Last Friday I finally had a real use for a couple lights. There is road construction going on in front of my house. They have one lane shut down, and are working in the other lane. The shut down lane has some really big holes in it. They have stop lights on both ends with delayed signals. I was about to run out to pick up some food we had just ordered when the power went out in the whole town. My first thought was, "wow great time to get out some of my lights!". My second thought was, "hey, the stoplights are out and this is a one lane road!". I called the police to get someone over to direct traffic but they going to the bridge to direct traffic. Yeah, it's a small town and probably only one officer was even on duty.
A car passed by and sure enough coming around the corner another car was coming the other way. They got around each other using the other lane, but I figured someone would either get hit head-on or drive into a hole in the road if this kept up. I flashed my light at a car and told them what was going on. Problem is the one lane road area is around a bend and you can't even see from headlights if the way is clear or not. My wife came out and we decided to direct the traffic. I ran in and grabbed my Predator and her cell phone. She had figured out how to work the reverse clicky to flash cars so I gave her the phone and took off running the 7-8 blocks to the other end. Okay... I ran most of it lol. I got to the other end and stopped the cars and she sent hers. The cell phones weren't working and her side of cars kept coming. Finally our phones worked and I sent the cars. By the time they were through the lights came back on flashing red. Then by the time her cars went by the stoplights started working again.
When I got back she said she tried to stop cars but she'd flash them and they would zoom right by. She said cars stopped but big trucks didn't... Maybe if I'd grabbed the STL-V2 on the way out for her they would've ;-) She thinks the problem was that she was wearing a hoodie in the dark trying to stop cars... lol I went and got our burgers and soggy fries and finally got back home (took a while since the registers had to be reset at the burger joint).
I guess the moral of the story is always have a light ready just in case!