Sandy #2

Thursday pt2

Right after making my blog entry I found a place that had ice in Hicksville.  Grabbing everything I jumped into the car and headed out to Nuzzelese Ice in Hicksville to get the precious frozen water.  On the way I saw a gas station that was open but the line was horrendous  plus I was on a time schedule so I passed it by.

I came to another station a little further down the road and they we allowing people with small gas cans only to buy gas.  They had the place taped off and the gas station staff was playing security guard.

I arrived at Nuzzelese and bought several bags of ice and learned that they had 17 50’ trailers on Wednesday with ice deliveries and they were sold out very quickly.

On my way home with the ice we passed at least 20 power company trucks from Carlisle PA staged at the local train station.  That to me was a sigh of relief that power was going to be restored soon.  But when, we have no idea.  P

When we arrived home we restocked the cooler with much needed ice. 

We heard of a station that had power and gas on Shore Road but the line was so bad people were cutting each other off and several fist fights ensued.  The police had to break them up.  Society was or is breaking down.

I don’t know if anyone as seen the show “Jericho” or not.  But if you haven’t you should.  Take away the fact that nuclear bombs were used and substitute hurricane for it and you get a pretty good idea in how things have broken down.  Of course take away the hero’s and the re-organization.

If this is how Long Island is after a hurricane, I would hate to see it if we had a total collapse of everything.

The local high school opened it’s doors and they were passing our hot meals to people, set up charging stations and provided activities for children.  That was a good thing for the community.  The local Stop and Shop allowed people to come in and sit on the benches and in Star Bucks there to get warm without having to buy anything.

That night we prepared for a long cold night.

 Friday

I got up early and headed on the road to top off my gas tank.  I saw the gas line to the only station that was pumping to the public.  I found the end and it was at least 3 miles long.  I was able to video it from start to end.  Because fights broke out yesterday the police placed three patrol cars and one motorcycle officer there.  One officer was directing traffic while the rest stood by and watched.

The gas station on the intersection of Valley Road and Harbor Road that is owned by a landscaping / construction company was still selling gas to landscapers only.  Anyone else got kicked off line.

I got a call from a friend in town who said his building had power and if there was anything I wanted to charge to go on up there.  I took him up on the offer and charged up our phones again.

On the way home we saw power company trucks working on some high tension lines only a few blocks away from the house.  Could it be that power is only a day or so away?

The radio was telling us how power was being worked on for the pumping stations for barges and tankers to off load gasoline.  From there it goes to tankers then to gas stations and hopefully to our tanks.

I never thought that in my that I would do the next thing.  FEMA was at the train station handing out hot meals in the form of self heating Meals Ready to Eat or MRE’s.  My wife and I looked at each other and with the food we might have to throw out we decided to break down and get a case of MRE’s just in case.  Who would ever think that here in March I was the CTO of a major corporation until I was replaced by a 26 year old punk now having to get free food from FEMA for my family.  I was and am humiliated at the prospect but my family comes first.

When I got back home my wife was preparing some food that was thawing out from the freezer that could be salvaged so the MRE’s were set aside.  She would rather finish off the thawing food first which makes sense.

We came up with a plan that on Saturday we would get up and be on the road by 5AM to get gas so we elected to go to bed early.

Just before retiring I had to go into the attic for something and looking out the window I saw lights only a block away.  It is getting closer!  Maybe Saturday?

Friday night was the coldest night so far.  So my wife insisted that I do an old hunters trick to help keep warm.  She gave me a pair of her tights to wear to bed.  This was my first time ever trying this so I was a bit embarrassed but since it was with my wife no one would see.  I have to admit they were very comfortable and did keep my legs warm.  Not perfect, but better than shivering.  For the top we both had layers of shirts and sweaters so the tights really helped our lower extremities.

Saturday

We got up and two of use went to go for gas at 5AM as planned.  When we got to the station and the line was already over a mile long and the station was not even open.  We decided to go into Manorhaven to see if they had power.  If they did there is a Sunoco station there that has gas in their tanks since they had no power on Friday.

We got there and sure enough the station had power for the night lights were on.  A deli next to is was in full operation and the street lights were all on.  Looks like we scored but there were cones blocking the entrances.

We elected to park and keep our eyes on the place for as soon as the attendant got there we would scoot right in.

We waited and watched and saw people pull up to the station on the street and then drive off.  Some came down Shore Road did a U-turn and saw the station was closed and headed back to the station with the long line.  One car drove over the cones, stopped at the pumps and waited.  The driver got out of the car and went to the windows of the darkend station and pounded on the glass yelling is anyone there.  He went back to his car and a few minutes later did the same thing again and then again a third time.  He finally drove off knocking down more cones.

Another car pulled in and the driver started to lean on the horn.  Not getting anywhere he drove off as well.  Time and time again cars would pull into the station and out again and others did very quick U-turns and headed back to the other station.

