Today I received an SMS from the ISP to disconnect the modem during the thunderstorm that was predicted.
This is the first time I received something like this, while thunderstorms and some lightning has happened before.
We have a decent switchbox and normally when something hits it shuts down the power to the whole house and nothing gets fried.
Most things are plugged in to a surge protected extension so I feel safe for the gear.
But normally during daytime there is no lightning and combined with the SMS I thought we could be in for some real heavy storm.
So well why not take it a step further, just switch off everything in the house, with all the flashlights what better reason is there to use them
Nice and cozy, heating is not depending on electricity.
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Yeah, it stormed, not well illuminated in the house, YAY
A Convoy C8 warm white medium mode lighted the toilet
A Convoy C8 neutral white medium mode lit the hallway.
The living kitchen were we are most of the time has a ceiling with about 4 meter as highest point.
Aha the Sky Ray King positioned on a central place gave enough licht but was standing too low so I found an old vase to prevent the light from directly shining in our eyes.
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The SRK light in combination with the vase made some interesting paterns on the ceiling, loved it!
Awesome story! I like the SRK/vase pattern too! 8)
Best one I had was a midnight New Years Eve party at my church. About 11:30 pm, someone hit a power transformer and killed electricity for the entire neighborhood. About two seconds after the room gets dark, “[click]” and my brand new Manafont/Ultrafire XM-L T6 lights up the entire room. This was my first XM-L, and by far, the brightest light anyone in the room had ever seen. People still talk about that night! :bigsmile:
The vase idea is super. Maybe we can get the ladies more interested with things like that And a nice looking home you have there too.
Yes, lightning can harm electronics and even simple stuff. I watched an incandescent light bulb filament go ‘poof’ with a nearby strike; another one left on in the bathroom actually shattered the glass when it blew. And they’re pretty darn sturdy electrically. It doesn’t happen often but it’s a possibility. And as you found it can be kind of fun to go off-grid for a little while intentionally.
As someone who lives in one of the top 10 most lightning-struck areas of the world, I can attest to that. Watching an incan bulb explode from a lightning strike is some serious nightmare fuel.
You live in an amazing place in France, but it has a downside! I remember well the telephone poles and those of the powergrid. The powergrid has quite a lot of protection buit in, but the (copper) grid from the phone company does not.
Many, many, many years ago (to quote Commandant Eric Lasalle) lightning struck the phone cable in the street were I live(d). My TV, VCR, and computer were fried. I brought my VCR to the electro store, and the first thing the owner said was: “you live in the so-and-so street? Put it next to the others on the pallet”. Well, the insurance guy made no fuss about it, and everyone involved got the list price for their old equipment. Your ISP was correct to warn you.
And you could easily defend the number of flashlight you have.
Heheh yes I was indeed happy with the idea of just switching everything off.
We had a blast, and yesterday evening I kept the lights off in and used the SRK Vase light.
Thanks for the compliments, it will take a lot of work to get all done here, but the foundation is good.
However, as Henk4U2 says, the power and phone lines are dangling in the wind, a sudden little shower of rain and internet is gone.
Our house in Amsterdam was next to a church with 30 meter tower, no lighting problems there, but here yes when a thunderstorm is starting th surgeprotector in the central switch cabnet kickes in regularly.
At nicht I like thunderstorms, seeing lghtning is spectacular, but now I like it even more, a good excuse to swotch off all power and play around woth torches!
Another nice thing, my son has choosen his favorite torch. At first he liked a budget thingy with side switch, But yesterday we played with a bunch and based on the color of the emitted light, color of the housing he now is the owner of a grey Convoy C8, 3 modes, neutral white. Good choice, since the two Convoys are the only two of our lights that could bare the label genuine.
After almost two months without rain and a day of 32°C in the shade
We have rain
And a sky full of constant lightning
Nice power goes off every few minutes
Yay turn off the power and bask in NW light!
