Hurricane is coming and I have an Above Ground Pool - HELP!

[AnnaK]

We had around 10" of rain and a lot of wind. I just finished scooping leaves and sticks out of the pool. Chems held up very well. We lost a birch tree which snapped in the middle and fell across the fence which now has a slightly bent top rail, no big deal. The neighbors lost a 40' cherry tree which uprooted and left a hole the size of a VW bug.

No power and MetEd says it could be a few days. I've run a siphon hose from the pool downhill to the house and am using the water for doing dishes and flushing toilets. Lots of bucket action. no power=no well pump. I'm not overly concerned about not having a pool pump for a few days because I can always mix bleach in with the net, or the dogs. Two German Shepherds swimming do produce a whole lot of circulation!

Hope everyone came through okay.

[CarlD]

Lots of road damage all around the area, but we had no damage. Very hilly but the rivers flood, so if you are on high ground, you're ok, but on lower down you can be flooded. We had similar flooding from snow melt in the spring. The big winds came after the rain let up.

Carl

[AnnaK]

Yeah, those northwinds did us in. It was okay while the winds came from the SE and it was raining. Once we were in the NW wind stream it got downright nasty here.

I just finished scooping debris out of the pool. Still no power

[CarlD]

Anna:
Get a generator. I GUARANTEE the power won't go out as long as you can get the generator to start!

But, if you cannot start the generator, you're in for a power loss. This is a variation of Murphy's Law.

See, I have two generators, a big, 6500 watt that's about a zillion years old (older than my teenager by at least a decade). I had a devil of a time getting it running. The teen and I had a plugged petcock, leaking fuel line, leaking fuel bowl and and loose battery (at least it's electric start). We fixed it all. The other generator, a little Honda, took about 10 pulls but started right up (after sitting a few months, 10 pulls is an EASY startup!)

But, by ensuring they both worked, the power company had no excuse to cut us off!

Carl

[AnnaK]

We do have a generator, a Honda EU2000i. Very quiet, takes 3 pulls to start, runs all night on a fillup. I'm powering two freezers and a refrigerator in rotating 6 hour shifts. It won't run the well pump, of course, and the pool pump isn't important enough. The genny also runs the UPS into which I plug the Mac, monitor, router, and modem and it's charging the cell phone, MacBook, and the iPad. So I'm not entirely without power. I have plenty of drinking and cooking water (stove runs on propane). The weather is mild today, A/C or fans not needed.

What I really really need is a nice long shower. Pool is too cold to get in, brrrrr.

[matcin2531]

You should be able to run that well pump. I did it once, just cut off extension cord end and connect it in the fuse panel to the wire. It will run the pump for sure. Anything else you want too. lights,plugs,etc... If your gen. is too small to do all at once just unplug it when you are done. I know you can't get hot water from electric water heater but if you have gas you can take a hot shower.

[Watermom]

OK. Maybe I'm dense, but ......... welder?

[AnnaK]

You should be able to run that well pump.

The well pump is 230, the Honda is 110. It can't power the well pump.

I'm doing fine. I got a siphon going by using the pool cover pump hooked to the genny to start the flow. Since the pool is uphill from the house there's no problem keeping it going. I attached a hose end sprayer with a shut-off lever and, by noon, I have running warm water. Pretty uptown, eh?

[matcin2531]

You can use a welder too. Last ice storm took days of power to come back on. I went to the rental store and said I need a generator, he laughed and said "all out". I said how about a welder and well I guess, he learned something that day. I suppose not too many people know this as they had a bunch.