to bury utility lines and eliminate some of the hazards. Local TV stations began predicting the storm over the weekend—several days before the storm, and as it approached, increased their coverage and intensified their warnings to prepare.

This is how I prepared on Tuesday, the 19th, the day before the storm.

Preparation

• I charged my 36 AH LiFePo4 battery and a spare 30 AH battery. I discovered that one of the two chargers I use to top off the battery does not charge when the battery is too low. The other charges anyway but at a much lower rate (25A vs 75 A).
• I had a new (never used) dual-fuel backup generator I didn’t expect to need. I had about 8 gallons of gas, but I had no idea how long the fuel would last, and gas would be hard to get. I had a full tank of propane and a half-empty tank hooked to BBQ. I went to Home Depot and bought another propane tank. I did not try to start the generator. This was a mistake.
• I charged my Tesla to 100% and my ICE car had a full tank.
• The Amateur Radio Emergency Services (ARES) team did not pass along any last-minute guidance, nor did the Redmond EOC or office of emergency services.
• Expecting high winds, we checked around the house and picked up anything that could blow around. We decided not to put out the large trash/recycle bins.
• At the last minute, we decided to pack the freezer with the left-over gel packs used to keep our incoming injectables cold in transit. Unfortunately, this raised the temp from 16 to about 25 degrees. Mistake: This should have done this sooner.

The Power Fails

• My weather system reported the winds were increasing but not to the extent seen in other areas.
• All evening on the 19^th, we got texts from people around us who had lost power. Ours flickered for hours, and at about 8 PM, it went off and stayed off.
• I reported our outage to the Puget Sound Energy (PGE) app. It showed affected areas—over 500,000 customers were without power. Our “estimated time to repair was January 2025.”
• I shut down all of my computers and their UPS systems to preserve whatever charge they had left.
• The T-Mobile cell service was spotty at best…even for texts. We heard later that some of the towers were taken out in the storm. This was unconfirmed.
• Our landline phones were also out—they too were connected to the Ziply fiber that provides us Internet access. The ONT (in-house fiber interface) and the router were both powered by UPS battery-backup systems but it ran down in a couple of hours.
• I discovered that my powered recliner was stuck with me in it. I struggled for some time to get out of it. The chair was also plugged into a UPS, but it was not strong enough to operate the chair.
• We had pre-positioned battery lights and found them essential, but Marilyn also had staged candles and t-lights to provide a bit of light.
• I listened on the ARES, LWHC, and PSRG repeaters and heard little traffic. We were never activated.
• We went to bed. In the past the outages lasted four to eight hours and we fully expected to have lights by morning.

Nov 20^th

• I got up at 3 AM when the small UPS used to keep up my CPAP failed. I had never had to use it before and had lost the charging brick. I connected my CPAP to my 36AH battery connected to a small inverter. It worked fine. The power was still out and there was no wind to speak of (less than 16 MPH) so I put the cans out on the street dressed in my jammies.
• I found the gas stove would work, but I had to manually light the burners.
• The gas water heater stayed up for the entire event.
• The next morning and throughout the day, we started getting cellphone calls but there was something wrong. We could not hear the caller. We got a dozen calls like this. I later discovered that I needed to turn off the “WiFi Calling” option on my iPhone.
• I later learned that Ziply kept up the FIOS network, but I would have to power the in-home ONT, the router, and a computer. I had planned to rig this on day 3. That has to be moved up to a higher priority. All of these devices were on UPSs but I would need to add them to one of the extension cords from the generator to keep them up.
• My scheduled meeting on the Microsoft campus was canceled so I didn’t go into the city. It’s lucky I didn’t—my normal route was completely closed from downed trees and power lines.
• Facebook reports of chaos at Costco and downtown traffic jams kept coming in. We didn’t have TV, so I tried to use my AM radio to listen to the news. 95% of what I heard (besides music) was right-wing propaganda. I needed a source of news.
• Using my portable emergency radio, I was barely able to hear the City of Redmond’s AM 1650 broadcast. If there was a time it should be activated, this was it, as the storm hit the city hard. I recognized the message; I had recorded it in 2019 and it’s been playing on and off ever since—unchanged. I verified it using my FT991a ham radio.

