Houston will have an ice storm early Monday morning. We'll have about 12 hours of ice, and temperatures below freezing, then it will melt.
People are panic buying at the stores. Businesses will close 2 days in advance.
It's scary... almost like a mini mini ice-age.
In the past, cultures would sacrifice a virgin to a volcano to assuage the climate gods.
Is Greta Thunberg doing anything on Saturday?
Houston area person here. I was here for the big freeze of 1989 where shit tons of pipes burst in Houston. (pipes are typically in our attics and our hose bibs are exposed because it is cheaper and isn’t a problem very much) I will be using every trick in the book to prevent my pipes from freezing and bursting.
Can you let me know if there's anything I'm forgetting? We have a sprinkler system and I've turned off the water to it and drained it and wrapped it. We are also planning to let water trickle in the house over night. Is just in bathroom sinks enough or do we need to run every faucet?
If you can close off the sprinkler system from inside the house or under ground it would be best. If not, double wrap the part coming up out of the ground. I just had a cutoff valve installed inside my garage. Those things freeze easily. I’ve already had two freeze and break on me. (old house and new house). Old house was because I didn’t know to drain though. New house burst a metal piece.
I bought a small heater to heat the part inside my garage where my well’s pressure tank and piping are.
The part you are forgetting is water supply to toilets, washing machine, and ice maker. For my ice maker I will simply dump the ice and just have it make ice all night. I’ll flush toilets during the night. Like now, I tend to be up in the middle of the night a lot. (dinural sleeping). Not sure what I’m going to do with the washing machine. Dishwasher is fed from the kitchen faucet, so with kitchen faucet running it’s not a problem.
I’m also considering opening my attic doors to heat the attic. I have two furnaces for my two story and heat rises so I might be able to do it.
I did read that the pipe water temperature has to get down to just below 20 before it starts to freeze. The water has to super cool before it actually freezes.
You only need one. Get all the water you need. Turn off the water at the furthest point from your house you have access to (typically at the street). turn off the WH. Open everything. Don't let the WH freeze. Ok it's a system.
I think this is the route we’re going to go unless there is a power outage. g8rb81 isn’t really wrong. It’s just that we have a well and I want water to move through the well head to prevent it from freezing. (yes it is wrapped and we have oleanders growing around it, but it’s going to get damn cold). Even for much milder freezes I have seen one unprotected well head freeze in the neighborhood. My neighbor’s hose bib froze and burst on the corner of his garage when it was only in the teens. Single digits is serious business in Houston.