2022-2023 Winter Weather Thread

[yoladu 4089]

42 minutes ago, 4th&Five said:

We’re usually Tuesday and they picked up ours before noon today. It was so weighted down with ice that it fell in the truck and the guy had to go in and fish it out. 

Those guys do God's work; i can say with near certainty they don't get paid enough.

Edited February 2, 2023 by yoladu

[crash_davis 23091]

holy shit. HEB William Cannon and Bluff. I think HEB had to throw out food because power went out. People are helping themselves to the trashed food in the dumpster. No idea if people are running through the store helping themselves. That would be bullshit.

from the caption

"We live a couple of neighborhoods over and have to travel north on Bluff Springs to get out of our neighborhood. My husband just texted to avoid going that way, as Bluff Springs and William Cannon is impassable. He said: I’m assuming the H‑E‑B lost power and mobs of people are raiding it and taking all the food they can grab. People are just parking in the middle of the street and running in. They are even taking all the food H‑E‑B threw out from the dumpsters."

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rz8nq/heb_william_cannon_and_bluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rzqf1/at_heb_need_anything_william_cannonbluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10ryi26/heb_on_william_cannon_i35_bluff_springs/

 

Edited February 2, 2023 by crash_davis

[Samson's Wig 3187]

29 minutes ago, Orange&White said:

I am not sure if you are just trying to be intentionally obtuse or not.

There are ENTIRE FUCKING TREES falling down right now. What would you as a homeowner do if you saw a city electric crew walk up to your 150 year old oak and tell you they are cutting it down in case we get a massive freeze and it falls on the power lines?

There is a massive fucking chasm between keeping the lines clear of branches and what is happening right now.

I agree that they should do a better job or the former, but if you think they should just have free range to cut down whatever the fuck they want, you are not even worth entertaining a conversation with.

I may well be obtuse, probably even stupid, but I apparently understand our city code better than you do.  Congrats on being an ass for no reason though, it's what we do around here and I respect that.

The city can come mow your yard if they want to, and they can tell you that you can't cut down a tree to build a shed or pool.  They sure as hell can come cut down a tree if it is deemed to be diseased or a public nuisance (you know, like threatening power lines).  They actually do this all the time for lots of reasons.  Do I want that power abused?  No.  Do I think they should be more proactive than doing absolutely nothing unless a homeowner bugs them to death about it?  Hell yes.  Power lines can also be moved.  The cost to bury all lines is prohibitive, of course, but it can be done on a case by case basis when other factors, such as a giant old live oak, deem it the more prudent option.  Instead, we simply do nothing at all and wring our hands when everything goes to shit.

I swear some of you refuse to take a step back and acknowledge the reality that this city repeatedly takes it in the shorts when other communities in the state handle the exact same disasters with much less trouble.  This is a failure of leadership, and it will never change because we don't want it to.  You are the problem.  

[Orange&White 5521]

12 minutes ago, Deej said:

Cutting back the canopy om trees near the lines might have kept the weight down enough on some of them to stop the entire tree from coming down, no? 

 

Sure, in some instance, but not all.

[ztejas 43402]

1 minute ago, crash_davis said:

holy shit. HEB William Cannon and Bluff. I think HEB had to throw out food because power went out. People are helping themselves to the trashed food in the dumpster. No idea if people are running through the store helping themselves. That would be bullshit.

from the caption

"We live a couple of neighborhoods over and have to travel north on Bluff Springs to get out of our neighborhood. My husband just texted to avoid going that way, as Bluff Springs and William Cannon is impassable. He said: I’m assuming the H‑E‑B lost power and mobs of people are raiding it and taking all the food they can grab. People are just parking in the middle of the street and running in. They are even taking all the food H‑E‑B threw out from the dumpsters."

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rz8nq/heb_william_cannon_and_bluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rzqf1/at_heb_need_anything_william_cannonbluff_springs/

 

Bunch of homeless and druggies in that area. 

[Deej 76735]

2 minutes ago, Orange&White said:

Sure, in some instance, but not all.

that's why I said "might have kept the weight down enough on some of them".

[mchookem 16303]

4 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

holy shit. HEB William Cannon and Bluff. I think HEB had to throw out food because power went out. People are helping themselves to the trashed food in the dumpster. No idea if people are running through the store helping themselves. That would be bullshit.

from the caption

"We live a couple of neighborhoods over and have to travel north on Bluff Springs to get out of our neighborhood. My husband just texted to avoid going that way, as Bluff Springs and William Cannon is impassable. He said: I’m assuming the H‑E‑B lost power and mobs of people are raiding it and taking all the food they can grab. People are just parking in the middle of the street and running in. They are even taking all the food H‑E‑B threw out from the dumpsters."

