Ice Is Nice (Sometimes)

We’ve all read about the weird weather throughout the US this winter. And, yes, no snow in NYC counts as “weird”. New England got a taste of winter this week. Schools in New Jersey closed because of rain and ice. In Maine we started with 5 inches of snow on Wednesday afternoon and ended with several inches of rain as the thermometer hovered in the 28 – 32 degree range. The result was the Ice Storm of the Century. I know the century is new and we had another “Ice Storm of the Century” in 1998. But, when you live in Northern New  England and it is cold, no power is an issue.

In some ways we were the victims of our own predictions. The Farmers’ Almanac said we’d get “pounded” this year. And, in the 53 years we have been located in Maine this is only the second time that the Farmers’ Almanac and Geiger (our parent company) could not open. Wednesday night trees were touching power lines setting off small fires along the road. We were down and stayed off line until last night when the crews from Central Maine Power Company put in a new transformer. As with any natural disaster, the unsung hero’s are the power crews who work without rest until all power is restored. In a heavily treed state like Maine, that is  tough work. Congratulations and thank you to the women and men who climb poles and do the work in the worst of conditions. The same can be said of those we saw on the national news doing the same after the tornado destruction.

At the peak 80,000 homes in Maine lost power. 48 hours later, about 10,000 are without power. In a future blog I hope to share the beauty of Maine under Ice.