September 16, 2025 • 26 mins
When inclement weather brings power outages, a generator can keep your household or business running—if it’s properly maintained and used safely. In this episode of Producing Confidence, Danos Operations Manager of Power Generation and Mechanical Bart Bergeron and Business Development Representative Bubba Himel share practical guidance on generator operation and upkeep.
They clear up common misconceptions about generator capacity, explain why standby units aren’t built for continuous long-term use, and discuss why managing your electrical load is key to keeping essential systems running without straining your equipment.
To learn more about Danos visit danos.com
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello everyone.
I'm Samantha McGee.
Thank you for joining us fortoday's episode of Producing
Confidence.
On today's episode, we've gottwo guests with me.
We've got Bart Bajron,operations Manager for PowerGen
and Mechanical.
Bart has been with Danos forover 11 years and has 35 years
of industry experience.
And we also have Bubba Email.
Bubba is a business developmentrep and he's been with Danos
(00:23):
for nearly 25 years.
He is a licensed electricalcontractor with 43 years of
industry experience.
Thank you for joining me today.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Thank you for having us.
Thank you for having us.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
So today we're going to talk about hurricane
preparedness as related togenerators, generator safety.
Can you tell us why ishurricane preparedness such an
important topic for our industryand our communities?
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Just essentially to get everything back running
after a disaster.
Being prepared just helps uskeep people with air
conditioning, with lights, staycomfortable, but also get the
oil and gas field back intoproduction.
You know, minimize the downtime,you minimize the hikes in oil
and gas prices.
You know we have a team that'sset up.
We're ready to go.
(01:04):
My generation, my powergeneration techs, are usually
scheduled Once they know there'sa named storm in the Gulf.
We have some customers who wantto put those guys on reserve
and just knowing that the dayafter the storm passes and we're
cleared to fly, we're in thatfirst flight, getting back out
there, helping them get, youknow, good, clean power, keeping
all the critical equipment frombeing damaged from great
(01:26):
voltages, blowing holes instators and just essentially
just doing a process to minimizethe recovery time and again get
back up and running.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Sure.
So what exactly does hurricanepreparedness look like for a
customer?
What do they do in advance ofthe storm.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
So in advance, on the customers on the platform,
aside from what we do to supportthem, they're tying everything
down.
They're trying to keep marinedebris down to a minimum.
They're trying to make surethat their freezers are full of
ice, duct tape, anything that'ssold for a prolonged outage of
plus two to three days.
It won't come back to acomplete mess of rotted food and
(02:06):
just as more of.
I guess it's almost secondnature now in the Gulf.
I mean, we've been living this.
To me it feels second nature.
We've been living this forever.
But during the summer we knowhurricanes are coming.
You know how many, how bad.
We know hopefully we areblessed this year that it's very
minimal.
But it's just a part of lifebeing in the Gulf of America and
(02:28):
getting prepared and, like Isaid, marine debris, having some
filters, oil, everything tomaintenance these units to get
back up, not knowing having agood diesel storage supply
because you will be coming backup with diesel more than likely
nine times out of 10 on a dieselgenerator and just, I guess,
keeping that best foot forward,knowing preparing for the worst
and hoping for the best.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
I mean you know here in South Louisiana we're prone
to hurricanes.
I mean it is what it is.
Being prepared is veryimportant because you never know
the severity of a storm andwhen it hits and how long you're
going to be out of power.
You know you want to keep yourfamily comfortable but you're
going to be out of power.
You know you want to keep yourfamily comfortable but you also
want to protect.
You know what you own and whatyou have.
You know what's in your freezer, what's in your refrigerators
(03:10):
and just make sure everything is, you know, taken care of.
So you know having a portablegenerator or a home standby
generator, having the fuel, themaintenance items and stuff like
that is very important for ushere in South Louisiana.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Absolutely, and so we're going to go back to our
home preparedness and how totake care of our homes in just a
second.
But, bart, specifically forwhat your team does with our
customers, what happens after astorm?
Customer calls you, what dothey do?
Speaker 3 (03:38):
So our guys are prepped up, we send them out
with meagers, dry out kits,dryer bands, which are big
heater bands, big space heaters,and we go out on site as pretty
much first come, first serve.
But we'll have some customerswho want to reserve up to five
guys right out the gate andthose guys get first dibs.
