All my planning

[ctg492]

I failed. I am not a prepper, but I have always added to needed items just incase. This goes back to when I was alone 30 years ago with small children, I kept a sick bag of essential since I could not run to the store and I felt I had no one to call. We have always had kerosene heater, electric heaters, plow, wood, gas. I felt pretty good that if the massive snow storm of the century came I could make it.
>>>then came TEnnessee two weeks ago. What I considered no snow ice storm, but in that part of the country it shuts every down. Our fault as the home is not where we call home and we did not move more then needed. I had no shovel, then again not many did as I saw no drives being done. I had nothing, if the power went out as the news kept says would, that's it nothing. My car was stuck in driveway, third day I got my car shovel out and dug away. Now it had melted froze and iced. I got out and ventured to the stores. Ok not a big deal but dry cleaners, eye Doctor, dentist were closed due to weather. Omg this happened three days earlier. Then something I never saw in my life, I had to go to WM, the parking lot was not cleared first. Then the shelves were bear! The freezer sections looked like they were stripped. Not one gallon of milk in the store. Veggies non existent. I have lived in snow belts before, but the area is equipped to handle it. Truckers don't run.
>>>>many more things happened during this storm. Husband had to stay in hotel as express way shut. One of ours car's could not get up drive way and got stuck in the ice. I found the general consensus was to wait it out it will melt.
>>>>What this did to me: I realized how fast things can change and one must always be ready for anything. I was so defeated and sadden by this. I said the south lost the war, but whipped me. I pitched the towel in and moved back north.
>>>Over the years of reading how others prepare I learned how different each area is. This is so true. What one needs in a hot climate is different then a cold climate. I will never be unprepared again. I never was before.

*>>>is because I can not indent for some reason

[lessisbest]

I'm so sorry you had to learn such a hard lesson. Our daughter and her family live in Tennessee, and it has been quite a challenge with the weather recently, but ice is quite common in the winter, and everything will shut down. We've given them the same things we have on hand - 72-hour kits, buckets of freeze-dried meals, Mr. Heater Portable Buddy Propane Heater — 9000 BTU, emergency cooking and lighting, and it has all come in handy. We even gave our granddaughter in college a 72-hour emergency kit. Another thing you will want in Tennessee are Yactrax - https://www.yaktrax.com/ so you can safely walk on packed snow and ice.

A few years ago we experienced a large-scale ice storm and were without power for nearly a week, and our neighbors were completely unprepared. When they ran out of peanut butter and bread, and had used the last scented votive candle for light, couldn't keep warm, they put their dogs in the car and drove to "mommies", over iced roads, downed power lines, fallen trees/branches.....

[ctg492]

It was so unnerving, so wtf happened to my life, how could this happen to me the lady who keeps shovel, blanket, winter clothing extras, mace, water dog food, granola in her car.

So yes so vastly different in areas away from our dot on earth. I learned from message boards actually years ago how everyone's utilities differ depending on local. So guess I should have known about this. Anyway MI snow I can handle. Tornados I go in basement, flooding I am on good ground but have sumpump.

[flowerseverywhere]

I would encourage everyone to read the blog "A place with no name" written by someone who lost everything in Hurricane Katrina and the mistakes he and others made.

http://www.theplacewithnoname.com/blogs/klessons/index.html

when these disasters happen it is a rude awakening how dependent we are on the trucks moving, electricity working and services functioning.

[ToomuchStuff]

Prepping isn't just about one type of emergency, but about being prepared as a whole. You may be ready for the next ice storm, but are you prepared for a fire? IMHE it is about preparedness as a whole and I realize there are situations that I will never be prepared for.

[iris lilies]

yikes, OP, that's a lot of ice! Sorry.

[sweetana3]

We drove to SC thru the Tenn. mountains last week. Stopped at two McDonalds and they were either closed or only drive in open. Then we stopped at a mall book store. It was shoveled out but closed at 11am (they normally open at 9am). The main roads were fine but when we finally watched the news realized how bad it was during the ice storms.

[ctg492]

Preparedness true can we really be prepared for everything. I guess what I learned was we can be prepared as we can be for the type of storms we are accustomed to. This stormed seemed like nothing to me, yet for the area it was. I also feel the media does a great deal scare tatics. The Nashville weather had a graph of what-ifs. For each 1/4 inch how long power "could" be out for. Never had I seen such on new where I come from. Of course that is going to scare people into clearing shelves out.

