“When did it come on?” asked Hank.
“About an hour ago when Mike and Jessica left.”
“Left?” asked Hank as he looked around the house. “To where?”
“Mike said both of their radios began to squawk as soon as the electricity was back. They’ve been called in to work.”
Hank managed a laugh and shrugged. A cop is never off duty.
“Mr. Hank! Come get your breakfast before it gets cold!”
Hank pointed toward the kitchen. “How’s she holding up?”
“Believe it or not, pretty good,” replied Sonny. “It helps her to stay busy. Maybe she’s hiding it, I don’t know. One thing is for certain, she has a million things on her mental to-do list while the power is on. She seems to think we could lose it again.”
Hank grimaced. If Erin Bergman was correct, they could count on it.
The rest of that day was a busy one. Information was still spotty, and mostly what they gathered was a repeat of the reporting the night before. The electricity situation was beginning to be a concern for Hank.
Without a doubt, the regions around the blast zones were experiencing massive blackouts, large-scale power outages that might go on for many months, if not longer. In the Florida Keys, the brownouts were an indication of the utility company’s inability to keep up with demand. To prevent blackouts in more populated areas, they reduce delivery of electricity to rural areas or places like the Keys.
As the brownouts began to occur more frequently as that Saturday wore on, everyone on Driftwood Key began to prioritize their chores to take advantage of a precious commodity they’d all taken for granted in their everyday lives—electricity.
Sonny and Jimmy focused on the greenhouses and hydroponics, the two sustainable food-growing processes that were an integral part of the inn’s operations. Phoebe worked to prepare meals and shuffle stored foods from one refrigerator to another. Those items that required freezing were prepared first because the inn’s portable generators weren’t strong enough to maintain them for the length of time necessary to keep the food frozen. Not to mention the fact that gasoline for the generators was also in short supply.
Hank took this opportunity to check on Driftwood Key’s Sol-Ark solar array. It was first installed seven years ago, and he’d upgraded and expanded the array every year since. Florida ranked third in the country for solar potential, with the Keys being the most viable candidate for solar energy. Between tax credits and other government incentives, he’d managed to power their sustainable gardening buildings, several of the inn’s bungalows located near it, and Phoebe’s supply storage building, including the refrigerators.
However, as the skies continued to darken from the effects of nuclear winter, Hank was becoming concerned that the stackable lithium-ion batteries attached to the array might not hold their charges as the sunlight was blocked.
The batteries cycled daily, meaning they charged, drained and then recharged. Over time, the battery’s ability to hold a charge gradually decreased, eventually requiring replacement. The original batteries from seven years ago were now operating at seventy to eighty percent of their original capacity. The newer ones performed better. Like many things around the key, he wished he had more of everything Sol-Ark offered.
It was getting late, and he was becoming concerned about his brother. He made a mental note to have Mike secure a sheriff’s department radio for them. If not, he’d have the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department frequencies on their Bearcat scanners, another staple of boaters in the keys.
Hank was beginning to see why Phoebe had been in a frenzy throughout the day. They had to prepare for every possible contingency, including a permanent blackout. It helped Hank put his worries in the back of his mind. He tried to convince himself that he was preparing for the day Peter, Lacey and her family walked across the bridge leading to Driftwood Key. It was a vision he’d hold onto until that day arrived.
Chapter Eleven
Saturday, October 26
Placer High School Fallout Shelter
Auburn, California
By day two in the fallout shelter, many of the occupants were beginning to notice that something seemed to be wrong with the ventilation system. First, the temperature, although not measured with any device, had risen dramatically. Everyone had stripped off unnecessary clothes and were still sweating. Those who were overweight suffered the most, coupling excessive perspiration with heavy breathing. This only served to make it warmer in the cramped space.
One of the benefits of placing a shelter deep into the ground was that dry earth was a reasonably good thermal insulator. The Placer High shelter was approximately thirty feet below ground. The walls were cool to the touch, although moisture had taken a toll in the past, and the paint was peeling off in many spots.
Large air ducts traversed the ceiling and then led upward through the ground or parts of the gymnasium. Round commercial air vents were located equidistant throughout the space, with one in each storage room and four in the main room. If you could reach these vents located twelve feet off the floor, you’d be unable to feel any air blowing through them.
There were no operable fans because the power grid was down. The only transfer of air was through the vents and provided via a Kearny air pump. Developed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee when nuclear bunkers were first designed, the air pump system was designed to be operated by hand.
A filter was installed into an opening above the shelter on a swinging hinge. The design allowed the user to pull a rope to begin the swinging process. Air is sucked in from the outdoors and filtered of contaminants. It would then swing freely back, essentially creating a one-way valve that operated to force air to flow in only one direction.
When constructed, the fallout shelter at Placer functioned perfectly. Four nylon twenty-eight-foot-long pull cords were affixed to the Kearny