(04:01):
We get out on site and it'spretty much you're dead in the
water, there's no power.
You hear the fog horns goingoff Hopefully the batteries
haven't been drained to thatpoint and you just kind of get
your.
You know the guys get safetiedup and they get down there and
they start to testing the unitsto see how bad they are if
they're wet.
And once we get good, cleanstators and we can dry them out,
(04:22):
you know there's ways to dothese without power other than
batteries, which is our dry outkits.
Once we get an establishedfunctional unit, then we can put
the heater bands on whichrequire AC power, which only
comes from a functional unit,and then just slowly progress
and kind of work with thecustomer to what's priority to
get back on.
If we get one generator up,they may want us to jump to
(04:43):
another platform, get anothergenerator up and just kind of
knock out the fields per theclient's priority.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Gotcha.
So just kind of see how it goesand take each day case by case.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah, sometimes we'll see some units are taking way
longer to dry out than others.
So what we try to do is, like Isaid, get the ones we know we
can, and while some are dryingout, we're testing the others,
and if we can move from one tothe other, we do so.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
So now let's flip to the home side of it.
I know obviously our customersand their operations are a huge
priority, because that keepsthings running and keeps our
lights on.
But back home, when we'refacing the storms and doing that
at home, what are the firststeps that we should take when
preparing for hurricane season?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
So for me I mean making sure your generators are
properly cared for andmaintenanced.
You know, gas sitting in agenerator is going to come up
the carburetor.
Sometimes, if a generator sitstoo long, it's going to lose
residual magnetism, which willcause it not to produce voltage,
even though it's running andyou're not getting any
electricity.
So keeping them running,keeping them maintained I
(05:50):
usually run them once a month.
Some people run them everythree months.
But it's very good to keep yourgenerators running, maintained.
Make sure you turn off the fuel.
Don't let the fuel sit in thecarburetor and let the
carburetor get gummed up,because what happens is when a
storm does come, people take itout after the storm and then
they realize that hey, you knowmy generator's not running.
(06:12):
Then they need to call somebody.
If you do the propermaintenance before and you
prepare yourself, then you'll beready for what.
You know what comes.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Once a month.
So that means we should alwaysbe in preparation mode with
those generators, then right.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
I do.
I mean, you know, some peopleare a little— and you're the guy
who can fix it.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
So if you're doing that, then the rest of us need
to be Right.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
And my biggest thing is don't wait until there's a
named storm in the Gulf to tryto get everything going, or even
try to buy a generator.
They will get gouged.
Home Depot, lowe's, costco,they all bring in all these
generators at way more than youcould buy them in the off-season
.
Just got to be prepared.
Little AC units, smallair-conditioned and windy units.
(06:52):
I have two in my closet stillin the box, just never needed
them, but I always had them justin case.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
You never know.
Yeah, we don't want to be inAugust or September sitting in
the heat, exactly.
So what's one important butoften overlooked item people
should have ready before a stormhits?
Speaker 3 (07:08):
I would say the maintenance items for these
units spare oil, spare filters,water.
I mean just for yourself ingeneral, for the human need, not
just for the generators.
But the biggest thing is theseunits are not designed to run
24-7.
Generators, but the biggestthing is these units are not
designed to run 24-7.
They're designed to run smallerhand crank wheeled gasoline
(07:29):
units and even your air-cooledhome units.
They're not a 24-7, even thoughsome of them are advertised
that way.
They're 18 hours a day at best.
And then you're looking athaving to maintenance these
items once every 100 hours,which is only five days plus or
minus.
So you want to have thosemaintenance items because, again
, if we have a prolonged outage,like we did for Ida, it's going
(07:52):
to be hard to come by.
And I remember being inLafayette and coming down to buy
to assist.
I went into recovery mode onour side of the business and I
had my two supervisors under mehandling operations in the
day-to-days of the business.
I was picking up oil andfilters and trying to come down
to buy and help everybody getback up and recovered, just
because of the lack of supplythat we had down here.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
So you say these generators aren't made to run
24-7.
So what does that look like fora home and for the small units?
How should people run those?
How should they, you know, planhow they're going to run their
units?
Speaker 2 (08:27):
So for me, your small units, every four to six hours
shut it down, you know.
Check the oil, make sure it's,you know, refuel it, but let it
cool off before you refuel it.
On the home generators, likeBart said, 18 hours max, but
some of these people run them24-7.
