Eight-Years Ago (28-August-2011) — New Jersey

Hurricane Irene. Central New Jersey.

My Sunday afternoon post from eight-years ago. Today we are watching as Hurricane Dorian tracks toward central Florida.

By mid-afternoon, I still was not able to report the downed power lines in my yard. I drove to the nearby High School where there I could get much better ATT wireless Internet reception. I logged onto the PSE&G site and reported that I didn’t have power and that I had downed wires in the yard. The automated response let me know that they would have power restored by 8 PM 04-September (next Sunday). I figured that I would be living in my RV for the week. By the time that I got back to the house, I was very surprised to see 3 PSE&G trucks pulling up. It took them some time to free the downed wire from the trees and vines. It was right around this time that the wind and a small amount of rain started up from the back side of the hurricane. I commend the PSE&G workers for their dedication to be out working before the storm had passed. After they completed here, they fixed some other local problems and were able to restore power before it got dark. I feel lucky this time that power was restored this quickly. I know that there are many others still without power and the PSE&G crews will be busy for the next several days. The following images were taken with a Leica X1 camera. Images taken with a Nikon D700 camera will be included in another post.

PSE&G Truck and Crew Getting Set Up oo Repair the Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Truck and Crew Getting Set Up oo Repair the Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Workers Viewing the Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Workers Viewing the Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Truck and Crew Working on the Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Truck and Crew Working on the Downed Power Line. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Worker Working to Free the the Downed Power Line from Trees and Vines. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Worker Working to Free the the Downed Power Line from Trees and Vines. Hurricane Irene. Image taken with a Leica X1 camera. (David J Mathre)

Four-Years Ago (28-August-2011) — New Jersey

Hurricane Irene.

PSE&G lineman repairing the power line to my house after hurricane Irene hit New Jersey. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 450, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/125 sec).

PSE&G Lineman Repairing the Power Line to My House after Huricane Irene Hit New Jersey. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 450, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/125 sec). (David J Mathre)
PSE&G Lineman Repairing the Power Line to My House after hurricane Irene Hit New Jersey. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 450, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/125 sec). (David J Mathre)

Wednesday (28-August-2013) — New Jersey

Weather, Technology, and Power Out.

It was raining this morning. Before I could run the recovery/restore from the HomeServer the power went off. The UPS systems all started beeping, and my Garmin which includes a National Weather Service radio woke up and announced a sever thunderstorm warning. Before the computers shut down I sent a note to PSE&G that the power was down. It wasn’t just my house that lost power since I heard the neighbors generator go on. The e-mail response back from PSE&G was that the power would be restored by 10 PM on 22-August (six days ago????). I shut down all of the computers, and decided to spend the night at a local Marriott Residence Inn. I had credit for one free night at a Marriott facility that coincidently would have expired today. It gave me a chance to do some laundry at the Residence Inn while I wait for my new washer dryer to be installed.

Electricity to my house has been off for more than 24 days during the last 3 years — due to hurricanes, Nor’easters, and snow storms. For all the years that I lived in Florida, I don’t remember the power being off for more than a day. I’ve thought about solar cells and a storage battery system, a generator (natural gas), or just moving somewhere else.

Tuesday (06-November-2012) — New Jersey

Hurricane Sandy Aftermath: Day Eight and Election Day.

Power lines still down and roads in my neighborhood are still closed. I have power, but others still don’t. PSE&G folks are working, but still a lot to do.

Drobo update. The 3 TB drive that I added to the Drobo disk array completed the disk protection process. Unfortunately, and not clear in the documentation — I need to add another 3 TB drive and wait for the disk protection process (24+ hours) before the additional space is available. So the warning is that if you have a fully populated Drobo, you will need to add 2 new drives (one at a time) to get more space. In my case this will take 2-4 days. On the positive side, I have access to all my data — but on the negative side, data access during the upgrade is slow.

Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)
Post Hurricane Sandy. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera (David J Mathre)

Friday (02-November-2012) — New Jersey

Hurricane Sandy Aftermath: Day 4 — Power Still Out.

Before the power can be restored, there is a lot of cleanup work that needs to be done. One of the transformers that went down has been leaking oil for several days. It is not known if the oil contained PCBs. A PSE&G truck was sent out to put absorbent down to clean up the oil. Unfortunately, at least one driver (in the last image) had been giving the PSE&G worker a hard time because he wasn’t being allowed to drive through the oil and under the downed power lines. The PSE&G folks are working 16 hour days to restore power and need to be acknowledged – not hassled.

Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)
Transformer Oil Cleanup. Hurricane Sandy Aftermath in Skillman New Jersey Day 4. Image taken with a Leica V-Lux 30 camera. (David J Mathre)