Starting the Generator

• Both my freezer and refrigerator have remote battery-operated temperature sensors. I noticed the freezer temp had risen to 30°. The refrigerator was now up to 55° so I decided to set up the generator. A friend helped move it in place and get it started. I decided to locate it behind the house near the freezer and position it so the exhaust would point out into the yard. Unfortunately, it would not start. I had lost the instruction manual, so I tried to pull it up on my phone. Eventually, I was able to do so—at least we confirmed which switches needed to be thrown to start it. I also found a warning on the generator that said (to my surprise), that the generator was not shipped with oil. I found some 10/40 and (unfortunately) overfilled the crankcase so I had to pour some out. We could not get it to start at all on propane, so we tried gas. It started right up but switched immediately to propane and it continued to run.
• I ran large extension cords into the house via the laundry room and kitchen windows. These were plugged into the refrigerator and freezer. The hardest part was getting access to the power cords as they were in a tangled mess in the garage. I also ran a cord into the den to power my chair, the phone charger, the TV, and supporting appliances. Once the TV came up, we finally got some local news from OTA (Over the Air) stations.
• Late in the day, the mayor released a statement about the Redmond’s response to the storm. It had several links we could not access without the Internet. I replied and thanked her for the information and suggested we could not see anything behind the links. A few hours later, she reposted it without the links.
• Email service via my phone was intermittent, but web browsing to follow links was all but impossible.
• I had limited email access and spotty IM messaging and SMS access.
• About three in the afternoon, the PSE app updated our estimated time for restoration (ETR), and the ETR for restoration for most Redmond residents to 8:30 PM on the 23^rd. That was two days away. It was good to get an update, but disappointing that it was not sooner.
• I saw a Facebook post about how the PSRG boater’s net control operator had not helped a person trying to get assistance for a deadly serious emergency. I was not listening at the time, but the reports were very disturbing. My focus, regarding ham radio, is emergency services. I had trained many of the net control operators over the years and taught them that emergency traffic had precedence. To me, this incident was disheartening. Thankfully, corrective measures were taken immediately, and the net control operators were briefed and advised that the nets would be refocused on emergency services. I hope something positive comes out of this.
• I spent some time monitoring the nets.
• I helped a neighbor figure out how his wood stove worked.
• I let the generator use up the first tank of propane. It operated the generator for about 8 hours. I used the remaining gasoline to leave it dry. I switched to the half-empty tank of propane from the BBQ.
• I recharged the big battery to use for my CPAP.

Power Restored

• Power was restored at 8 PM on the 21^st. We were only down for about 48 hours.
• We spent the next few hours plugging the appliances back into the grid, restarting the computers and servers, and getting back on the grid. I stayed up until 11 catching up on social media and informing friends and family we were okay, and power was restored.

Lessons Learned

• When the WiFi goes down, disable WiFi Calling on our cell phones. Apparently, the phone isn’t smart enough to figure this out on its own. This might (might) have been the reason we could get calls but not hear the person on the other end of the call.
• Print off the instructions for the generator. This is already done. Do a full-blown load test on the generator including adding/checking oil beforehand.
• Stage the power cords needed to connect power from the generator where they can be easily accessed.
• If a major storm is coming, lower the freezer temp to below 0°, and the refrigerator temp to just above 32°.
• Encourage others to get battery-operated remote temperature monitors for freezers and refrigerators.
• Fill the space in the freezer with items to displace the air.
• Don’t add anything warm to the freezer 24 hours before the storm. This means the last-minute grocery run should not include items that will raise the freezer temperature too close to the arrival of the storm.
• Plan to move perishable food to outdoor food lockers when the outside temp is at or below the 40s.
• Learn which foods should be discarded at specific temperatures/durations. Too many people were discarding food that would have been safe to eat.
• Figure out how to gather reliable news. We can’t depend on the Internet or social media even when it’s working as unvetted sources are prolific and problematic. If what you have to post is not from a first-hand and reliable source, don’t pass it on.
• As a ham radio operator, I need to figure out how to contact people well outside the disaster area. I plan to add a better long-distance (HF) antenna to my ham radio and establish reliable contacts in other states or outside the affected area.
• After this event, I realized that the city is unprepared to distribute news or guidance in a timely manner. Even when they do, they seem to be highly dependent on web-based content.
• Continue to press the city to get the AM 1650 system upgraded to reach more of the city and broadcast public service announcements in real-time.
• Make plans to wire the gas furnace to the generator. We did not miss the furnace as the house is fairly tight and holds heat well. The inside temp never got below 50°.
• I have subsequently bought two short (15A) extension cords that will make connecting both the freezer and refrigerator far easier in the future.
• We have already added special valves to our gas meters (I organized having them installed in the entire neighborhood) to automatically shut off when an earthquake occurs.

Comments or suggestions are welcome.