That first line… deja vu? Do you live in the middle of South America? lol
We’re having one of those days, except it got to 36ºC in the shade with no sun spots nearby. Luckily this winter drought actually had a number of rainy weeks, so it wasn’t unbearable like ’14 and ’15. God, those were awful :weary:
But it’s soon to end now that the Equinox date is nearing, and we’ll be guaranteed afternoon storms with so much wind it’s certain to knock out a good few power lines! Can’t wait :smiling_imp:
All in all, I’m envious but hoping I won’t be for much longer for us to be in the same powerless but not lightless boat :sunglasses:
We didn’t lack for rain but it didn’t come in the usual way so we saw some dry spells for 10+ days. And we didn’t get hardly any of our usual summer afternoon heavy./severe thunderstorms. Still it has been one of our hottest summers on record; you have to go back about 120 years to find worse. Our summer may not be over yet but thankfully it’s beginning to get cooler so outdoors is now tolerable to the natives here once again, but the D.Y.’s are still whining about the temps
Its nice to use flashlights around the house. My wife breastfeeds 8 week old its easier for her to use a flashlight next to the bed then walk across the room to flip the switch or go on my side for the lamp. She took over my blf x6 and ee x6 with dedomed xpg2 s4 0d. Its pretty much free lighting. We have lanterns I hung over the bed as well. It cost what 1/2 penny to recharge a eneloop pro? Maybe 1 1/2 penny to charge s lithium 18650. And sometimes I rthenrge them in my truck at night for free charging (basically). At bight the house is filled with lights on moonlight to light up hallway and living room for my middle daughter. It rains year round here. Like 60+ inches a year is normal. Lots of lightning probably have a power outage every two months. Sometimes for 2-3 hours. Usually happens at night though.
But never had a ISP or any company besides weather channel warn me about a storm and unplug things.
I see using flashlights instead of house lights for certain things as saving electricity. If I can light a room for 4-6 hours off one battery it has to be cheaper to recharge then a 13watt cfl bulb
Dang straight. I see that as an enormous advantage to having and using torches. Plus, unlike with ceiling bulbs, you can easily pick what tint you want to see in at that moment
Yeah Jack, you describe exactly what happened, heavy winds preceeded the first rain, dang our 50+ year old wisteria that is really big and hangs over our front porch is moved a bit from the house (spanns 10 x 3 meter) so needed to do a lot of cutting today, Rest wll do when all the leaves are gone.
Some trees lost some branches but for the rest all is well.
And yeah before the flashlghts there were rooms I used the lights now I use flashlights, also at night.
We have LEDbulbs so IDK if this saves electricity.
Great to have the ability, even if not the need. I know some of us get excited about impending total darkness during a storm and some of us even have enough lights to share with neighbors.
Night before last, 4:40AM, power went out. My son’s room was dark as a cave, apparently my Mom and Dad’s room was as well… Dad woke up in the pitch black having to go to the bathroom. He’s almost 88 and can have some issue moving around, no fear, he grabbed a light I gave him and made his way with no issue.
My room was a rainbow of tritium vials. I’ve even retrofitted trit vials into the hands of the grandmother clock my uncle made the year I was born. Clock keeps excellent time, I’ve been hearing it tick-tock and Bong Bong Bong all my life. Now the 12 O’Clock position glows brightly with a 3x9mm flat trit and the hands glow with 2 trits on each hand, 1 1.5x6 and 1 2x8 (small yellow on the tip, with a purple or blue behind it). I’ve got 10 trits in my ReyLight Ti X6 and 9 more in my Sinner Mokume Gane EDC 18350 as well ast trits in 2 Courui D01’s and a big blue one in my favorite BTU Shocker. Never pitch black in the bedroom. Even my Ti Quad has a trit in the boot and the new ReyLight brass AA has a green trit in the tail button slot. Looking around the room I believe that’s 32 trits in lights and on the clock. Might have gotten a bit carried away huh? lol (Keychain has a Ti lantern with a 3mm x 25mm blue, gorgeous thing!)
Lights came back on at about 7:20AM. No storms, no rain, no wind, no obvious reason the lights were out. Happens like that here quite often, even in the middle of a blue sky day. Chalking it up to country living.
So I don’t feel bad when, like yesterday, we’re out shopping at Wal Mart for groceries and I have 6 or 7 lights on my person. Who knows? The lights could go out in big bad Wally’s World…
We had an unusually mild summer here, it only got up into the 100s (~38C) a few times, typically temps have been around the 35C to 37C (mid/upper 90F) for us, and it’s been great. A few years ago, we had a drought/heat-wave and had some miserable temps during that time. We had over a month with every day over 100F/38C, and high temps around 45C during that period. :weary:
Hah, and here comes Dale with the most entertaining stories You’re gonna owe us some pictures of all this tritium madness, brother!
Over where I live we are long overdue a good nighttime power outage. Now that I have a T10 with a diffuser, I’m itching to read Close and Present Danger with it as the single light source in the entire block :smiling_imp:
And a nice looking home you have there too.