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rz8nq/heb_william_cannon_and_bluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rzqf1/at_heb_need_anything_william_cannonbluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10ryi26/heb_on_william_cannon_i35_bluff_springs/

 

sheesh

 

[crash_davis 23091]

2 minutes ago, Samson's Wig said:

I may well be obtuse, probably even stupid, but I apparently understand our city code better than you do.  Congrats on being an ass for no reason though, it's what we do around here and I respect that.

The city can come mow your yard if they want to, and they can tell you that you can't cut down a tree to build a shed or pool.  They sure as hell can come cut down a tree if it is deemed to be diseased or a public nuisance (you know, like threatening power lines).  They actually do this all the time for lots of reasons.  Do I want that power abused?  No.  Do I think they should be more proactive than doing absolutely nothing unless a homeowner bugs them to death about it?  Hell yes.  Power lines can also be moved.  The cost to bury all lines is prohibitive, of course, but it can be done on a case by case basis when other factors, such as a giant old live oak, deem it the more prudent option.  Instead, we simply do nothing at all and wring our hands when everything goes to shit.

I swear some of you refuse to take a step back and acknowledge the reality that this city repeatedly takes it in the shorts when other communities in the state handle the exact same disasters with much less trouble.  This is a failure of leadership, and it will never change because we don't want it to.  You are the problem.  

Dude, we hate CoA government probably more than anyone but your blaming AE for trees falling all over the fucking city and taking out power lines is delusional.

[yoladu 4089]

4 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

holy shit. HEB William Cannon and Bluff. I think HEB had to throw out food because power went out. People are helping themselves to the trashed food in the dumpster. No idea if people are running through the store helping themselves. That would be bullshit.

from the caption

"We live a couple of neighborhoods over and have to travel north on Bluff Springs to get out of our neighborhood. My husband just texted to avoid going that way, as Bluff Springs and William Cannon is impassable. He said: I’m assuming the H‑E‑B lost power and mobs of people are raiding it and taking all the food they can grab. People are just parking in the middle of the street and running in. They are even taking all the food H‑E‑B threw out from the dumpsters."

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rz8nq/heb_william_cannon_and_bluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10rzqf1/at_heb_need_anything_william_cannonbluff_springs/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/10ryi26/heb_on_william_cannon_i35_bluff_springs/

 

yeah, but HEB is not having to pay for the power they are not receiving. amirite?

[Orange&White 5521]

1 minute ago, Samson's Wig said:

The city can come mow your yard if they want to, and they can tell you that you can't cut down a tree to build a shed or pool.  They sure as hell can come cut down a tree if it is deemed to be diseased or a public nuisance (you know, like threatening power lines).  They actually do this all the time for lots of reasons.  Do I want that power abused? 

So yes, you are just going to be overwhelmingly obtuse.

 

Are you saying that a perfectly healthy tree, 50 feet from the power lines, that is is 80 feet tall, with no limbs near the power lines, can just be sawed down because it MIGHT one day fall down on to the power line when a massive freeze comes? 

[crash_davis 23091]

4 minutes ago, Orange&White said:

So yes, you are just going to be overwhelmingly obtuse.

 

Are you saying that a perfectly healthy tree, 50 feet from the power lines, that is is 80 feet tall, with no limbs near the power lines, can just be sawed down because it MIGHT one day fall down on to the power line when a massive freeze comes? 

We should cut down all of the fucking trees in Austin and have a barren wasteland of uncut fields and grey soot covered buildings. That is called The Houston. But at least we will solve the problem of having to maintain trees or having them fall on power lines. 

Edited February 2, 2023 by crash_davis

[Bevo Num1 1011]

AISD said they'll let us know about school tomorrow by 3:30 pm today. Said that 20 schools are currently without power and besides that, many of the routes people take to school are impassible because of debris. 

No school for AISD tomorrow.

[Orange&White 5521]

1 minute ago, crash_davis said:

We should cut down all of the fucking trees in Austin and have a barren wasteland of uncut fields and grey soot covered buildings. That is called The Houston. But at least we will solve the problem of having to maintain trees or having them fall on power lines. 

Where will the warblers live? Murderer.

[crash_davis 23091]

Just now, Orange&White said:

Where will the warblers live? Murderer.

They can live in the tent cities with the thousands of other transient assholes.

[crash_davis 23091]

2 hours ago, Gourmand said:

Looking for a reputable arborist in the Round Rock area. 

Recs?

https://www.treesaregood.org/findanarborist/findanarborist

[Homercles 10205]

Sheets of ice are randomly falling off my roof and I cringe as it sounds just like trees crashing.  

I have ptsd from ice and trees.  Fuck you ‘mother’ fucking nature.  Lil bitch

[crash_davis 23091]

2 minutes ago, Homercles said:

Sheets of ice are randomly falling off my roof and I cringe as it sounds just like trees crashing.  

