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Posted

The year i bought my fire bird i drove it home from maryland to stratton ontario. At the michigan border i hit wet snow. By the time i reached grand rapids and pulled into my aunts place i was pushing snow up onto the hood on the back roads. Btw something ive done for our mailbox to keep the plow from having to much fun is to mount the post on a spare tire, works great for mowing to. Just pick it up and mow. If the kids edge to close and hit the mirrors it flexes instead of marking the mirror. Now if only i could train them to actually retrieve the mail...

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Posted

Hey   uncledj    I would think that the safety cone would just be TARGET PRACTICE for most plowers!

Also got dumped with around 10" to 12" of snow and freezing cold air. Had to go out after snow plow went by and dumped over a foot of hard snow at end of the12 neighbors I help out!

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Posted
12 hours ago, RDawson said:

Hoping son n wife are ok. Prayers up. 

Thanks. They are doing surprisingly well.  Son had left foot surgically repaired and left leg immobilized because of broken kneecap. Boot on right foot with 1 broken bone there and 8 broken ribs.  Daughter in Law didn't have broken bones but was released then readmitted due to pain.  She pulled her oblique muscles from the pelvic bones.  She gets out of rehab today.  We will be trying to get them to their house on Saturday weather permitting. We will definitely vouch for the Hyundai Santa Fe Safety ratings.

 

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Posted (edited)

In the mid 1950's to early 1960's southern Manitoba towns were a population of about 3000 to 5000  and would call the local farmers for help with large amounts of snow ....We had a home built powered by a 100 horse power tractor that would handle drifts of snow up 4 feet deep .. The snowblower would blow the show directly on a tandem drive truck and then it would be dumped at a remote location ...Some of the farmers then would be farming up to 1000 acres  .

A snowblower was a must have  piece of equipment  ..

Edited by larrydr
Posted
1 hour ago, bpate4home said:

Thanks. They are doing surprisingly well

I’ve made a living the last 19 years working wrecks like that. They are lucky indeed. Best wishes for an easy recovery. 

Posted
57 minutes ago, larrydr said:

In the mid 1950's to early 1960's southern Manitoba towns were a population of about 3000 to 5000  and would call the local farmers for help with large amounts of snow ....We had a home built powered by a 100 horse power tractor that would handle drifts of snow up 4 feet deep .. The snowblower would blow the show directly on a tandem drive truck and then it would be dumped at a remote location ...Some of the farmers then would be farming up to 1000 acres  .

A snowblower was a must have  piece of equipment  ..

When I moved to TX the guy buying our house in Northern OH wanted my grill.  It was his sticking point.  I took him into the garage and showed him my 36" 2 stage snow thrower. Said he could not have my grill. Look at that driveway (3 cars wide and ~50 long) do you want to shovel that or will the snow thrower do? needless to say I kept the grill LOL.

 

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Posted
4 hours ago, bpate4home said:

Thanks. They are doing surprisingly well.  Son had left foot surgically repaired and left leg immobilized because of broken kneecap. Boot on right foot with 1 broken bone there and 8 broken ribs.  Daughter in Law didn't have broken bones but was released then readmitted due to pain.  She pulled her oblique muscles from the pelvic bones.  She gets out of rehab today.  We will be trying to get them to their house on Saturday weather permitting. We will definitely vouch for the Hyundai Santa Fe Safety ratings.

 

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Thats a scary looking wreck Bob, glad to hear the kids are on the mend 👍

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Posted

I know we’re laughing and joking about the weather, taking it in stride but I feel for those in Texas and areas that have no resources to deal with it. I told my wife this morning we come and go as we want, have power and water, along with backup generators and a freezer full of food. We’re on a well and have backup heat so we don’t depend on anybody else. Whenever we have an extended power outage the neighbors know there’ll be running water at the hydrant in my yard. In other words we don’t have the right to complain about it. We’re short handed at work right now so I’ve been pulling some 48 hour shifts and gone for long hours, knowing the wife has everything she needs while I’m gone means a lot. 

