We had a little more snow last night. It was still just a dusting, but heavier than yesterday. Porch temperature is -1. Wind chill is forecast to be -13 and the high is forecast to be 20.
The snow surprised me, because I thought it was too cold to snow. I can recall my father saying that long northern Pennsylvania winters. Apparently, it isn’t true. At least, Professor Google says it’s never too cold to snow.
I can’t remember the last time it was below zero here, but it may have been as long as 15 or 20 years ago. I believe that I’ve seen it as low as -10, with -5 more common. But I don’t keep records of those things, so I don’t really know.
The Blue Ridge Mountain EMC has announced more outages on their Facebook page:
“TVA has issued Step 50 of the Emergency Load Curtailment Plan effective at 6:31 am. BRMEMC is in the process of responding and will begin rolling temporary interruptions of general firm load in the next few minutes. During this time there will be brief interruptions of service 15 minutes each hour in order to attempt to stabilize the grid.”
“Attention BRMEMC Members: The extreme cold weather has and continues to create an unprecedented demand for energy across the Tennessee Valley. Earlier today, TVA notified BRMEMC that they would be initiating Step 50 which requires all the local power companies to force brief, intermittent outages strategically throughout our system to help curtail the demand on the grid. It is very likely that BRMEMC and all other local power companies will be asked to do this again this evening and throughout the night. We’re making you aware so that you can plan accordingly and reduce energy consumption without compromising safety. These will be brief intervals of power outages to help ease the stress and demand on the grid. Our crews and personnel will be working around the clock to ensure we’re doing all that is asked to keep our system operational and to assist our members. Please keep check on all your family, friends, elderly neighbors, pets and more.”