It appears that hi-rise apartment buildings and hotels must be evacuated if power fails at Y2k for more than a day? Where is there good discussion of this problem?

-- Bruce L. Hicks (blathan@lazerlink.com), August 28, 1999

Answers

Bruce

Your best bet would be fire dept. and emergency service training manuals. Also, see if there is any refrence to the evecuation during the world trade center bombing. We probably learned a thing or two from that. (It provided a boat load of disaster recovery information to us IS geeks.)

Watch six and keep your...

-- eyes_open (best@wishes.net), August 28, 1999.

No, you don't have to evacuate. You could just sit there in the dark without water, 30 stories up...it would make a good observation post.

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), August 30, 1999.

Check with your local boards (board of health is another one) about what circumstances would cause the building to be condemned.

-- Brooks (brooksbie@hotmail.com), August 31, 1999.

Mad Monk, but how would one see thru the plumes of smoke? :)

-- JQ (onca@hotmail.com), August 31, 1999.

Preplan your location. Do not be in a large city much less a hotel or a high rise. Those locations are only for the 3 day bump in the road or the mythical snow storm.

-- gerad crane (cen84943@centuryinter.net), September 02, 1999.

Let's say Y2K already hit and it was bad enough to cause great misery to apartment dwellers. When things are fixed, will people be reluctant to go back to an apartment-dwelling life? Will new ideas be applied to apartment building architecture that take into consideration some of the problems that came with Y2K? Or will most people just want to live on the ground with land enough for a vegetable garden and a couple fruit trees. How would this impact the environment, ecology, city planning, business, and the economy? Would home-ownership increase? Would homes be more affordable?

Sincerely, Stan Faryna

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), September 08, 1999.

I live in a 4 story building with a different sort of set up. The apartments are 2 stories; like 2 story cubes stacked 2 deep. I've worked out how to stay warm, fed & alive in there during a Canadian winter...it's doable.

What concerns me is oncwe things start thawing...how many buildings will have to be condemned, abandoned or temporarily evacuated as they struggle to find & fix all the burst pipes?

-- Sue Smith (ssmith30@home.com), November 05, 1999.

As the administrator for senior citizens living in a 15 story highrise, HUD sponsored building, we have prepared our residents as well as we can. They have water, flashlights and food. They know it may be cold in their apartments with no power. But our elevators are on a generator. We have a kitchen with the walk in cooler and walk in freezer, as well as the icemaker on the generator. We do have emergency lights. We have tested more than once to make sure the fire system will work on the generator. Our stairwells are pressurized - meaning that smoke will not be able to enter the stairwells so they would not have to walk down. In a real emergency, the firemen and civil defense are prepared to carry them down. We are saying, if the power goes out, go out in the hall and check on your neighbors. Make an activity out of it. First is the icecream party. Everyone share! Staff: if schools are closed, bring your children and grandchildren. If radio's announce that only emergency workers report to work, then only the maintenance supervisor and I will show up.

-- Sue Parris (sy3175@aol.com), November 08, 1999.