Made it out of the Texas winter storm alive

[hepcat]

Now that it’s in the 80s in Texas again I feel I can start to decompress from a hellacious week last week.

We had 6in of snow in temps hovering around 10 degrees in Austin last week. Our power went out at 2am on Monday 2/15 and didn’t come back on until around 4am Thursday 2/18. We had temps in the house right around freezing overnight. Luckily we have a wood burning fireplace and our cool neighbors were willing to share firewood with us, and we still had gas service so our stove and water heater still worked which was CRUCIAL!!

We had frozen pipes in our house and had one working sink in the interior of the house. Some sediment backed up into our drains which was really weird. But once we started to thaw out none of our pipes burst so I feel very lucky. Worst we had was some tree limbs come down from an old ash tree in our front yard that we ended up just getting removed entirely.

We know several people who had burst pipes and ruined their entire house. A lot of exterior tankless water heaters froze and burst. And a friend of ours had their car stolen. 

So overall I feel pretty fortunate when others weren’t so lucky. F*ck Texas’s leadership gaslighting the wind and solar industry when natural gas failed us just as much, and f*ck Ted Cruz and other cowards for leaving the state during a disaster.

[Anybodyhome]

Glad you got through it okay.

From what I saw on the news and other information I've read, it doesn't seem the houses are built with a lot of energy efficient methods? I've lost power to my home a couple times, once for about 36 hours and the outside temps were in the 20's, but inside my house is tight enough that it never dropped much below 55. 

[hepcat]

1 hour ago, Anybodyhome said:

Glad you got through it okay.

From what I saw on the news and other information I've read, it doesn't seem the houses are built with a lot of energy efficient methods? I've lost power to my home a couple times, once for about 36 hours and the outside temps were in the 20's, but inside my house is tight enough that it never dropped much below 55. 

Really depends on how old and well built your house is. Some folks said temps hovered in the 50s without heat, others had the water in their toilets freeze inside the house. We had temps that were in single digits and temps that didn’t make it above freezing for a week. We have a relatively well insulated brick house with new double pane vinyl windows and we still got rocked by the cold.

[Squirrel]

Glad you made it through okay.  It wasn't only houses that had issues. Houston international Airport didn't have water one day and Dallas fortworth Airport had a control tower had a waterline bust. 

 

 

[hepcat]

3 hours ago, Squirrel said:

Glad you made it through okay.  It wasn't only houses that had issues. Houston international Airport didn't have water one day and Dallas fortworth Airport had a control tower had a waterline bust. 

 

 

Yea man for sure, the PGA store here in Austin had a burst pipe and 3 in of standing water in the store for days. They’re closed for at least 2 months.

[cookinbrak]

Seeing how stuff went down in Texas has led me to get a generator. No power in Sept. because of a storm is a nuisance, no power when it's below freezing could be deadly.

[kass]

On 2/25/2021 at 8:53 PM, hepcat said:

Really depends on how old and well built your house is. Some folks said temps hovered in the 50s without heat, others had the water in their toilets freeze inside the house. We had temps that were in single digits and temps that didn’t make it above freezing for a week. We have a relatively well insulated brick house with new double pane vinyl windows and we still got rocked by the cold.

Had to look up what double pane meant, before i post and made myself a fool but i guessed right..

In Sweden Triple pane have been standard pretty much since the 80s. But I guess our climate is a bit different. But it still amazes me how hard this cold hit Texas. Glad it worked out ok for you.

[hepcat]

On 2/28/2021 at 6:51 AM, kass said:

Had to look up what double pane meant, before i post and made myself a fool but i guessed right..

In Sweden Triple pane have been standard pretty much since the 80s. But I guess our climate is a bit different. But it still amazes me how hard this cold hit Texas. Glad it worked out ok for you.

lol yea those double pane windows are pretty clutch in the summer when it's 100+ for two months straight