The power is out… again. This can be a common occurrence on the island from time to time, and it is awful when it happens. I am writing this post at 9 a.m. on Monday, June 1st. The power has been out for more than 26 hours over the 48 hours (at the time of this writing). Is this normal? No. Does it happen more than it should. Yes. Will a power outage ruin your vacation? Well that depends on where you are staying.
Many villas and condos have backup power in the form of a generator or solar with batteries. If you are staying in one of these properties, your vacation will pretty much continue as normal. If you are staying at a property that does not have backup power during one of these extended outage, your vacation will be absolutely miserable and there is a high probability that you will never want to visit us again. And I would not blame you one bit.
If you do not have backup power, you also will not have water. We collect our rainwater, and store that water in a cistern. We need a pump to get that water into the house, and pumps need electricity to work. So no power means no water.
Also, lots of areas on island are dead zones in terms of cell service. I live in Fish Bay, and I only have wifi at my house. If I did not have backup power, I would not have any cellular service when the power goes out. So depending on where you are staying, no power also means no cell service.
No power. No water. No cell service. Total misery.
Ok, on to the positive…
Most of our business do have backup power, as long as their generators are working. This means that you can dine at most of your favorite restaurants and shop at your favorite shops during these outages. And you can always go to the beach, of course.
Now how often does this happen? Here is every time my house, which is feeder 9E, lost power since January 1st. St. John has two feeders – 9E and 7E.
- May 31st: Went out around 8 p.m. and still out at the time of this writing. 13+ hours and counting.
- May 31st: Out 351pm-635pm
- May 31st: Out 943am-1258pm
- May 31st: Out 1253am-221am
- May 30th: Out 616pm-1222am
- May 6th: Out 925pm-425am
- April 23rd: Out 140pm-147pm
- April 2nd: Out 918am-1159am
- March 31st: 918am-344pm
- March 29th: 752pm-309pm – 19 hours!
- March 28th: 814pm-1125pm
- March 19th: 725pm-1114pm
- March 19th: 1147am-454pm
- March 16th: 748pm-1208am
- March 16th: 740pm-745pm
- March 16th: 730pm-735pm
- March 15th: 232pm-728pm the following day – 17 hours!
- March 14th: 956pm-1141am – 14 hours!
- Feb. 21st: 11am-106pm
- Feb. 20th: 801pm-1009pm
- Feb. 18th: 1145am-130pm
- Feb. 7th: 619pm-623pm
- Feb. 6th: 519pm-615pm
- Feb. 5th: 916am-1137am
- Feb. 2nd: 957pm-1002pm
- Feb. 1st: 419pm-434pm
- Jan. 31st: 2pm-530pm
- Jan. 29th: 641pm-704pm
- Jan. 29th: 522pm-537pm
- Jan. 28th: 432pm-520pm
- Jan. 20th: 703pm-911pm
Now let’s be honest, not everyone is going to feel badly for you if you are here on vacation and do not have power. I see the comments chastising people on the social media pages all of the time. The sentiment I’m seeing is that it is your vacation while this is our life.
I literally had a conversation with my son Dalton this morning. He is seven years old. I told him that power outages are not normal or that they should not be considered to be normal.
“Yeah they are mom,” he responded.
Herein lies the problem.
We have children growing up on an island where they are used to not having power. They are used to having to stay home from school due to no power. They are used to businesses being closed due to no power. They are used to watching their friends and families struggle due to no power. None of this is right, and none of this is acceptable.
Will it ever change? I have zero faith that it will. I hope it does, but, sadly, I just do not see it happening.
So what can you do? You NEED to rent a place that has backup power. I can’t fix this for those of us who live here, but I can definitely share some advice for those of you who plan to vacation here.
YOU NEED BACKUP POWER.
There is a press conference happening today at 10:30 a.m. Hopefully they will have some promising news. Fingers crossed everyone.