OB -- Water emergency

I already wrote about this once.
The point of writing about it now is two things you might not have thought about.
One issue is flushing.
When there's a water emergency you CANNOT afford to be dainty.  You have to let the liquids build up and flush only about every 4th use or when there are solids.
1.  You need a bucket that holds at least 2 gallons of water.
2.  You need a bathtub full of water.
3.  You need to dip the bucket and get at least a gallon of water to flush the toilet.
See the video.
Even if you're on water restrictions, it should be possible to fill the tub once.  During the whole emergency. 
One emergency in my area lasted five days; it was a 64 inch water main.
The other issue is pumping.
A number of people moved into big properties in the country where the water was on an electric pump. 
Their water mains didn't break.
Their electricity broke.
They didn't have emergency drinking water.
They didn't have emergency flushing water.
The electricity was out for a week because they were way out in the country, with few people on a given line, and the electric company worked from most populated to least populated.
When I was growing up we lived on a farm for a while and it had a hand-powered artesian pump.
If you move out where you rely on well water, make sure that you have an artesian pump for your well besides the electric pump.  That's the only way you can deal with a power emergency.  Unless you have solar power for your pump or can hook it up to a generator.
And that gets me to the next subject.
© Patricia Jo Heil, 2013-2018 All Rights Reserved