Read Online Jakarta Pandemic, The by Steven Konkoly - Free Book Online
Authors: Steven Konkoly
Ads: Link
the furnace. The furnace itself was located in a slightly recessed area about fifteen feet to the left of the tanks, along the southeast side wall of the basement. An oversized water heater sat a few feet to the left of the furnace. In the middle part of the room was a large, rectangular, cream-colored plastic box, standing three and a half feet tall, four feet deep, and six feet wide—the PowerCube Generator and Storage (G/S) 900 module, configured to store the electricity generated by their south facing rooftop solar panels. He could tell by the full bank of green LED lights that the system was fully charged and operational, free of any detected faults. One PowerCube could provide 6000 Watts of continuous power output, for as long as the batteries held a charge.
Alex looked back over his right shoulder at a five-foot–tall, black, metallic safe next to the door. The safe was three feet wide and had two built-in locks, one toward the top and one at the bottom. The locks were opened by the same key, which hung on a small nail, hidden nearby in the basement rafters. The black steel rectangular box was a gun locker. The weapons inside were clean, oiled, and ready for action, and the locker also held ammunition.
He turned his head back toward the center of the room.
Where to start? Fuel tanks.
He walked nearly straight ahead to the two fuel tanks and checked their fill gauges. One tank was completely full, and the other was two-thirds full.
Pretty good levels for the beginning of November.
They’d filled the tanks at the beginning of May and had only used one-third of a tank to heat water for nearly six months. Three years before, they had installed a second tank in response to skyrocketing oil prices. He wrote in his notebook: Call Dead River Oil to fill tank.
He turned around and decided to start at the wall adjacent to the door. The metal storage shelves started there and extended to the front concrete wall of the basement and contained spring water in two-gallon containers. Each four-level shelving unit held thirty of these containers, all on the lowest three shelves. The containers were stacked five in a row, two rows high on each shelf. There were eight shelving units along this wall, together holding nearly five hundred gallons of water.
All of the containers were marked with their date of purchase. Each week, at least one of the oldest containers was removed and placed in the kitchen for consumption. During the weekly grocery run, the container would be replaced, ensuring that the water supply stored in the basement was slowly turned over throughout the course of the year, preventing the inevitable decay of the plastic containers.
The system employed to rotate water through the shelves was also applied to most other stockpiled items. They regularly rotated food, water, medical supplies, batteries and other shorter shelf-life items into their daily lives, and replaced them on a weekly—or at least monthly—basis.
The Fletchers had started their stockpile by first purchasing all of the shelving units, which had cost a small fortune, and then slowly filling them with essentials. They hadn’t bought everything at once, but instead had purchased a few items in each essential category, once or twice a week, until the shelves were filled. It took them less than a year to fill the shelves with enough food and supplies to survive at least a year.
Alex quickly walked down the row and checked for any obvious leaks pooled on the floor. The only thing that caught his attention was the date marked on the front of the newest container, 2/12/11, and the thick layer of dust covering the rest of them. The systematic rotation of their stockpile had ceased after the 2010 swine flu scare, which had fizzled just as quickly as it had arrived.
At the end of the water row, he faced the first of eight shelving units placed along the front basement wall of the house. The first shelving unit contained health and medical supplies.
Alex looked back over his right shoulder at a five-foot–tall, black, metallic safe next to the door. The safe was three feet wide and had two built-in locks, one toward the top and one at the bottom. The locks were opened by the same key, which hung on a small nail, hidden nearby in the basement rafters. The black steel rectangular box was a gun locker. The weapons inside were clean, oiled, and ready for action, and the locker also held ammunition.
He turned his head back toward the center of the room.
Where to start? Fuel tanks.
He walked nearly straight ahead to the two fuel tanks and checked their fill gauges. One tank was completely full, and the other was two-thirds full.
Pretty good levels for the beginning of November.
They’d filled the tanks at the beginning of May and had only used one-third of a tank to heat water for nearly six months. Three years before, they had installed a second tank in response to skyrocketing oil prices. He wrote in his notebook: Call Dead River Oil to fill tank.
He turned around and decided to start at the wall adjacent to the door. The metal storage shelves started there and extended to the front concrete wall of the basement and contained spring water in two-gallon containers. Each four-level shelving unit held thirty of these containers, all on the lowest three shelves. The containers were stacked five in a row, two rows high on each shelf. There were eight shelving units along this wall, together holding nearly five hundred gallons of water.
All of the containers were marked with their date of purchase. Each week, at least one of the oldest containers was removed and placed in the kitchen for consumption. During the weekly grocery run, the container would be replaced, ensuring that the water supply stored in the basement was slowly turned over throughout the course of the year, preventing the inevitable decay of the plastic containers.
The system employed to rotate water through the shelves was also applied to most other stockpiled items. They regularly rotated food, water, medical supplies, batteries and other shorter shelf-life items into their daily lives, and replaced them on a weekly—or at least monthly—basis.
The Fletchers had started their stockpile by first purchasing all of the shelving units, which had cost a small fortune, and then slowly filling them with essentials. They hadn’t bought everything at once, but instead had purchased a few items in each essential category, once or twice a week, until the shelves were filled. It took them less than a year to fill the shelves with enough food and supplies to survive at least a year.
Alex quickly walked down the row and checked for any obvious leaks pooled on the floor. The only thing that caught his attention was the date marked on the front of the newest container, 2/12/11, and the thick layer of dust covering the rest of them. The systematic rotation of their stockpile had ceased after the 2010 swine flu scare, which had fizzled just as quickly as it had arrived.
At the end of the water row, he faced the first of eight shelving units placed along the front basement wall of the house. The first shelving unit contained health and medical supplies.
Similar Books
