Night patrol
Sep. 10th, 2020 07:32![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
torquillI was woken up at 2:38 am by my air filter chirping. Then silence. Profound, dark silence.
By 4 I had eaten and dressed. I woke my aunt to tell her I was going out to look for downed power lines. The phone was out.
I drove down the hill at about 20 mph; one of my headlights was out again, but I was using my brights anyway. The houses I passed were dark, but then again, it wasn't even 5 in the morning. Just after the fork for Coast Creek Road, I spotted a lit house, open garage door showing a blaze of light -- I rolled down my window as I drove past, and heard the rumble of a generator.
I was down around the boarding stable, past Blackwell Park, when I passed a small fire truck heading up the hill. I relaxed a little. West Valley FD was doing a patrol, then, and there was no point to going any further; they would have caught any problems on their way up. I turned around and came back up to the house.
My aunt met me in the garage with a flashlight, and we went inside to listen to the battery-operated radio. NPR was on, but for an hour there was nothing but music for the station breaks. KLCC was unstaffed. The world outside the windows turned pearly grey, then greenish. There was a mixture of fog and cold smoke wreathing the trees when I let out the chickens.
At 6:40 am I heard a peep, and saw several little lights come to life around the living room. It was a shorter power outage than I had expected, but I don't regret getting up when I did. Few things in my life have been more eerie than that slow drive down the mountains, keeping one eye on the power lines and one eye hunting for deer.
The plumbers are supposed to come today to re-pipe the main junction. It looks like it might be a long day.
By 4 I had eaten and dressed. I woke my aunt to tell her I was going out to look for downed power lines. The phone was out.
I drove down the hill at about 20 mph; one of my headlights was out again, but I was using my brights anyway. The houses I passed were dark, but then again, it wasn't even 5 in the morning. Just after the fork for Coast Creek Road, I spotted a lit house, open garage door showing a blaze of light -- I rolled down my window as I drove past, and heard the rumble of a generator.
I was down around the boarding stable, past Blackwell Park, when I passed a small fire truck heading up the hill. I relaxed a little. West Valley FD was doing a patrol, then, and there was no point to going any further; they would have caught any problems on their way up. I turned around and came back up to the house.
My aunt met me in the garage with a flashlight, and we went inside to listen to the battery-operated radio. NPR was on, but for an hour there was nothing but music for the station breaks. KLCC was unstaffed. The world outside the windows turned pearly grey, then greenish. There was a mixture of fog and cold smoke wreathing the trees when I let out the chickens.
At 6:40 am I heard a peep, and saw several little lights come to life around the living room. It was a shorter power outage than I had expected, but I don't regret getting up when I did. Few things in my life have been more eerie than that slow drive down the mountains, keeping one eye on the power lines and one eye hunting for deer.
The plumbers are supposed to come today to re-pipe the main junction. It looks like it might be a long day.
no subject
Date: 2020-09-11 03:20 (UTC)