And then seven days laterthey're wondering why the
generator shut down and why it'snot working properly.
(08:47):
They've overused it.
So just make sure that you knowyou got the manual from the
manufacturer and it'll tell youwhat that generator is designed
to do.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So that'll tell you how long you should shut it down
for as well.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
Right, yes, ma'am.
Yeah, you always want to go bymanufacturer's recommended specs
.
But as far as you know, you dohave some more of these
commercial light industrialunits which are liquid cooled,
radiator cooled, other than aircooled.
Air cooled is essentially likea lawnmower engine, but you have
your liquid cooled.
Those are more prone to 24-7,but you are pulling a lot of.
(09:25):
If you're natural gas anddiesel, people will be shocked
if they ran one of those unitsfor five days what their gas
bill will be.
And Bubba had mentioned that wehad one of our employees or
coworkers I should say they hada whole home generator installed
, liquid cooled.
But there's such a pull on theinfrastructure for natural gas
(09:48):
that they cannot support all theadded usage.
We had what?
400 generators, bubba you said,plus in the city of Houma, and
the pull on the natural gaslines is ridiculous.
They were dropping out left andright.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
I remember that after I had I mean, in my parents'
neighborhood almost every homehas a home generator and then
they weren't working becausethere was not enough natural gas
.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
So what's something that we can do to overcome that
obstacle?
Speaker 3 (10:15):
Buy a diesel yeah buy a diesel.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
You know, because, like Bart said, I mean the
people at the front of theneighborhood where that line was
coming in.
They would get, you know, thegas supply by the time it got to
the end of the neighborhood,which is the end of the gas line
.
There was not enough supply topower that generator to keep it
running.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
So when people are looking for home generators,
what should they look for?
How do they decide what kind toget for their home?
Speaker 3 (10:39):
So you really give your specs and the size of your
house, the square footage, thetonnage of your air conditioners
is the biggest thing if you'reelectric or natural gas on
heating stoves.
So you get with themanufacturer of who you're
looking at buying and they'llactually do the calculation.
We go, put our meters on We'vedone it for the family here.
(11:01):
We'll take a load survey andthen we'll see what the max draw
is and kind of based off ofthat load analysis, what size
generator you need and then wekind of weigh the pluses and the
minuses of natural gas versusdiesel, depending on where
you're at.
You know, I think down to buyingGalliano.
It's not that big of a deal.
But when you get to Houma andjust the congestion and all the
(11:25):
generators it becomes more of aburden on an already weakened
infrastructure.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
And so for those obviously a lot of people
listening to this are usinggenerators.
What's the number one safetymistake that people make?
Speaker 2 (11:37):
The number one safety mistake that I find people make
is ventilation the carbonmonoxide poisoning.
It can kill you in five minutesand you don't even know it's
happening.
I think that's the biggestmistake that people make is they
don't properly ventilate theirgenerator and they don't
properly have enough airflow tokeep it cool and to keep the
exhaust going in the directionthat it needs to go into.
(11:58):
I've seen people where theydidn't have enough ventilation
and it got sucked up into theirsoffit and then went into their
house and then their carbonmonoxide detectors on the inside
of the house went off.
Thank God they had them,because if they hadn't had them
they would probably not be hereto talk about it.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
How do you know if there's enough ventilation?
What do we need to look for?
Speaker 2 (12:20):
You just got to make sure that the generator.
When you install a generator,the manufacturer will tell you
how far it needs to be away froma structure and I think most
parishes and states have rulesof how to install a generator
and it makes sure that you haveenough ventilation.
So if it's inside of a fence,that's not a ventilated fence.
It might be, you know, a woodenfence that doesn't have airflow
(12:43):
.
If it's next to a corner, it'sgot nowhere to go, so it's going
to go up and it's going to getsucked in.
Because of what's going on inyour house with your air
conditioning and all of that,you know it eventually gets
sucked into there.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
I know a lot of the generics now have them pointing
down just to kind of hopefullyspread it out versus just
straight up.
Having, like Bubba said, havingit pointed straight up to the
eaves is just a direct shot intoyour attic, and then I mean
it's just a matter of timebefore it gets, it finds its way
into the home.
And I mean it's just a matterof time before it finds its way
into the home.
