Anyone Sleep Through Power Outage

[Architect]

Years ago, I would wake up immediately, soon as power shut off, felt I couldn't breathe. My block had power outages every other month, due to all types of reasons, mainly due to overgrown trees on the power lines, wind and squirrels.... Long story short, power company finally took action. Past several years, once/twice a year due to severe windy thunderstorms, I sleep right through power outage. Over the years, believe I adjusted. Power usually is restored 30 minutes.

I was told by the power company, all I need to do is mail/fax physician letter. Medical letters from residence is priority, ensures power restored first.

[tlohse]

Power Outages don't happen to often around here. But I have experienced a few with out issues.

[stevenal]

As a power company employee, I can say that medical priority is mainly fictitious. Any outage needs to be restored from the point of failure. In most cases you and your non-medical neighbor will be restored simultaneously. The cases where actual priority can be given are rare. Suggest arranging backup power if you truly have a medical need.

My wife likes to have fans on, so the silence will wake me. I then call the outage line, use the head, and go back to sleep with my battery backed up CPAP.

[chunkyfrog]

As a power company employee, I can say that medical priority is mainly fictitious. Any outage needs to be restored from the point of failure. In most cases you and your non-medical neighbor will be restored simultaneously. The cases where actual priority can be given are rare. Suggest arranging backup power if you truly have a medical need.

My wife likes to have fans on, so the silence will wake me. I then call the outage line, use the head, and go back to sleep with my battery backed up CPAP.

Or, if the outage is expected to be extended, and you don't have the resources;
get your cpap, jammies, and toothbrush to a shelter.
Call local emergency management for directions.

[Architect]

As a power company employee, I can say that medical priority is mainly fictitious. Any outage needs to be restored from the point of failure. In most cases you and your non-medical neighbor will be restored simultaneously. The cases where actual priority can be given are rare. Suggest arranging backup power if you truly have a medical need.

My wife likes to have fans on, so the silence will wake me. I then call the outage line, use the head, and go back to sleep with my battery backed up CPAP.

Hi friend, thanks for info, understand what you share completely, depending upon outages. If city wide outage, power is restored to crucial locations such as hospitals, emergency facilities, nursing homes, etc... Also, depends on the size of the city, I live in a very small city. Longest I"ve been without power is 8 hours past 20 years, when a powerline pole fell to the ground, larger cities can be without power for a week to a month, in my state due to severe weather, hurricane, tornado, etc... Thank goodness, I never had to experience. I can still sleep without bipap, believe power company was referring to those with severe disabilities requiring oxygen.

[Janknitz]

It always wakes me immediately when the power goes out or my CPAP gets accidentally unplugged. It feels like it's suddenly sucking the air out of me (yes, I know its NOT really doing that!) instead of blowing it in. I When I was new to CPAP and wearing a FF mask, I had to study with the anti-asphyxiation valve carefully until I trusted it would really work during a power outage.

As a power company employee, I can say that medical priority is mainly fictitious. Any outage needs to be restored from the point of failure. In most cases you and your non-medical neighbor will be restored simultaneously. The cases where actual priority can be given are rare. Suggest arranging backup power if you truly have a medical need.

Curious about that. My office is located on what is known locally as a "Hospital Corridor" (two hospitals in close proximity) which is spared from scheduled power outages (in California we are having these in times of high winds to supposedly reduce the fire danger from live downed power lines). Recently we had a power outage that was unexpected and pretty widespread, but the people on the hospital corridor said their power was only out a few seconds while the rest of us had no power for about 3 hours. Is it possible that there's another "grid" connection for that hospital corridor?

During the planned outages (which have sometimes lasted several days!) I can recharge my battery powered generator at my office and have enough power to run my CPAP for the night.

[Pugsy]

Years ago when I asked the power company about any special treatment in regards to power outages since I had to use a special machine at night and I was told no special treatment except I would be one of the ones notified first in the event of a planned outage of some sort....and those outages are always in the day and I did get one...once... years ago.

The one outage that I slept 22 minutes through happened to start at about 6 AM...and lasted a couple of hours.
Some dumb ass ran off the road about a mile from my house and took out a power pole.
Otherwise I have been really lucky but winters have been mild with minimal snow, ice outages as the electric company has been really aggressive with tree trimming around here. In fact we got a notice not long ago that again the power company will be trimming tree branches that are within a certain distance to power lines.

[SJ-Paddler]

Thanks Guys for the many perspectives.

I was debating getting a backup battery, they are not cheap for the number of watt hours you need. Most of the time power outages are just for a few minutes or hours.

However last year we did have a 48 hour outage which cost us some food. Wondering if money is better spent on a generator. But then again for the once in 5 years occurrence just not sure it is worth it.

[Pugsy]

However last year we did have a 48 hour outage which cost us some food. Wondering if money is better spent on a generator. But then again for the once in 5 years occurrence just not sure it is worth it.

This is what we did. Or I guess I can lay it on my husband since he was the one that really wanted it.
We did compromise and not get a massive fancy generator though. It is a gas powered but electric start (I have trouble with pull start stuff because I can't pull strong enough) but big enough to handle the really important stuff like fridge and my cpap and if I am careful we can use it for the other stuff like TV (important to hubby more than me).

