|
Be Prepared by keeping a flashlight and
batteries on hand. Important items to keep ready:
Flashlight
and full batteries.
Battery-powered
radio.
Battery-powered
or wind-up clock.
Emergency
telephone numbers, including the number of your electric company to
report outages.
A
cord telephone to notify your electric company of the outage.
Points to Remember:
Buy devices with built
in surge protection or battery-powered back-up; or use surge protectors
or arresters in order to protect your appliances. -Keep sensitive
equipment such as computers away from circuits that may fluctuate when a
major appliance is started, such as a refrigerator or air conditioner,
by plugging them into a separate grounded circuit. -Lighting arresters
installed at your main circuit panel are a good consideration as well.
Keep
the refrigerator closed during a power outage.
In
the event of an outage, stay away from downed power lines and warn
others to do the same. Report downed lines to your local electric
company.
Turn
off all appliances including your furnace, air conditioner, water
heater, and water pump. Leave only one lamp on so you know when power
has been restored. This way, you can avoid a circuit overload and
another outage that may result when all of the appliances receive power
at once.
Keep
freezer and refrigerator doors closed. In a full freezer, food will stay
frozen for 1 to 2 days if the door is kept closed. In a half full
freezer, food generally stays frozen for about a day.
On
a hot day, close your blinds and drapes on the sunny side of your house.
Also, to stay cool drink plenty of water, take your pets to a cool
location such as a basements, and go to an air-conditioned civic center,
mall, or library if necessary. If you have any health-related questions,
don't hesitate to consult your local physician.
Electric Companies
work to restore power quickly.
All
electric companies have a detailed plan to restore power quickly after
an outage. Usually, the first step, to prevent injury and fires, is to
make sure power is no longer running to downed lines. Then, power
restoration process is based of priorities:
First
repaired are the transmission lines and distribution substations. They
are the most important lines that carry power from generating plants to
a large number of customers over a wide area.
Next,
companies restore power to critical and important community services,
such as hospitals, police and fire stations, and communication
facilities.
Then,
companies restore power to as many people as possible as soon as
possible. Then the restoration process is systematic; restoring
neighborhoods, industries, and companies, and then individual residence
and small groups until full restoration is complete.
|