Another one we find, though,with people trying to, I guess,
(13:15):
get brave and we call themsuicide cords, is where you have
a double male cord and you pluginto your generator and then
you try to plug back into thehouse instead of just feeding
multiple extension cords intoyour generator and plugging in
your essentials, yourrefrigerators, your freezers, a
window unit, and they havesplitters for those.
(13:38):
But when people try to backfeedinto their home, not only are
you putting the home electricalat risk, you're putting the guys
on the poles at risk if youdon't knock off your main
breaker.
So if you don't have a doublethrow, which is an on-off-on,
you're either on shore power offor on your generator power,
which isolates your utilitypower from your home, and it's
(14:00):
just.
You see a lot of back feeds andpeople don't really realize
that it'll actually go back uppast and back to the pole and
you got guys who are trying torestore power and you can put
their lives in danger as well.
And to me that's one of themost besides the ventilation,
because you hear more tragicdeaths about the ventilation
than anything.
But you also hear about peoplebackfeeding and not doing it
properly, thinking they know andunderstand electricity and how
(14:22):
it works but not realizing thatthey're actually going beyond
their own home back to thesource.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Yeah, because you know, even though you put, say
they plug, they backfeed 110into one of their wall sockets,
even though you put 110 intothat wall socket, by the time it
gets to alignment it could be13,000 volts.
You know the transformers canwork backwards as they work
forward.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Yeah, they step up and down.
So they're coming from thepoles stepping down to your home
to 240, 120.
And, like Bubba said, by thetime you shoot it back, it's
there to bite them.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
We should add the disclaimer that if you're not
qualified to work on generators,don't do it.
Do not, please don't.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
That's correct.
If you're not sure what you'redoing, please do not.
And I've seen too where peoplehave taken a plug and taken the
plug and twisted one of the legson one of the plugs to make it
work, where they might have hada 15-amp receptacle and had a
220 plug, and they'll take thatplug and twist it to make it
work and it's not doing anybodyany good because you're going to
(15:20):
hurt somebody.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
So we talked about the biggest safety hazards.
What about any misconceptionsthat people have with generators
?
Speaker 2 (15:27):
I think one big misconception is the generator
can run everything.
If they don't know the size oftheir generator and the size of
the load that they need fortheir house, they can overload
that generator.
They can overload extensioncords.
You know people will buy acheap extension cord, which is
probably a 16-gauge cord, wherethey probably need a 12 or a
(15:47):
number 10, you know AWG cord.
Just make sure that when you'rebuying the extension cords
don't buy 100 foot if you onlyneed 25 foot and make sure that
the size is proper, because-.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
What difference does that make?
Speaker 3 (16:00):
So Volt drop at the end of the run and you I'm sorry
Bob, no go ahead.
So you have a volt drop.
I was going to actually justadd on to that right before you
asked that question, becauseI've had it.
If you have a, like, say, anoutlet at your house and you put
a small receptacle um a smallextension cord like 100 feet of
16 and you try to plug aircompressor into it, air
(16:21):
compressor will not run.
You'll have power in there, butyou have such a large, large
voltage drop from the source tothe to the end.
Because that's why you sizecopper higher.
When you have longer runs yougo up in copper size wires like
16, 14, 12, 10.
The smaller the number, thebigger the cable.
It's just opposite of what youwould think.
(16:42):
And when you're using thosesmall cables you get a voltage
drop and then you end up burningup electronics TVs for
information critical things.
They just won't even runcompressors on your air
conditioners or on yourrefrigerated freezers.
But you'll be surprised whatyou actually can run Like a
6,500-watt unit.
(17:04):
We properly installed.
We've ran three freezers, tworefrigerators, a window unit, a
6,000 BTU window unit, everyceiling fan.
In my brother's home we did thisfor, oh what hurricane hit home
prior to Ida.
Gustav, was it Gustav?
(17:25):
Yes, it was Gustav, and we didit.
I went over there and isolatedhis home and ran it through a
30-amp plug and to keep ourgrandmother comfortable, we were
able to keep her right in frontof a window unit, oscillating
fans, ceiling fans, tvs and thatwas all done with a 6500 gas
(17:45):
unit that we had wheeled outinto the driveway to allow it to
stay cool and run.
You don't want to, like Bubbasaid.
You know, besides justventilation, it's got to have
some intake, it's got to havefresh air coming into it.
It was amazing what youactually can run.