I have ptsd from ice and trees.  Fuck you ‘mother’ fucking nature.  Lil bitch

I have a ton of really large oak and pecan trees around my house. All morning they were shedding ice onto my roof. It sounded like I was in Kyiv being attacked by Russian. It was nuts.

[Brisketexan 104914]

1 hour ago, YGIFS said:

I think we should mandate it on new developments/ROW's...especially you can now so cheaply attach rural broadband to it and last I checked, expansion is going out into rural areas not in reverse.  As I've stated, not much you besides keep the lines clear of shit but people won't for myriad reasons.  

Most new developments do it anyway.  As mentioned above, the aesthetics help the developer sell more houses, and they're already trenching and laying underground utilities anyway, it doesn't add much cost when you're already doing it.  Especially in areas like Kyle, Buda, etc. (i.e., dirt, not rock).

Putting wires underground in W. Austin built on rock.....would be insanely expensive.

[faps 806]

1 hour ago, gsoda3 said:

it's a million dollars a mile to bury existing power lines with additional costs for maintenance.  good luck with that.

This seems low, honestly.

[Armybrat 40798]

41 minutes ago, yoladu said:

Those guys do God's work; i can say with near certainty they don't get paid enough.

That’s why I always tip each one $20 for Christmas.

Almost all our ice has melted….

 

[crash_davis 23091]

2 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Most new developments do it anyway.  As mentioned above, the aesthetics help the developer sell more houses, and they're already trenching and laying underground utilities anyway, it doesn't add much cost when you're already doing it.  Especially in areas like Kyle, Buda, etc. (i.e., dirt, not rock).

Putting wires underground in W. Austin built on rock.....would be insanely expensive.

It's all the same ROW and trench. If you are going to burying telecom fibers, might as well lay electrical wires in the same trench, or vice versa. Cost can be shared which makes it a much more cost effective endeavor than burying old infrastructure.

[crash_davis 23091]

3 minutes ago, Armybrat said:

That’s why I always tip each one $20 for Christmas.

 

[KaiserSoze 997]

32 minutes ago, Orange&White said:

Where will the warblers live?

 

Birds aren't real.

[BrickHorn 18207]

3 hours ago, Samson's Wig said:

Tell me you don't live in Austin without telling me you don't live in Austin.

I just spent 3 hours cleaning up about 1/10th of the tree debris in my Austin yard.  I don’t have time to get into a tax policy debate with you or to explain how stupid it is to defend Texas’s taxes by saying they’re as high as anywhere else in the US, as if trickle down idiocy was somehow limited to our fair state. But I do have time to say one thing before I leave my dark, cold house to spend the next 2 hours of daylight clearing tree branches: go fuck yourself. 

Edited February 2, 2023 by BrickHorn

[Brisketexan 104914]

And now....am trying to think about what we do with freezer and fridge contents.  When we go home, I think I'll check and see how they're holding up.   But we may be getting close to the point where we make the call on what we try to save, which I can do by loading them up and taking them over to dad's, who has extra freezer and fridge space in the garage.

Deciding whether we do that tonight, or tomorrow afternoon.  I think I'll just check the temp and status of things to guide that call.

I'm really getting tired of this disaster shit.

[crash_davis 23091]

4 minutes ago, BrickHorn said:

I just spent 3 hours cleaning up about 1/10th of the tree debris in my Austin yard.  I don’t have time to get into a tax policy debate with you or to explain how stupid it is to defend Texas’s taxes by saying they’re as high as anywhere else in the US, as if trickle down idiocy was somehow limited to our fair state. But I do have time to say one thing before I leave my dark, cold house to spend the next 2 hours of daylight clearing tree branches: go fuck yourself. 

Is that a sternly worded letter, cause that reads like a sternly worded letter?

[Deej 76735]

Fitlump on 590 KLBJ right now.

[crash_davis 23091]

2 minutes ago, Deej said:

Fitlump on 590 KLBJ right now.

getting ready

[Frank Drebin 5660]

37 minutes ago, faps said:

This seems low, honestly.

I was quoted a million a mile in the late 90s when I was looking into for a family member's rural property.

[Deej 76735]

According to her, the blame falls squarely on "the woke members of the city council."

Edited February 2, 2023 by Deej

[Pato del Muerto 52460]

29 minutes ago, Deej said:

Fitlump on 590 KLBJ right now.

Listened to her on the way to taking the dog to the vet.  She does have the political speech and some business buzz phrases down. 
 

did notice she said she was the vice- chair of austin energy I believe?

the 100 million annual gift was brought up, she wants to keep it for vegetation management. Didn’t hear anything about lines going from aerial to buried. 
 

city cares more about trees than energy was her sound byte. 

Edited February 2, 2023 by Pato del Muerto

[Deej 76735]

I wish they had been taking call-ins.

