The Weak Are Meat, the Strong Do Eat

"The Weak Are Meat, the Strong Do Eat"

These chilling words, spoken by the nefarious Dr. Henry Goose, in David Mitchell's fascinating and intriguingly non-linear book, Cloud Atlas: A Novel, came back to me yesterday evening when the entirety of Ucluelet, Tofino and Port Albion suffered through a seventeen-hour power failure.

How easily do we take for granted the luxury, and indeed in today's society, the necessity of having electric power, and how quickly do we become incapacitated by its absence. Our power went out at 1:30 PM when we were entertaining a new friend, Vi Mundy, having coffee and talking about local and family history and other topics. The smoke detectors uttered a sudden declarative chirp, and when I went to check things out, it wasn't until I noticed that the clocks on the stove and microwave were off that I realized the power had failed.

As the afternoon wore on, I was able to use my iPhone to check the BC Hydro website and look at their Outage Report page, which duly informed me how much of the area was affected and that the estimated restoration time was 4:00 PM. OK, we thought, we'll just wait it out. The trouble was that 4:00 PM came and went and at 4:08 PM, the estimation became 6:00 PM. That time came and went and still no power... And no further updates.

 

Luckily, we have a gas grill and I was able to prepare an excellent meal without any real problem. But what about those without a grill (or a generator)? What about all the tourists in both towns whose hotels would be either running on generators, or worse yet dark. How many restaurants in the area would have generators powerful enough? How long would the generators last? The Co-ops gen-set packed it in after a while and left them with a freezer section that was roped off and unavailable the next day.

As the evening wore on (and thank god it stays light fairly late right now), I kept checking the BC Hydro site, and got more and more frustrated... No further updates! What is the point of having an outage page with which to communicate with the public, and then not keep it up to date during a major system failure? This is just plain stupid. They classified the problem as "Substation Fault", so this was equipment-based... not from a storm, not due to overload from air conditioners (virtually no need here on the coast, as even during this heat wave, we are about 12 degrees cooler than further east), this was a failure of their equipment.

We went to bed in the anticipation that certainly the power would be back on soon, and I had a fitful night, waking often to glance over, hoping to see the flashing red numerals on my clock radio, and worrying about the roughly $200 worth of Costco meat we'd recently brought home and put in our freezer. At 4:03 AM, I checked the Hydro site once again, and yeah, you guessed it, no updates... it still said that the estimated time for restoration was 6:00 PM the previous evening! Now I certainly realize what "estimated" means, but you know what, I would expect that someone there would have the sense to put some more detailed explanation for their customers to see, even if it is that the fault is still being diagnosed and is 'to be determined'. But obviously BC Hydro either did not care, or simply dropped the ball. Either way, I find this completely unsatisfactory.

 

We finally got up around 6:00 AM and I had to make tea using the grill. Finally, at around 7:30 AM, the power did finally come on, again with no further info from good ol' BC Hydro.

 

This experience, however, goes to show just how much dependence we have on our modern technology. Now we've all seen the dystopian movies showing the post-apocalyptic breakdown of society and how nasty things get. But take a moment and just think about this 17-hour outage, and what will happen when we have the big quake here. (Notice I said 'when', not 'if', because there's no doubt whatsoever that it's going to happen... we're SO overdue, it's a virtual certainty.) If you're lucky enough to live through the quake itself and the aftershocks, let alone the resulting tsunami (due about 15-minutes after the initial quake), what about supplies to keep you alive for probably weeks if not months before relief arrived?

You aren't going to drive out... Highway 4 is just about falling off its foundations now. After a major quake, huge chunks of it would be gone, especially around Kennedy Lake. And roads would be littered with fallen trees, power lines and poles, and god knows what else. So you're stuck here. Why would relief take so long? Because it would be centred in the major population areas like Victoria and Vancouver. We'd only be reachable by air or water and with our minuscule population we'd be so far down on the list we'd be inconsequential.

In addition, the tsunami, if it left anything at all on the peninsula, would have left only small areas, virtual islands in the path of devastation, unconnected and without resources to support survivors for any appreciable length of time. And unfortunately, the communities here have such an incredible lack of any type of emergency planning and forethought that droves would probably die. Yes, you're supposed to have your 'earthquake kit' of supplies and make your way to the local rendezvous point (in our case, the Ucluelet High School, which is perhaps 4 or 5 whole metres higher than where we live), but what then? How long do the supplies last? How long before things really get desperate? Do you share your food with your neighbor because he didn't cache enough himself? What happens when your medications run out? How long does it take before those with the guns take from those that don't?

It's not a pretty picture, is it? The dystopian future awaits us, no question about it. A couple of months ago, while researching tsunami preparedness, we came across a sobering article entitled 'You're all going to die. (Whatever)' written by Jacqueline Windh, a PhD Structural Geologist, that talked about the eventualities of what will occur when the big one hits. Everyone in the area should read it. This is written by someone who is knowledgable and truly concerned about the probabilities and possibilities. Concerned enough to sell her house on Chesterman Beach and move high up in Port Alberni.

We originally moved out here, signing a one-year lease to see how we would like it, and we do love it. We love the beaches, the trails and the people. But, I have to admit to being very concerned about the scenario I've painted above. As we draw closer to the end of our lease period, we've been discussing staying or moving back to the mainland. One big factor that is pushing us in that direction is simply family... my three kids all live in the Langley area, and I miss them terribly. And as much as we've hoped we'd see them out here for visits, it's difficult. It's a long way, it takes a long time, and it's getting more and more expensive on the ferries. And young people often just don't have the time. So, we've decided to consider this a year-long vacation in a place that has been remarkable, breathtaking, and unparalleled. And yes, we'll miss it terribly. The beaches, the trails, living right in the rainforest, it's been a dream come true.

But, as with all things in life, sometimes you just have to move on.