But you know, while we're doingthat, we're always checking our
amperages and making sure weweren't overloading everything.
So it's pretty resilient if youcan keep the loads balanced and
(18:08):
monitored.
And do not try to put afive-ton home whole home air
conditioner on a.
It's not going to, it's notgoing to start, it's going to
set a break on that littlegenerator that's going to shut
down and probably damage someelectronics on your air
conditioning unit itself.
Speaker 1 (18:24):
So do you guys have any examples of where
preparedness or lack ofpreparedness really had a big
impact on someone or yourworkplace?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
I've seen where, like family members, don't do the
preparedness and then, once thestorm is over, they can't get
their generator to run.
So you know they're calling me,of course, and I'm running all
over town, you know, trying tofind parts, trying to figure out
what's wrong with the generator.
Most of the time it's fuel.
(18:54):
It's fuel gummed up in thecarburetor.
Sometimes it loses residualmagnetism which is caused from
either sitting up too long orthe generator, you know, when
it's running it shuts down undera load, running out of fuel or
whatever.
But lack of preparedness onpeople that don't know seems to
put people like me and Bart andother electricians I don't want
(19:16):
to say in harm's way, but putsus in a situation where, because
of the people that we are, wefeel obligated to go and run all
over town while our wives andfamily's sitting at home we're
trying to take care of otherpeople.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
Yeah, you got your own family to take care of, and
also after hurricanes've gotyour own family to take care of,
and also after hurricanes it'sdangerous to be out on the road
as you all know, it's amazinghow much my phone rings during a
hurricane Sure.
Everyone's your best friend,huh.
Oh hey, buddy, how you doing.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
Oh yeah, it's a hurricane, I see.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
So what's one quick win for Hurricane Prep that our
listeners can do this week?
I would say take your generatorout, start it, load it and what
I mean by load it is plugthings into it.
Make sure it's putting outvoltage, let it run for 15, 20
minutes.
Then take the load off, turnthe fuel off, let it run out of
fuel.
Put some stabilizer in yourfuel tank Seafoam very good.
Yeah, make sure you put somestabilizer in your fuel tank
(20:15):
Seafoam very good.
Make sure you put somestabilizer in your fuel tank.
And then next month, if ahurricane doesn't come, that's
great, but next month do itagain.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
Bart anything.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Like Bubba said, be prepared.
Have those spare supplies onhand.
Know how to operate yourequipment.
If you don't know, call beforethere's a hurricane, you know.
Don't be afraid to make thatphone call, I mean we Call bark
before the hurricane.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:37):
It.
Just it helps me stagger allthe phone calls.
No but it and we don't mind.
I've never not tried to helpsomeone on the phone or, and if
we couldn't get to that point,drive out there and take care of
it.
Like I said, if it's customerand co-employees or fellow
co-workers, friends, anybody, Imean I've helped the competition
(20:58):
.
You know, when our guys getoffshore, it's not just our guys
and the customers.
A lot of our really goodcustomers are comfortable with
us guiding our people, but also,like some of our competitors,
are like man, we didn't haveenough guys, he's had to get
this guy.
Can you please help him?
Of course, you know we neverturn anybody away and that's the
biggest thing you know.
(21:19):
And, just being a part of Danos, the servant leadership that
comes from the top down, that'swhat we try to implement with
our coworkers, with ouremployees, with our techs with
our coworkers, with ouremployees, with our techs, with
our friends, customers,everybody.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
I love that.
So this may similar question,maybe the same answer, but
what's one thing you hope everylistener remembers after our
conversation?
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Preparedness and keeping your maintenance
supplies, making sure you havethe proper maintenance supplies.
So making sure you know you runthat generator, making sure you
know it works, making sure youhave the proper extension cords,
making sure your extensioncords are intact, making sure
you have the proper extensioncords, making sure your
extension cords are intact, thatthere's not a ground cut,
there's not a nick in the wire,just being prepared for when
(21:58):
something happens.
I guess the Danos hotline985-219-3313.
Speaker 3 (22:05):
Bart Badger on call please.
I love that plug.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Are there any resources available to employees
or listeners to find out moreabout how to prep their
generator or get ready for stormseason?
I?
Speaker 3 (22:17):
think usually all your user manuals, your
technical information sheets onif you have the equipment.
I mean chat GPT.
I just learned about chat chatGPT.