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Posted

This kind of cold in Texas is so rare that they were not prepared for it and they had problems with all of their different kinds of generating plants.  One nuclear unit shut down due to something freezing but it is back up.  Many fossil fuel plants shut down but most are back on line.  The majority of the wind generators are still off line.  I think I heard on tv that due to the warmer weather in Texas, theirs does not have the capacity to deice the blades.  I'll be interested to see the final report on what caused all the loss of power.  Our modern civilization does not exist without electrical power.  For the record, I spent my engineering career working on nuclear power plants and I think the country made a mistake not pursuing more nuke generators.  No carbon dioxide coming from nukes.  About 70% of France's elec power comes from nukes because they didn't want to spend their money buying coal and gas from other countries.  

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Posted
23 hours ago, RDawson said:

When snow reaches all the way down in Alabama what do engineering students do? Fill the quad with 8’ snowmen.

That just goes to show we know how to handle snow, mix a little dirt with it so we have enough for a snowman. 

Posted
21 hours ago, BlueSky said:

This kind of cold in Texas is so rare that they were not prepared for it and they had problems with all of their different kinds of generating plants.  One nuclear unit shut down due to something freezing but it is back up.  Many fossil fuel plants shut down but most are back on line.  The majority of the wind generators are still off line.  I think I heard on tv that due to the warmer weather in Texas, theirs does not have the capacity to deice the blades.  I'll be interested to see the final report on what caused all the loss of power.  Our modern civilization does not exist without electrical power.  For the record, I spent my engineering career working on nuclear power plants and I think the country made a mistake not pursuing more nuke generators.  No carbon dioxide coming from nukes.  About 70% of France's elec power comes from nukes because they didn't want to spend their money buying coal and gas from other countries.  

You're 100% right that the power system was not ready for this cold. Of the ~54% capacity that was lost 17% was due to wind turbines were frozen. The rest was Natural Gas and Coal plants. They could not keep the supply of NG going due to the cold. This happened about 15 years ago when we moved here and then again about 10 years ago.  At that point they said they mitigated the issues.  Yesterday a power company exec said the systems here are not designed for this cold and after looking into it they said it was too costly. For me that is neglect.  I pay for a product that comes from a monopoly regulated by the government. They should be held liable for any death of someone who was not able to (physically or mentally) that died. They should be held liable to a degree for all the damage caused by them not providing power. 

On the flip side - people need to take care of their own issues when it comes to staying warm. A company or government cannot take care of you better than you can.  They cannot manage your situation better than you can. I believe if you did not do this and it was not extenuating circumstances then you are responsible. For example, we had a pipe break in our water heater. We had made arrangements for neighbors to check on our house during this since we were not going to be home. They came over a couple of times a day.  They found the broken pipe and shut off the water main to the house. They had no power and still were checking on our house. There are people in our neighborhood that were home and didn't even know where to turn off the water to their house when needed.  That's on them. 

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Posted

Still snowing here as we speak to add an additional inch on the ground.  Temperatures will remain in the mid 20's all day, but by Wednesday we should get a little bit of warm up and reach 40's.  I'll just take it day by day here.  My prayers to those that are affected by this weather disaster in State of Texas.  

Posted

I live in a hurricane zone actually part of Wilmington NC but not officially within the city limits.  Snow is a rare event.  When a hurricane strikes the east coast, it almost always comes to Wilmington.  So, we have to deal with those storms.  being close to the city, the power lines are underground.  that combined with the fact that priority is given to the cities with their concentration of people and traffic lights the power is restored within a day or two when a storm comes our way.  But, I also bought a generator to power the lights and refrigerator and I use my propane camp stove to cook food.  People who live in the country where the power lines are above ground often go without power for a couple of weeks.  I would definitely have a larger back up power system  if I lived in the country cuz I'm getting old and I don't like to be inconvenienced.  Okay, I'm a crabby old coot!  LOL!   

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