"Fitlump, how does your experience as a cam girl prepare you for these situations?"

[yoladu 4089]

yeah, for a 12 hour period today (mostly in daylight) they went from 156,000 customers without power at 5:00am to 146,479 by 4:30pm

roughly 10,000 customers got power restored today

something tells me there will be customers without power by 6pm Friday.

Edited February 2, 2023 by yoladu

[Pato del Muerto 52460]

1 minute ago, yoladu said:

yeah, for a 12 hour period today (mostly in daylight) they went from 156,000 customers without power at 5:00am to 146,479 by 4:30pm

roughly 10,000 got power restored today

something tells me there will be people without power by 6pm Friday.

How do you know that it wasn’t 50,000 people got power restored but 40,000 more lost power during that time?

[Deej 76735]

Just now, Pato del Muerto said:

How do you know that it wasn’t 50,000 people got power restored but 40,000 more lost power during that time?

[yoladu 4089]

2 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

How do you know that it wasn’t 50,000 people got power restored but 40,000 more lost power during that time?

I don't.... anyone on here lose power today, but had it yesterday?

 

who do you work for?! tell me now. 😀

Edited February 2, 2023 by yoladu

[Pato del Muerto 52460]

You’re not my supervisor!

[TexArcher 37744]

16 minutes ago, Deej said:

According to her, the blame falls squarely on "the woke members of the city council."

Did she actually say this?

[Deej 76735]

Yes.

And I'm sure you could hear Ed Clements furiously masterbating in the background.

Ed also added "I have people in Pemberton who lost power, too."

Thanks, Ed.

Edited February 2, 2023 by Deej

[Steel Shank 9421]

We lost power this morning sometime between 4 and 6am.

[4th&Five 41499]

10 minutes ago, yoladu said:

I don't.... anyone on here lose power today, but had it yesterday?

 

who do you work for?! tell me now. 😀

There were more lights out on my way home at 4 than there was on my way to work at 9. 

[Pato del Muerto 52460]

Hopefully all the ice is gone now and any headway they make restoring service is only buffered by people frying themselves doing limb removal from around the lines.  

[Brisketexan 104914]

Just now, Pato del Muerto said:

Hopefully all the ice is gone now and any headway they make restoring service is only buffered by people frying themselves doing limb removal from around the lines.  

As I understand it per recent reports, the ice is largely gone, meaning that NEW instances of trees falling on lines is not really happening.  So, now is when the work crews can start to make gains.  They just have a metric shitton of ground to cover.

[dcar00 14124]

29 minutes ago, Deej said:

According to her, the blame falls squarely on "the woke members of the city council."

well there are 9 of them so good chance some of them are at fault...

[Deej 76735]

[South Austin 52373]

Damn, nature.

[Godzillatron 292]

Dude, we hate CoA government probably more than anyone but your blaming AE for trees falling all over the fucking city and taking out power lines is delusional.

AE has statutory power to clear vegetation that could impact their lines. I’m fucking lucky they exercised this power in my neighborhood last month and came in and stripped vegetation on the ROW that was impacting the power lines. We didn’t lose power, and every house in my subdivision has significant tree damage. But nothing hit a power line. If AE was doing their job this would be happening proactively across their service area.

[Pato del Muerto 52460]

Posting a success story.   First pic is a repeat from upthread, second is recovery. 

[Willfully Horn 7984]

3 hours ago, Orange&White said:

There is a massive fucking chasm between keeping the lines clear of branches and what is happening right now.

Yep. Add that the past several years have been rough on trees. Were the trees in better health this wouldn’t have been as bad.

[PTINS 3456]

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

Most new developments do it anyway.  As mentioned above, the aesthetics help the developer sell more houses, and they're already trenching and laying underground utilities anyway, it doesn't add much cost when you're already doing it.  Especially in areas like Kyle, Buda, etc. (i.e., dirt, not rock).

Putting wires underground in W. Austin built on rock.....would be insanely expensive.

To do it after the fact, I agree on expense.

We moved to new build area on top of a limestone plateau with a thin veneer of topsoil, and all the utilities are buried. I'm guessing the developer opened the ditch, each utility installed their stuff, and developer closed the ditch.

Power line maintenance is ugly for both utilities and landowners.   Only in extreme cases do landowners ask the utility to come cut on their trees.  Once they are out there, do they make a cut for the next year, or one that will suffice for 10 years?

Blaming utility officials, weather people, etc. Good for you if it makes you feel better. You can only do so much, and mother nature always wins. Always.

Ice storms are prevalent in this part of the country, and there is not much you can do about it.  We consume more energy here than almost everywhere, because it is hotter here for more hours of the day, more days of the year, and it is humid, not dry.  At some point, the bigger lines have to go above ground. If they get enough ice on them, they are coming down.