I know we've been using it fora while but that is awesome.
I did test it on a generator soit did.
It didn't get it 100% correcton the theory of a generator,
but preparedness is is prettypreparedness is okay.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
All right, we'll make sure.
I know we can't trusteverything it says yeah, there's
.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
There's hundreds of documents out there for
hurricane preparedness andhurricane safety and generator
safety.
Esfi, which is ElectricalSafety Foundation International,
has a good one.
Sleca has something out there,energy has something out there
for people in other parts of thestate.
Slimco, demco I'm sure all ofthose have something out there.
But yeah, there's stuff allover the Internet, but always,
(23:05):
if you're not sure, call aqualified electrician and don't
ever try it yourself.
If you're not sure, call aqualified electrician and don't
ever try it yourself.
If you're not sure, if you haveany part of being unsure of
yourself, do not and make sure,because you know eventually
you're protecting yourself, yourfamily and others if you make
sure you get a qualifiedelectrician out there.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
That's great Great resources, great advice.
Anything else that we didn'tcover that y'all think was worth
mentioning.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
The biggest thing is don't try to get on the road
during a hurricane if youhaven't been prepared.
Just at that point you justkind of got to grin and bear it
and wait till the sun comes backup and kind of just dust it all
off and find out what's goingon.
After the fact Evaluate yoursituation.
But definitely if, say, agenerator goes down in the rain
(23:51):
and the storm's passing through,probably not the best time to
be running that unit, you wantto have it for after the fact
You'll probably have powerthroughout a good portion of the
storm.
But trying to run those unitsin sideways rain, wind-blown,
heavy, heavy sheets of rain theywill fail.
They're water resistant to adegree on the design.
(24:12):
They're not waterproof.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
They're not made to run during the middle of the
storm.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
No, ma'am.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
No ma'am.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
And another thing you know carbon monoxide detectors.
That's very important.
I know we always talk aboutfire and smoke in your house,
but your carbon monoxide Carbonmonoxide detectors are very
important.
Everyone should have these intheir homes.
I have five in my home.
You're probably only requiredto have maybe two at the most.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
I think I only have one right at the garage door.
Yeah, I think I have one too.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
I'm going to go add that to my Amazon cart after
this conversation.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
Be careful with those , because Lysol spray will set
them off and fault them, justFYI.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Noted.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah, and I had an issue one time where I had ran
my generator outside of mygarage.
I turned it off.
30 minutes later I brought itback into my garage, went inside
, took a shower.
I happened to be home alone atthe time.
I was in the shower and I couldhear somebody beating on my
door.
It was the fire department.
The residual carbon monoxidethat was still in the exhaust
(25:15):
system 30 minutes later mycarbon monoxide detectors was
able to pick that up.
So make sure you know you keepit outside long enough, let it
cool off, if you got to put afan on it or whatever.
But yeah, that did happen to meone time.
So just make sure.
But I guess my point is makesure you have carbon monoxide
detectors to protect you.
(25:35):
So, important, yes, veryimportant.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Well, thank you so much for joining us today.
I know this has been veryinsightful for me.
I know our listeners will alsofind it insightful.
Bart, what's that hotlinenumber again?
Speaker 3 (25:47):
985-219-3313.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
Awesome, and that is for our customers.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
For our customers, employees, techs anybody who
needs help.
Please ask for Bart Patrick.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
Or Bubba, or Bubba, sorry Bubba.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Well, thanks again, Really appreciate it.
I'm going to go home, get somemore carbon monoxide detectors
and pull out my generator andrun that before we really have
to face it during a storm.
Appreciate it, guys.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Thank you, thank you.
Hello everyone.
I'm Samantha McGee.
Thank you for joining us fortoday's episode of Producing
Confidence.
On today's episode, we've gottwo guests with me.
We've got Bart Bajron,operations Manager for PowerGen
and Mechanical.
Bart has been with Danos forover 11 years and has 35 years
of industry experience.
And we also have Bubba Email.
Bubba is a business developmentrep and he's been with Danos
(00:23):
for nearly 25 years.
He is a licensed electricalcontractor with 43 years of
industry experience.
Thank you for joining me today.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Thank you for having us.
Thank you for having us.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
So today we're going to talk about hurricane
preparedness as related togenerators, generator safety.
Can you tell us why ishurricane preparedness such an
important topic for our industryand our communities?