We also had a licensed electrician come out and do the wiring to the house so it would be safe....he cost more than the generator cost. Generator was 1100 and electrician was 1700....hubby says it was worth it for his peace of mind and it has been used once in the over 5 years it has been in place....and for 4 hours during the day. I forget why we had that outage.
He was home when it happened or else it probably wouldn't have been used....like I said his TV is important to him.
My husband is OTR truck driver and he wanted me covered just in case he was gone and we had a sustained outage for some reason. Periodically he goes out and drains the gas and all that stuff and runs the generator for a little while without diverting it to the hose just to make sure it works like it is supposed to and will start.

[zonker]

Thanks Guys for the many perspectives.

I was debating getting a backup battery, they are not cheap for the number of watt hours you need. Most of the time power outages are just for a few minutes or hours.

However last year we did have a 48 hour outage which cost us some food. Wondering if money is better spent on a generator. But then again for the once in 5 years occurrence just not sure it is worth it.

yeah, a generator is definitely worth considering. i know it's a fairly big investment and i'm privileged enough to afford it. it did take some consideration, though, as i'm well known cheapskate.

however, like pugsy, i live rurally. and near an earthquake corridor. also like pugsy, it's usually some idiot hitting a power pole. but, in the two years previous to the generator we've had 3 times where the power has been out for 4 plus hours at a time.

not sure if i'd have been so quick to buy if it was once in five years.

tough call.

[stevenal]

I had a portable generator before I had a CPAP battery. Drag it out of garage by flashlight in the rain, connect and start it before going back to bed. And make sure to keep this thirsty thing fueled. Not too conducive to sleep. Decided to go with a battery, and if needed, start the generator in the morning to recharge the battery.

Permanent standby generator systems are available of course. They will sense the outage, start the generator and transfer over all automatically. The battery was significantly cheaper.

[Janknitz]

Thanks Guys for the many perspectives.

I was debating getting a backup battery, they are not cheap for the number of watt hours you need. Most of the time power outages are just for a few minutes or hours.

However last year we did have a 48 hour outage which cost us some food. Wondering if money is better spent on a generator. But then again for the once in 5 years occurrence just not sure it is worth it.

A lot of my neighbors have gas powered generators because of the frequent fire prevention power outages. But a cautionary tale--generators have to be maintained by running them monthly so that the gas (and oil?) don't dry up and clog the mechanism. Down the street last year a neighbor dutifully ran his generator for maintenance, and then put it away in a shed. It was still hot. It caught the shed on fire, burned down half of his house and his neighbor's garage. The flames were shooting 30 feet above his house. This was scary as hell because we live on a narrow street at the edge of town where in 2017 we lost 4000 houses overnight in wildfires (Santa Rosa, California). The firetrucks took up our entire street and there was no way for US to get our cars out to evacuate if that fire spread in our neighborhood because of drought conditions. The repairs on the neighbor's house are still unfinished more than a year later.

When we have power outages for fire prevention they are in the hottest days of summer (temperatures over 100) and we have no AC so we sleep with windows open. The gas fumes are choking and the noise from all the neighbors' generators is significant. We chose not to have a generator for these reasons. Now after that fire, a lot of neighbors are switching to solar with Tesla storage batteries. Because all of our major appliances are gas powered we can't make the finances work to go solar, though. But if that makes economic sense for you, go solar--safer and cleaner. I'm thinking of investing in enough portable solar panels to recharge my battery generator that runs my CPAP at night when necessary. And we try not to store a lot of expensive food in the freezer all summer because we lost a freezer full the year before last. At least we still have our home!

[Wulfman...]

Hi Guys:

You long timers must have dealt with power outages in the past. How long does it normally take to wake you up?

This morning I just noticed my clocks were blinking meaning we lost power. After looking at Oscar I saw it was a tiny 1 minute and 20 second outage.

I never woke up, like it did not happen. I would have thought the SECOND the power goes out breathing would be so hard it would automatically wake you up. I am sure if it went on for 15 minutes I would be awake but just wondering on other experiences.

Thanks.

Bullshit!

Get a friggin' UPS battery backup and plug your machine into it........if the power goes off, your UPS will start beeping immediately!!!

Problem solved.

Den

,

[SleepyCPAP]

A recent power outage seemed to show it took me about a minute to wake, two more minutes of hard breathing and wondering why it seemed so hard, then awake enough to realize power was off. My O2Ring showed my SpO2 dipped a couple points for that time. I got my 12 adaptor hooked up to the small (wheelchair type) battery I keep at my bedside, and slept until morning. The clocks showed the power outage was two hours but I hadn’t noticed that.

- SleepyCPAP

[SleepGeek]

First of all I think a battery is a much better choice to power a cpap during any power outage.

In most campgrounds running a generator after quiet hours is not permitted and I would think that during a neighborhood outage that neighbors would also appreciate the sound of silence. It seems that when the power goes out (or at nite) that sound travels quite a way.

But I have to wonder just how one could manage to put any generator away packed so that it would start a fire? Maybe blankets on top of the muffler? idk

Down the street last year a neighbor dutifully ran his generator for maintenance, and then put it away in a shed. It was still hot. It caught the shed on fire, burned down half of his house and his neighbor's garage.