It was starting it get crazy there so we decided to pull into the station at the pumps before anymore nut jobs came around.  Within a few minutes there were 8 cars jockeying to get to the pumps and one was trying to push in front of us.  We were wondering if our cars were going to get hit but the panic striken drivers.

A Nassau County Police car pulled up and turned on his lights.  They started to chase the cars away.  The officer came up to us and told us that the station was going to have gas on Tuesday.  I asked him how does he know?  He said he got that from dispatch.  I asked to see it or speak to the station owner who was not there yet since it was only 7AM at the time.  The officer said he didn’t have to then threatened us with arrest if we didn’t leave.  An abuse of power?  Typical Nassau County.  So we left.

We passed two other stations that the lines were unbelievable.  We headed home.

I saw a power crew down the street.  Could it be that we will have power by tonight?

I heard that FEMA was setting up other locations with food and water of people here on Long Island plus there was a report that FEMA was going to supply gasoline to people as well but that was pretty far away from where we are.

A  relative and I went over to a neighbors house with some hot soup to see how he was doing.  He is 85, lives alone and has no heat or power as well.  So we gave him the soup and spent some time with him.  He was bundled in a blanket we brought over earlier.

The sun went down and the house got real cold real fast.  My wife was bundled in two blankets to keep warm but she was shivering like crazy.  Since we still had gas I went to the kitchen to make her a cup of tea.  As I filled the tea pot with water all of a sudden and without warning the lights went on!  Our power was restored!!!

It took a bit but the house heated up and the refrigerator started to cool so we could move food back into it.   Instead of tea we made a pot of coffee, something we have not had in a while.

Finally we were able to turn on the TV and and caught up on the events.  All I can say is OMG!  The devastation was worse than what the radio made it out.  As the old saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words.  Houses gone, a neighborhood totally wiped out, families loosing all of their possessions.  Video taken from the South Shore with boats littered everywhere on shore, restaurants and other business damaged or wiped out.

It was a living nightmare.  I have no idea if it compared or not but it was very reminiscent of what South Florida went through when hurricane Andrew hit in 1992.  Looking at Wikipedia Sandy is the second costliest hurricane in U.S. history.  Seeing what I saw on the news, I would have to say yes it was.

Sunday

We spent the day putting things like candles, flash lights and what have you away.  We heard of a few gas stations open so we decided to go for it and try to get gas.  Each trip was a waste of time.  The lines were that bad.  Since Monday a lot of people should be going back to work, we figured that we can try and get gas early Monday AM.

I went to the local supermarket and the staff and vendors were re-stocking the shelves.  It will take some time to get everything back.  One of the workers at the store that I know told me not to buy any of the frozen items for at least a month.  The stuff was thawing out and some actually thawed out and they are re-freezing it instead of tossing it out.  Good advice.

A neighbor called late in the afternoon and said that he saw a short line at a station on the main road.  So we grabbed our keys to our cars and darted off to give that a try.  It took us maybe 5 mintues from getting the call to making the end of the line.  It was longer than what we were told.  But we elected to wait on it anyway.

While on the line some jerk in a brand new Corvette tried to push his way into the line in front of me.  Big mistake.  A 2012 $80,000 fiberglass car simply is no match for a 2001 $2,000 Towncar driven by a stubborn Irish/Scotsman.  The jerk saw that he was out gunned by my big tank and decided to abort the attempt.  He tried a few more times along the line and got no where fast.

Another jerk with a new Rolls Royce was going to try and push his way into the line further down but failed as well.

An hour and a half later we were able to get our cars full of gas.  From there we headed home.

We were discussing the gas shortage.  Is it possible that while there might be some delivery problems could it be that a good part of it is contrived by the oil industry to force prices up?  In the 1970’s they did just that.  A fake oil shortage to get the prices higher which we have never recovered from.  During the so called crisis TV news crews took helicopters out over the ocean and filmed tankers as far as the eye could see.  Not one of them was being allowed to come to port of off load thereby creating a shortage.

I would not doubt that the price of gas will hit well over $5 a gallon very soon.

A friend who lives in Deer Park told me that while she was on line to get gas a car started to push it’s way into the line a few cars ahead of her.  The driver of the car got out and pulled a gun to make it clear that he wanted to get into the line.  Naturally the police took the guy into custody but it is getting violent.

Talking to a friend who is still at my former company told me that they had to utilize my Disaster Recovery Plan and it worked perfectly.  But of course my former nasty boss and that punk are taking credit for my work.

In final respect, things are slowly getting back to normal here on the North Shore.  Hopefully we will get gasoline soon.

The damage that was suffered in East Egg was minor as compared to those on the South Shore that lost everything.  Many people are now homeless or close to it.  So here in my town I can consider ourselves lucky.

A lot of the issues I think is that we have become complacent.  The weather forecasters always forecast the worst and nothing ever happens or less than what they claim.  So who can believe them at all?  I can’t and I am sure that I am not alone.  This time they were right but who could ever prepare for a storm surge of that magnitude? 

With this under my belt, time to prepare if we ever find ourselves in that situation again.

‘till next time