Lessons Learned -- Another FUD Story.

F

FUD

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Those that have been following some of my posts, know that I was thinking about having a home security system installed (House Alarms : Added Safety or False Security) because between work and getting paged at all hours of the night; and the little one waking up at all hours of the night and wanting to play; and the time I spend on TFL (1,000 posts in six months), when I go to sleep, I really sleep. I came to the conclusion that all of my guns and my ability to use them would be of little use if someone gets the jump on me before I even have a chance to get my hands on one.

So, this week-end we had a security system installed which we've been setting when we go to bed and when we leave the house.

Well, this morning before the sun came up (I believe it was just before 5am), the house alarm went off. I rolled out of bed and grabbed my S&W4006 which I keep in a bolted down strongbox with a simplex lock on it. I've practiced getting the gun out without looking at the combination and had the gun in hand on the very first try.

My wife grabbed the phone and discovered that the line was dead! :eek:

At this point, the baby started crying -- awakened and frightened by the loud alarm still going off. My wife grabbed the cell phone and closely followed me out of our bedroom as she attempted to turn it on. As we made our way toward the baby's room, we quickly noticed something: the house was dark -- totally dark!

What's so unusually about this is that I have the whole house wired with timers and censor lights -- some which go on when they sense something moving while others which go on when the darkness falls beyond a certain level. Well, none of this was working and we were completely in the dark.

Before we got more than half way through the house, the lights turned back on and the alarm stopped.

It turns out that we had a brief power failure lasting less than a minute. Under these conditions, the alarm is designed to run off the back-up battery and alert you to a possible security breach.

When the power came back on, we checked on the baby and as my wife tried to put her back to sleep, I checked the house and everything was fine.

This little event thought me the following things:<UL TYPE=SQUARE><LI> I've pretty much ignored conventional wisdom about keep a flashlight near my bed because I had the whole house wired with all different types of lights and I felt that I didn't need a flashlight as it would be one extra thing that I would have to carry. I was wrong. If somebody breaks in and kills the power, I'll be facing someone in the dark. Consequently, I now have a flashlight near my bed. I also purchased a few of those emergency back-up lights from HomeDepo (the kind that businesses have on EXIT signs in the event of a power failure) and I installed them throughout the house in key locations so that no matter where you might be, if the power goes out, there will be some light shining in your direction. I'm also going to look into getting a tactical light and mounting it on my pistol.
<LI> In future emergencies, I grab my gun and the flashlight while my wife grabs her gun and the cell phone.</UL>I just wanted to share this so that others could benefit from it and if anyone else has any other observations to add, please feel free. Regards,

FUD
fud-nra.gif


PS: One more point -- if power failures like this are more common than I realize and this type of thing happens again, I'm beginning to question the "wisdom" of getting the house alarm.
 
Hard to beat a dog or 2 for a house alarm. Also consider getting a Surefire flashlight or 2. Very bright beam.
 
No flashlight beside the bed??!! Geeez, Fud, you don't live in earthquake country, do you??

My wife and I have kept four cell Mag lights beside each side of the bed, for many, many years. In the 1994 Northridge earthquake in Los Angeles, it was surely nice to be able to grab those flashlights (after we had been nearly tossed out of bed), illuminate our shoes, and then walk through a lot of broken glass without cutting our feet.

Flashlights are for more than shooting bandits. FWIW. J.B.
 
No Jay, I don't live in earthquake country. I moved down to the southern Florida swamps about a year ago and I'm still getting use to my environment and I miss the heavy snows of the cold north.
 
FUD - another point you just discovered. You shouldn't have an AC powered phone as the only phone in your safe room (in your case it sounds like your bedroom is your safe room). It's ok to have an AC phone with all the bells and whistles, but you should also have a phone that is powered only by the telco line even if it isn't always connected - just switch plugs when necessary. That way you will have phone access in case of a power failure or in the extremely rare case where the perp throws your breakers (actually I think that only happens in the movies). A charged cell phone is an even better idea if you have good reception. It doesn't even have to be registered on a cell system to call 911.

[This message has been edited by Mal H (edited August 03, 2000).]
 
Thanks for the words of wisdom, FUD. I can't remember when I didn't have a handy flashlight next to my bed.

Best alarm system in the world is geese, preferably a dozen or so. Dogs are also good.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by FUD:
My wife grabbed the phone and discovered that the line was dead! :eek:[/quote]

What kind of phone are you using? One that plugs into 120v AC? A cordless? Get a regular "old fashioned" phone as it is rare that the power and the phoneline should go out at the same time, unless the lines are cut by something(Tree falling or BadGuy). A phone that requires AC to work WILL go out with the power but the "old" kind run on the power(24v?) that comes in on the phone line.


