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Batten Down the Hatches - Flo is comin asho

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swarfrat

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I thought four days before landfall was "not waiting till the last minute". Already there is no bread or bottled water to be had.  We're far enough inland that it doesn't make sense to evacuate, but they are calling for 10-15" of rainfall here. There's not much for us to do in the Triangle but prepare to be without power for a few days.

I'm trying to clear the logjam in the creek behind our house this afternoon, and waiting on the wife to get home so I can do it.  It doesn't hold any significant water during normal rainfall but it backs up in a hurry during heavy rains. Creek normally is about 2" water 5ft below grade, but I've seen the back yard flood (as in current in the back yard, not standing water)  -if the bottom floods it's about 200ft wide.
 
Good luck, stay safe.

I hate hurricanes. I haven't had to deal with nearly as many as they do down south of here (I'm ~40 mi. N. of NYC), but I've been though several Hurricanes, Nor'Easters, Tropical Storms and blizzards.

Have you been getting a lot of rain recently?
That just makes things worse. Nothing worse than having saturated Earth before heavy winds. Loosens up the tree roots. We had that prior to Irene. About two weeks of soaking  rain prior to it hitting. I thing it was down to a level 1 or a Tropical storm  when it hit, but the winds were knocking down fully grown healthy oak trees.
 
Got my saw started finally - dumped the old gas. Cleaned the air filter and plug. Tried starting fluid. Finally got online and remembered that on this saw you have to set the chain brake or it disconnects the spark plug. (I'll forget the next time I need it too. )

Stores have been out of water for days but its still coming in. My biggest worry aside from a tree across the house is that I have a picky eater in the house who we're already worried about. Skipping supper one day and breakfast the next. Stuff like that. And my wife gets bullheaded about not letting him drink through straw cups, so he stays dehydrated. Goes all day at school without drinking anything. Stuff like that.

We have had a lot of rain recently - and all summer long. And we're in a heavily wooded neighborhood. It's been raining the past few days before the storm even began influencing the weather.
 
Stay safe. The news keeps saying the landfall will really be something.
 
Smart-alecky video postings aside, we're thinking good thoughts for you mid-atlantic folks as Flo heads toward you.  Here's hoping you only get a little wet.  Best of luck.
 
Finally got the saw started this morning. New gas. Clean filter. Clean plug. Starter fluid spray...nope. If you forget to set the chain brake it grounds the spark plug out.  That's good news - I'll feel a lot better with that log jam out of there - or at least free to wash downstream.
 
Too much fines in the log jam, best I could do is cut it into smaller pieces, but I did take about 2ft off the top and most importantly, cut the lynch pin log into many small pieces. I also got a good look at the downstream improvements the horse farm has been doing, about 100 yards below my property, it opens up into a huge swale, maybe 100 yards wide and 10-20ft deep with no banks to speak of. I doubt flooding is a major threat. The tree houee might be a boat dock for a day or two, but I'm more worried about trees on the house.
 
My SO was born and raised in Puerto Rico and has had to deal with the consequences of hurricanes her whole life. Never take chances and stay safe!
 
I'm WELL inland - it doesn't make sense for us to leave. We're likely to only get tropical storm force winds. But it's been raining for several days, and it's already been a record wet summer. Our local forecast is down to 6-10" of rain which is likely to be memorable but not catastrophic. My biggest worry for ourselves is that if there's any local power outages - all the line crews will be down in harder hit areas (where they should be) and we might be a while. In that scenario however, odds are good for crashing with family who still have power.

The coast is another matter entirely. The inland picture is a bit more optimistic now than it was a couple days ago too.
 
Glad to hear you're not right on the coast. Wet is a lot easier to handle than full storm fury. Stay dry and comfortable.
 
New track shows it taking a freakish dogleg to avoid my house as much as possible. We have maybe two days of drinking water and about 100gal of wash/flushing water, provided my attempt at securing the tub drain holds water that long. If not, we have about 20 gallons of non-drinking water in lidded buckets to work with. Wife has fought me tooth and nail about getting more than 3 gallons drinking water on hand. It's truly bizarre.  I 'd been trying to secure bottled water since monday to no avail, but it seems to be available now that the supplies have caught up with the downgraded forecast.

Days without poser was an occasional occurrence growing up in the winter storms of the 70's.  This reaction has me mystified.

the poor folks in the SC low country are the ones who will really get it. they just had 1000yr flooding three years ago. Most of the news is about NC beach and estuary towns, but the next few days I expect SC to really get deluged. They'll be wondering if this is a 5,000 year flood
 
High and dry and pigging out on hurricane snacks. A few hundred people in the area without power at various times. With this morning's light - I think we're pretty much past the biggest danger of power outage. Nothing like down at the coast where it's about 300,000 without power.  This storm really collapsed quickly. Whew. Thank God. I almost wish the power had gone out for a couple hours so the wife wouldn't give me grief the next time I try to make preparations for a rural power outage on a well.
 
It's good to hear you came through it so unscathed. Preparations are good to do. It could have gone the other way just as easily.
 
Glad to hear you're weathering the storm! I'm really not sure why preparedness gets that reaction from some. It's not a conspiratorial delusion, how many times have we all seen the footage of people lined up at the FEMA trailer waiting for their ration of relief supplies because they were unprepared for a natural (or man-made) disaster or other disruption in the normal availability of goods? We keep fresh water and emergency food rations on hand at all times, in addition to two 800 gallon rainwater storage tanks. We live in the desert, and the desert doesn't mess around! Nor does the Atlantic Ocean I gather, good on you for making efforts to make sure that your family has what it needs!
 
It's just now actually impacting us here. The storm is just a heavy rain storm at this point but it's moving at about 3mph. We had 10" of rain since Saturday night. The tree house is now a boat dock!

I dumped our non-drinking water yesterday morning after the storm had "passed on". But  we lost power for a few hours last night. Nothing serious, we were sleeping, no meltage in the freezer. Late getting to school due to a tornado warning - been several of those all around. Several road closures, so "working" from home - only the machines at work are still powered off.

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