Are all our north American users OK in winter storm?

[Spocks-cuddly-tribble]

Hi fellow AFC members,

just wanting to ask if our north American friends are fine.


And again:

Merry Xmas!
Happy New Year!

[thunderchero]

no

[Spocks-cuddly-tribble]

Sorry to hear that. Let's hope the situation improves soon.

For people without energy, heating or brocken water supply it's not easy.

[slickrcbd]

The storm didn't affect all of North America. In Chicago was just got a minor dusting of snow this morning. We had worse on Friday with about an inch and a half, but high winds most of the day followed by a deep freeze on Chirstmas. Again, this is relatively normal and anything less than 2 inches is minor snow. Anything more than 4 inches is a big snowstorm, and we normally don't get more than 7 inches. More than that is considered a major snowstorm that shuts everything down.

So it's rather normal for winter, with bellow average snowfall for December (only ~2 inches snow total this month, but we had some rain earlier. Rain in December makes me want to believe in Global Warming).

This was hardly severe winter weather, even if the cold the last two days was bad, it was hardly unheard of and far from the coldest like in 1994 or 2019.

[thunderchero]

my issue is more heath than weather related

[Spocks-cuddly-tribble]

That can be worse than temporary circumstances. Been there myself, 2018 I wasn't sure I would make it over the year.

Due to many lifelong chronic issues, I was forced early on to obay many basic health measures. During bad times these habits helped me to sustain some base health. But there is an inevitable decline with age. It gets harder to do each day/week all the minor stuff that matters to take care of yourself.
But if I don't do it on a regular base (albeit, it might suck), every time it gets harder to recover from the following regression.

[KrazeeXXL]

From what I gathered from the news, temperatures dropped by thirty degrees within two hours in some areas. That's some insane cold snap. I can't really fathom that. I mean it's one thing to have -30°C over a period a time. You kinda get used to it. But add wind and wetness to the mix within such a short timeframe to adapt... well, fuck that.

Stay safe!

[Spocks-cuddly-tribble]

add wind and wetness to the mix within such a short timeframe to adapt...

Yeah, like that: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... thday.html

[KrazeeXXL]

Terrible what happened to her. I fear that these extreme weather conditions are just the beginning. And honestly, it is terrifying to me how damn fast the weather can change in an extreme manner.

The best example I have is June 20th, 2000. Best friend's 18th birthday celebration party were within 5 minutes, one of the sunniest and friendliest days turned into some apocalypse like hurrican with tons of heavy hail and winds up to 130km/h. This was scary.

People laughed at me for always having a little first aid kit in my backpack, next to some other stuff. I'm far from a prepper or something but weather can change so quickly. Just a couple of years ago, I was on my way and surprised by hail. Right in the middle of the city and nothing to stand under to shield yourself or anything. I had to sprint a couple of hundred meters to finally find some shelter and my did this hurt.

Such crazy weather events may even just be restricted to a couple of hundred meters or just occur for some minutes or whatever. But my, better be over-prepared than not.

Personally, I wouldn't solely rely on my smartphone ever. Even in normal mild winter, the battery drains quite fast. There was an interview of a student from our country who is residing in Chicago at the moment. And he said that the battery of his phone went from 90% to 10% in like 10 minutes or something.

Not sure how long a flashlight would last in such extreme conditions.

[slickrcbd]

I learned the hard way that using a cell phone as a flashlight will quickly deplete the battery. Most won't last an hour before the batteries are dead, and some models will even overheat from having the light on too long as they were not intended to be used as flashlights (most of those are older ones where you need a 3rd-party app. HTC One X and X+ being examples, but those are 10 years old). Instead you can get a small flashlight only a couple inches long that uses AAA batteries at the dollar store or Walmart that does a better job than the cell phone.
The cell phone should only be used as a emergency light source. Use it to navigate to and locate your candle and matchsticks or [cigarette] lighter, a lantern, or at least a flashlight.
I've done several jobs where I had to crawl under desks or counters to install/update/replace systems, and I carry a small flashlight instead of using my phone for this reason.

As for 90% to 0% in 10 minutes, that happened several times at the end of my HTC One X+'s lifespan when it needed a new battery. It was 7 years old at that point and I just went and bought a new phone because it was obsolete and many apps were no longer compatible.

[KrazeeXXL]

Yea, these little LED flashlights where you can throw in a bunch of tripple A's are amazing. I've a couple here as well and also use them when I have to crawl under the desk xD

Still, the temperatures would probably kill these things rather quickly as well. I've two versions here, where one has 3 LEDS and the other one comes with 9 or so. I've also a brand new NVA (signal) flashlight with an adapter. Usually, they used these old 4.5 Volt blocks. Haven't seen those in ages, though and no idea as how they would fare.

I recently read some combat readiness reports and things about winter wars and there was a battery comparison in there. Now, Li-Ion actually was miles ahead of the older stuff like Nickel-Metalhydroxid/Nickel-Cadmium or whatever the older stuff was. But still, the ability to store/utilize energy at hazardous temperatures was reduced by 50% or so. The Nickel stuff even just had 10% or so compared to normal temperatures. No info on Lithium-Polymer but from my personal experience, it's also reduced noticeably.

Problem with phones also are the apps and all the hidden stuff running in the background which silently kills off the battery. There are some good apps to measure this and to restrict access and to revoke access of apps after they haven't been used for a set amount of time. But still. Lots of energy is wasted on useless drawbacks/callbacks. Not sure if energy saving mode would help as it might prevent the flashlight option from working, too.

I'd probably not use a flashlight at all. It may take some time but we get used to the dark. It may take half an hour but the vision adapts rather quickly in my experience. It's always a pain in the ass when I go on a run and some other runner comes at me with bright as hell LED headlights or even some strobe lights. I rather use no light as I feel that I'll be able to react better to uneven terrain or whatever than using a flashlight with a limited radius.

edit: regarding phones. At some point I noticed that the WiFi on my Pixel3a is always on. No matter if it's deactivated. I noticed this when I activated my WLAN and the phone automatically engaged with the network despite WiFi set to off. It might just be one antenna of however many are in these phones nowadays, but it's still drain. Same goes for GPS which is kind of a hassle to deactivate. I actively have to set those tracking functions off in my google account but I'm sure that's just cosmetical as well.