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Just essentially to get everything back running
after a disaster.
Being prepared just helps uskeep people with air
conditioning, with lights, staycomfortable, but also get the
oil and gas field back intoproduction.
You know, minimize the downtime,you minimize the hikes in oil
and gas prices.
You know we have a team that'sset up.
We're ready to go.
(01:04):
My generation, my powergeneration techs, are usually
scheduled Once they know there'sa named storm in the Gulf.
We have some customers who wantto put those guys on reserve
and just knowing that the dayafter the storm passes and we're
cleared to fly, we're in thatfirst flight, getting back out
there, helping them get, youknow, good, clean power, keeping
all the critical equipment frombeing damaged from great
(01:26):
voltages, blowing holes instators and just essentially
just doing a process to minimizethe recovery time and again get
back up and running.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Sure.
So what exactly does hurricanepreparedness look like for a
customer?
What do they do in advance ofthe storm.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
So in advance, on the customers on the platform,
aside from what we do to supportthem, they're tying everything
down.
They're trying to keep marinedebris down to a minimum.
They're trying to make surethat their freezers are full of
ice, duct tape, anything that'ssold for a prolonged outage of
plus two to three days.
It won't come back to acomplete mess of rotted food and
(02:06):
just as more of.
I guess it's almost secondnature now in the Gulf.
I mean, we've been living this.
To me it feels second nature.
We've been living this forever.
But during the summer we knowhurricanes are coming.
You know how many, how bad.
We know hopefully we areblessed this year that it's very
minimal.
But it's just a part of lifebeing in the Gulf of America and
(02:28):
getting prepared and, like Isaid, marine debris, having some
filters, oil, everything tomaintenance these units to get
back up, not knowing having agood diesel storage supply
because you will be coming backup with diesel more than likely
nine times out of 10 on a dieselgenerator and just, I guess,
keeping that best foot forward,knowing preparing for the worst
and hoping for the best.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
I mean you know here in South Louisiana we're prone
to hurricanes.
I mean it is what it is.
Being prepared is veryimportant because you never know
the severity of a storm andwhen it hits and how long you're
going to be out of power.
You know you want to keep yourfamily comfortable but you're
going to be out of power.
You know you want to keep yourfamily comfortable but you also
want to protect.
You know what you own and whatyou have.
You know what's in your freezer, what's in your refrigerators
(03:10):
and just make sure everything is, you know, taken care of.
So you know having a portablegenerator or a home standby
generator, having the fuel, themaintenance items and stuff like
that is very important for ushere in South Louisiana.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Absolutely, and so we're going to go back to our
home preparedness and how totake care of our homes in just a
second.
But, bart, specifically forwhat your team does with our
customers, what happens after astorm?
Customer calls you, what dothey do?
Speaker 3 (03:38):
So our guys are prepped up, we send them out
with meagers, dry out kits,dryer bands, which are big
heater bands, big space heaters,and we go out on site as pretty
much first come, first serve.
But we'll have some customerswho want to reserve up to five
guys right out the gate andthose guys get first dibs.
(04:01):
We get out on site and it'spretty much you're dead in the
water, there's no power.
You hear the fog horns goingoff Hopefully the batteries
haven't been drained to thatpoint and you just kind of get
your.
You know the guys get safetiedup and they get down there and
they start to testing the unitsto see how bad they are if
they're wet.
And once we get good, cleanstators and we can dry them out,
(04:22):
you know there's ways to dothese without power other than
batteries, which is our dry outkits.
Once we get an establishedfunctional unit, then we can put
the heater bands on whichrequire AC power, which only
comes from a functional unit,and then just slowly progress
and kind of work with thecustomer to what's priority to
get back on.
If we get one generator up,they may want us to jump to
(04:43):
another platform, get anothergenerator up and just kind of
knock out the fields per theclient's priority.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Gotcha.
So just kind of see how it goesand take each day case by case.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah, sometimes we'll see some units are taking way
longer to dry out than others.
So what we try to do is, like Isaid, get the ones we know we
can, and while some are dryingout, we're testing the others,
and if we can move from one tothe other, we do so.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
So now let's flip to the home side of it.
I know obviously our customersand their operations are a huge
priority, because that keepsthings running and keeps our
lights on.
But back home, when we'refacing the storms and doing that
at home, what are the firststeps that we should take when
preparing for hurricane season?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
So for me I mean making sure your generators are
properly cared for andmaintenanced.