[Tiam]

Well, just based on what you have in your house, should you get snowed in, no access to shopping, how are you set? I'm good for a week maybe two for 3 or 4 people. Water for a week; drinking and some for flushing or washing. Not lots of cooking. Lots of paper i.e. paper towels and tp. I'll never be more shored up than that. I've come to that conclusion, because I just don't go through enough canned food to keep up the rotations.

[ctg492]

I failed because I was living in a temporary home, my life time of needed items were 550 miles away.

[kib]

I wouldn't look at this as a failure so much as a learning experience. You were clearly not as prepared as usual due to your move, but the place where things went wrong was going out after three days: you probably picked the exact day where the stores were picked clean but not yet restocked. Next time you will know that a cold emergency in your area could last x days (five or six, maybe?) I got stuck in 2010 on a road trip in Texas and had to be towed out of muck/ice twice (by the same guy, good grief :|() because I couldn't imagine an ice storm in Texas taking more than two days to be gone again and tried to get going again while it was still a mess. My motto has become "this too shall pass, and as long as you're safe, waiting an extra day doesn't hurt."

[Gardenarian]

Completely agree with kib. You didn't fail; you learned some important things. You made it through in one piece, and that's what counts.

[jp1]

The OP's situation hits on a key concern I have with trying to prepare. We have plenty of food, water, flashlights, candles, outdoor grill with self-contained propane tanks to cook with, no concern with cold weather where we are, etc, so if we're home and the building hasn't fallen down from an earthquake (in San Francisco our most likely emergency) we should be fine. Even if we're at work when whatever crisis strikes, we'd be ok most likely. It'd be a long walk, but barring massive damage and chaos in the city we could both get home by walking if we had to.

But I travel a lot for work and pleasure, mostly by plane. How to prepare for a potential disaster/emergency when I/we are far from home. Years ago, when we still lived in NJ, we were in Portland Maine and our plane got delayed and delayed due to a spring nor'easter. (rain, not snow, thankfully.) Eventually we got a hotel room and spent the night, hoping to fly out in the morning. Then at about 7:00 am the power went out at the hotel. (and if you've never been at a hotel when the power goes out, all I can say is, it's creepy. They aren't designed to function for any amount of time without electricity. Even the front door to the building stopped working...) The airport, next door, also had no power, so no planes were going to take off until they got the power back on. Ultimately we decided to drive the rental car back to NJ. That worked out (thankfully I-95 wasn't flooded although there was water in the ditches right up to the edge of the roadway at several points so if it'd been just a bit worse we wouldn't have made it home.) But what if we hadn't had the rental car, or what if the rain had been a bit worse? What could we have done to avoid, or at least limit, the difficulty and danger. Or what if it had been a winter nor'easter with snow and cold temps? I can't pack enough to prepare for that situation each and every time I travel, so for the most part I just trust that a disaster is reasonably unlikely and pray that if one does that there will be enough support from the government/aid agencies like the red cross that I/we will survive to tell a good story. Not an ideal solution, but I've not seen a better one anywhere so I just accept the risk as unavoidable.

[kib]

I think at some point in emergency planning and actual emergencies it's necessary to accept that you may be uncomfortable, seriously inconvenienced or cut off for an unknowable period of time, possibly in unsanitary circumstances, and perhaps a bit hungry. In other words, at some point trying to be prepared so you can go on living like a lucky American just no longer works, and you need to ascertain what you need to do to keep from being seriously injured or killed.

This isn't meant as a criticism, I just think that our day to day lives are so removed from elemental reality that we lose track of what's essential vs. what's nice. This leads to being really anxious and confused when creating an emergency plan because we're not actually thinking in terms of raw survival. Sure it's better to have a hot meal and a warm bed and a working toilet with toilet paper. But we plan for emergencies as if we were planning for a trip to the Carribean - oh gosh, did we remember the sunblock?? Cold soup out of a can, a bucket, the reader's digest and a heavy dry blanket will keep you alive.

Travel: granola bars or some other portable food with a high calorie and nutrition density, a steri-pen, and depending on location, something to keep you warm and dry are a good start to not dying.