The Wise Fail(safe): The Winter's (Tech) Tale

What’s winter like at my mountain abode? Well, if the pictures I shared with you earlier this month aren’t sufficient to satiate your curiosity, perhaps you’ll enjoy the following story.

Two evenings ago, by the time twilight faded at 5:30PM, I had the entire walkway and deck cleared. Predictably, the wind and snow then kicked up, after it was too dark for me to do anything about their effects (although, I confess, I thought about digging out my heavy-duty mountaineering headlamp). I went to bed, lowering the thermostat to 55 degrees as is my usual fashion, and apprehensive of what I’d find waiting for me the next morning.

Sunrise yesterday revealed a 4-foot drift blocking my front door, with similar-sized snow-and-blow accumulation elsewhere on the property. And, when I cranked the thermostat back up to 68 degrees…the heat didn’t kick on. I was…sad. Fortunately, a local repair technician who I promptly called was able to come out later that day. But unfortunately, just as drifts had amassed on the deck and walkway, the snow had also completely filled in the under-deck area below the front door, which happens to be the sub-floor access point to the natural gas-fueled forced-air central heating system (just to the left of the stairs in the picture below). I was…more sad.

An hour or so later, I’d shovel-cleared out the under-deck crawlspace access region. And a few minutes later, the heat kicked back on. Whaaaa??? A quick phone call to the technician’s assistant cleared up the mystery. The front door under-deck area also contains the air intake and outtake plastic pipes for the central heating system. Normally, periodic furnace operation generates sufficient outtake vent warmth to keep the pipes (and bigger-picture crawlspace area) clear of snow. But since I’d turned the thermostat down to 55 degrees, and since the home’s inside temperature had only dropped to 62 degrees overnight, the heater never turned on.

Substantial overnight snow accumulation had blocked the pipes, and under these conditions the furnace won’t turn on, presumably to avoid the potential for back-pressure carbon monoxide accumulation within the dwelling. The furnace periodically resets itself, and once it detected that the vents were clear again, it re-ignited. Smart design move, Carrier!

Followup: I lost premises power just as I was preparing to publish this particular post. Thank goodness for UPSs to (temporarily) keep the LAN humming. According to the woman who answered the phone at the utility company’s emergency line, a snowplow hit a pole…they hope to have the electricity flowing again by ’sometime this evening’. Luvly…