On the whole, I love living alone. Maybe I’m just selfish. Or maybe I just find that putting up with my own idiosyncracies is easier than putting up with someone else’s.
However, when it comes to red weather warnings, I’ve realised that it might be reassuring to have some company because I have to admit that I was a little worried (maybe even scared) last week both during and after Storm Eowyn had passed.
Although I was aware that a major weather event had been forecast for last Friday for all of Northern Ireland (I don’t live under a rock after all), it was hard to believe the evening before that something so extreme was on its way. As usual, I’d gone to running club and had got home just after 7. I’d really enjoyed the run, not least because the weather was so mild.
Equally, however, I realise now that I must have started to worry a couple of hours beforehand when my mobile phone suddenly began making a very loud noise, a bit like a siren. It reminded me of the sound that we used to hear from the local fire station in Coleraine when it was summoning the fire fighters to action. These days, of course, it’s done by text which is a lot quieter. Anyway, this was far from quiet and was really disconcerting as I couldn’t figure out where it was coming from.
Then I realised my phone was flashing wildly at me with a text warning which read as follows:
“Severe alert issued by the UK and Scottish governments
“A RED warning for wind has been issued. Extremely strong winds associated with Storm Eowyn are expected to cause significant disruption from 10am on Friday 24 January 2025. Strong winds can present a danger to life causing flying debris, falling trees and large waves around coastal areas. Stay indoors if you can. It is unsafe to drive in these conditions. Avoid coastal areas.
“The storm may damage infrastructure causing power cuts and disruption to mobile phone coverage. Consider gathering torches, batteries, a mobile phone power pack and other essential items you already have at home.
“Stay up to date with the weather forecast and follow advice from emergency services, network operators and local authorities”
That really put the wind up me (sorry, awful pun) and I have to say that I did, at that point, plug in my mobile phone power pack.
According to the Mail Online (not my usual go-to for information but it was the only site I could find that had the actual text that had appeared on my phone), people have been complaining because the alert was so loud. It even scared their pets, for goodness sake but then what can you expect from these lefties? Then again, it’s called a siren for a reason. I can’t remember what I did to get rid of the message but I think it disappeared as soon as the warning sound ended.
I was surprised that Mail readers weren’t questioning how the government had got hold of all these mobile numbers. No doubt they will in time. Or maybe they’re happy to receive weather warnings that might just have saved their lives. Who the hell knows?
Anyway, the wording in the alert had obviously been filtering through my brain subconsciously while I was out running because by the time I got back home I’d decided that I needed to move my three bins (one for general rubbish, one for garden and food waste and one for recyclables) from the side of the house where they were attached to hooks in the wall with bungee cords. Even in less severe winds they tend to move around a bit.
So for once in my life I took preemptive action and moved them to the back of the house which is much more sheltered. Just to be sure they wouldn’t get tossed around I put a brick on top of each of them. But then my brain went into overdrive or anxiety mode or both. Perhaps one wouldn’t be enough. So I went outside again and added another one to each bin.
But then (oh, yes, there’s more) I started to worry that the bricks might fly off and hurl themselves through my windows. That meant I had to go back out yet again, remove the bricks, move the bins away from the windows and put the bricks back on. By this point, it was raining and the wind had started to gain momentum.
Satisfied I’d done all I could, I went to bed and somehow managed to sleep until about 6am by which point the wind had started to sound quite angry. I looked out my front window to see that a nearby tree had already fallen. Luckily the wind had caught it in such a way that it came down onto the grassy area behind it rather than across the small road in front of it that runs alongside my cul de sac. Had it done so, no one would have been able to get in or out but then again no one was going anywhere.
There was also a large branch being blown about in a strange dance with the wind which was brought to an abrupt halt when it hit a fence just outside a building across the road from me.
After that, I worried about losing power as I knew that there were outages all over the province as a result of falling trees, tiles that had become separated from their roofs and other flotsam and jetsam that was now flying about where they shouldn’t. In a rather threatening development, my lights started to flicker.
Even more worryingly, my friend who lives in an over-55s complex in Kilrea and who I wrote about in an earlier blogpost messaged me to say that he and his fellow “inmates” had lost power. So no heat, no light and no internet. My worst nightmare. Quite why a complex for older people has no generator is a bit of a mystery. Luckily they were reconnected about 10pm that evening but others have not been so fortunate. I have a couple of friends from running club who are still waiting to be hooked back up.
But although it may seem that I’ve been incredibly lucky, it’s not really luck for one very good reason. That is: there are no overhead power cables to sway precariously from pylons to my house. As it’s a new build and the builder is a good one, they are all buried underground and therefore not susceptible to the vagaries of high winds. Okay, the rats might get at them but at least I’m protected from storms for which I’m very grateful.
However, I’m not taking anything for granted and I’ve decided that I will plan ahead for once in my life for the next storm which no doubt is immiment. As I’m completely dependent on electric power, that means buying a decent torch, some tilly lights, a camping gas stove and an ethanol heater to ensure that I don’t freeze to death. Even if I never use them, I’ll know they’re there which will make me feel better.
What would be better still of course would be action on the part of our politicians to reduce our emissions so that these kinds of extreme weather events don’t keep happening. However, that seems unlikely given that people keep voting for climate change deniers, irrespective of their own experience of floods, fires, hurricanes and droughts whilst simultaneously ignoring the mass of scientific evidence out there showing that we, as humans, are bringing this about on ourselves.
Sometimes I’m glad I’m 70 because - unless we come to our senses - it looks like things can only get worse. Sorry to be so pessimistic but I just can’t see how we’re going to dig our way out of this particular hole. If anyone has any optimist ideas or thoughts to share, please feel free.