.

Interesting. I see most of my friends and practically all my colleagues paying everything ($1.60 Tims) with cards and they proudly admit they never carry cash anymore... Call me old fashion I suppose.

I'm also reading that 911 services and even NS EHS services were impacted. Again a good reason to be self-sufficient in matter of first aid skills and equipment, as well as some good fire prevention/fire fighting abilities.

proudly admit they never carry cash anymore...

I notice that, too. Many people seem so proud that they "don't bother with cash anymore".

If the debit is down at Tim's my sister would have to borrow cash to buy a coffee.

Then there's:"I got rid of my land line and our family uses five cell phones". I always ask the same thing when I hear this, "If you don't have a landline and you call 911 emergency but can't speak, where do they go?"

Always the same blank look and, "I never thought of that."

The phones are back on now. The cause on the news was "The outage was caused when major fibre network links were cut during third-party construction in two separate locations."

Two locations at the same time...interesting.

I read the part of the cable cut a 2 locations too... I'm not one to believe in conspiracies or hiding truth, but this would be such an interesting coincidence!

Interested article in the wake of the outage. Amateur Radio users...
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/prince-edward-island/amateur-radio-atlantic-canada-bell-phone-outage-1.4236756

I wonder how many people even know what ham is anymore?

This seems like another area in which I'll need to get into. Oh, and reminds me I have to program the 2x Baofeng radios I've bought over a year ago!

Coincidentally enough, a couple of weeks I enrolled in an Amateur Radio course to start in the fall. I don't figure I'll be a master at it but I should be educated enough to keep track of what's going on in an emergency.

Coincidence two; the gent who signed me up for the course mentioned that one of the local club members showed him little red hand-held radio that cost $41 (or $61?). He had been impressed with it and thought it would make a good beginner radio. I wonder if it was the Baofeng mentioned above and shown in the picture in the article.

Cash is king and if you can, have a few hundred tucked away in wallet or purse at all times. Same for in go bag you have in car, office, cottage etc.
For gas, get past doorman or parking booth attendant in office tower, wave to taxi driver so you can get out of downtown chaos as things unfold, medicine , food etc etc
Don’t leave hom3 without it!

I understand that without power the debit cards / credit cards don't work. However, neither can Tim's make coffee, nor can the gas stations pump gas... If there's no power, most stores close. Cash is King, but if you can't but anything with it, it's the King of what exactly?

That said, I try to carry cash. I don't believe that in a disaster that cash is King. It might buy you something that you need, but it won't go as far as if you had the foresight to buy what you needed before the power went out. Don't leave things to the last minute.

Before the lights came on for me, cash did save my butt. Nova Scotia experienced Hurricane Juan in September 2003. The lights went out for several days. Like many people, I went to Canadian Tire to buy a stove. I got there and the store was closed because they had no power. I banged on the glass and my next door neighbor (an employee) came to the door. I told him that I needed a stove and had cash. He said that the registers were down. He agreed to take the money and would look after it (come to think of it, I never got my change). 🙂

It was personal relationships that made the difference. Not that I had cash. I was however glad I had it.