I see Mal H beat me to tell you this...Damn I type slow... :o

[This message has been edited by LongArms (edited August 03, 2000).]
 
LongArms & Mal H, the phone was a cordless phone. Once power was cut to the base, the handset obviously didn't work. We have a couple of regular phones without any bells & whistles which don't run on AC but the original thinking was the a cordless phone could be taken with us as we make our way to get the baby and we could still remain in contact with '911' -- it appears that thinking was flawed and now needs to be revisited. Additionally, once we get to within about half a mile of our house, cell phone service starts to break up for some reason. In our home we appear to have 1 or 0 bars of strength which isn't enough to place a call.

It's actually good to discover these type of things in advance so that you can correct them for the future.

-- FUD.
 
Fud,

Those cordless phones often have a pass through jack on the back of them. Plug in the old Ma Bell phone into this should allow you land line when no power.
 
Get a flashlight that has momentary capability, you can turn it on and off just by pressing gently on the button.

There are two schools of thought on what kind of flashlight. D-cell Maglites are bright and make a dandy bludgeon for the off hand but they are large and hinder a two-handed shooting grip. The tactical lights such as Surefire are bright enough to be used as a temporary blinding weapon but are fragile. The plus side to them is that they are small enough to hold between the fingers of the support hand and are designed to be held and used that way. The light is parallel with the bore axis of the gun and a two-handed grip is still being used to steady the weapon.

Mounting the light on the gun is an option. But then you are pointing a gun at everything you want to illuminate (like the toddler in the crib) and you cannot hold the light away from your body if you think that may be called for.

The best use of a flashlight in a tactical situation is momentary flashes to illuminate questionable targets. DON'T search a house with the light constantly activated as you can easily be spotted and tracked by an intruder long before you see them.
 
Let's see, two things, find a better cell phone company. If it is a monitored alarm system, you will probably find you phone dead anyway. The alarm will take over the phone, to dial out. You will get it back eventually, but even if it takes a minute, it will feel like forever. And yes definatly get a regular phone, and a large extension cord. Seriously, before the advent of the wonderful cordless phones, people used to walk around with 50 ft or 100 ft cords attached. Get a cheap 19 dollar phone, and 100 foot cord and put it under the bed so no one trips on it. In an emergency when you need the reach to get to the baby room, you have a phone that doesn't rely on power.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by TBeck: ... DON'T search a house with the light constantly activated as you can easily be spotted and tracked by an intruder long before you see them.[/quote]Good point. Thanks, FUD.
 
You may want to consider getting a battery backup for your alarm system. We have one on each PC here in the hospital. They'll give the computer about 20 minutes of running time in case of a power outage. We do have emergency generator power, but that takes some time to come up to full, clean power.

You may want to see if you could disable the power outage alarm. You want to know if one of the sensors is triggered, not if there's a blackout.
 
MrKandiyohi, the alarm DOES have a battery back-up -- that's why the darn thing started screaming when the power went off but you have a good point able disabling the power outage alarm feature. I'll have to read the 40+ page manual when I get home tonight to see if I can do that. FUD.
 
FUD - this brings up another point. You might want to ask your alarm supplier why it went off when the power was off. That is not the normal thing to happen. Your backup battery would be drained rapidly if you weren't home when the power went off. Two days ago there was a power outage here during a horrendous thunderstorm and my alarm system just had the "System trouble" light on, no alarm. I don't have an option to have it alarm when/if there is a power outage.
 
Just a note on cordless phones:

They need more power than is supplied by the telco line to operate the tranceiver. Sony and V-Tech both have models with a charging bay for a spare battery in the base. I find it very convienent, because I never have to leave the phone on the base, but there is an added advantage. The spare battery will automatically provide enough power to operate the base for several hours after the power goes out. Kind of cool.

LOL,
Rob
 
My last two cordless phones had a battery backup for the base. The one I have now is a Sony. Still have a cel phone in the bedroom.

Ledbetter
 
Now I have an unusual setup at my place. I used to be a CB nut. Loved to be on the CB. My CB setup is a car CB hooked up to a 12 volt battery. I have a trickle charger connected to the battery so it is always fully charged. So in the event of a power outage and even if the BG cut all the lines I could still fire up the CB to Channel 9 and I'm sure I could catch somebody on, that could get me help. Smokey might even be monitoring channel 9. Like the man said. Whatever works!

------------------
***Torpedo***
It's a good life if you can survive it!
 
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