Originally Posted by I-Like-To-Bike
The electricity was out for 54 hours at my house during this past weekend's ice storm. Though my heat is natural gas, the heater blower runs on electricity. My main concern was that electricity would be out so long as to allow the house to freeze up and burst water pipes. When the power came back on it was still 47° in the house, though below freezing outside. The land line telephone service never went out. And we didn't lose any major branches from the trees in the yard; actually it turned into a good pruning; others weren't so lucky. I am going to have to get a portable kerosene heater for emergency heat.
It's good to have a backup plan. If the freezing rain had been followed by high winds and temperatures like we saw in early February, the damage would have been much more severe. It makes me think that we shouldn't just take the grid for granted. 54 hours in a house with no electricity with tempatures near 0F would certainly have frozen pipes. On the other hand, your freezer would have been OK.