You know, gas sitting in agenerator is going to come up
the carburetor.
Sometimes, if a generator sitstoo long, it's going to lose
residual magnetism, which willcause it not to produce voltage,
even though it's running andyou're not getting any
electricity.
So keeping them running,keeping them maintained I
(05:50):
usually run them once a month.
Some people run them everythree months.
But it's very good to keep yourgenerators running, maintained.
Make sure you turn off the fuel.
Don't let the fuel sit in thecarburetor and let the
carburetor get gummed up,because what happens is when a
storm does come, people take itout after the storm and then
they realize that hey, you knowmy generator's not running.
(06:12):
Then they need to call somebody.
If you do the propermaintenance before and you
prepare yourself, then you'll beready for what.
You know what comes.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Once a month.
So that means we should alwaysbe in preparation mode with
those generators, then right.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
I do.
I mean, you know, some peopleare a little— and you're the guy
who can fix it.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
So if you're doing that, then the rest of us need
to be Right.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
And my biggest thing is don't wait until there's a
named storm in the Gulf to tryto get everything going, or even
try to buy a generator.
They will get gouged.
Home Depot, lowe's, costco,they all bring in all these
generators at way more than youcould buy them in the off-season
.
Just got to be prepared.
Little AC units, smallair-conditioned and windy units.
(06:52):
I have two in my closet stillin the box, just never needed
them, but I always had them justin case.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
You never know.
Yeah, we don't want to be inAugust or September sitting in
the heat, exactly.
So what's one important butoften overlooked item people
should have ready before a stormhits?
Speaker 3 (07:08):
I would say the maintenance items for these
units spare oil, spare filters,water.
I mean just for yourself ingeneral, for the human need, not
just for the generators.
But the biggest thing is theseunits are not designed to run
24-7.
Generators, but the biggestthing is these units are not
designed to run 24-7.
They're designed to run smallerhand crank wheeled gasoline
(07:29):
units and even your air-cooledhome units.
They're not a 24-7, even thoughsome of them are advertised
that way.
They're 18 hours a day at best.
And then you're looking athaving to maintenance these
items once every 100 hours,which is only five days plus or
minus.
So you want to have thosemaintenance items because, again
, if we have a prolonged outage,like we did for Ida, it's going
(07:52):
to be hard to come by.
And I remember being inLafayette and coming down to buy
to assist.
I went into recovery mode onour side of the business and I
had my two supervisors under mehandling operations in the
day-to-days of the business.
I was picking up oil andfilters and trying to come down
to buy and help everybody getback up and recovered, just
because of the lack of supplythat we had down here.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
So you say these generators aren't made to run
24-7.
So what does that look like fora home and for the small units?
How should people run those?
How should they, you know, planhow they're going to run their
units?
Speaker 2 (08:27):
So for me, your small units, every four to six hours
shut it down, you know.
Check the oil, make sure it's,you know, refuel it, but let it
cool off before you refuel it.
On the home generators, likeBart said, 18 hours max, but
some of these people run them24-7.
And then seven days laterthey're wondering why the
generator shut down and why it'snot working properly.
(08:47):
They've overused it.
So just make sure that you knowyou got the manual from the
manufacturer and it'll tell youwhat that generator is designed
to do.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So that'll tell you how long you should shut it down
for as well.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
Right, yes, ma'am.
Yeah, you always want to go bymanufacturer's recommended specs
.
But as far as you know, you dohave some more of these
commercial light industrialunits which are liquid cooled,
radiator cooled, other than aircooled.
Air cooled is essentially likea lawnmower engine, but you have
your liquid cooled.
Those are more prone to 24-7,but you are pulling a lot of.
(09:25):
If you're natural gas anddiesel, people will be shocked
if they ran one of those unitsfor five days what their gas
bill will be.
And Bubba had mentioned that wehad one of our employees or
coworkers I should say they hada whole home generator installed
, liquid cooled.
But there's such a pull on theinfrastructure for natural gas
(09:48):
that they cannot support all theadded usage.
We had what?
400 generators, bubba you said,plus in the city of Houma, and
the pull on the natural gaslines is ridiculous.
They were dropping out left andright.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
I remember that after I had I mean, in my parents'
neighborhood almost every homehas a home generator and then
they weren't working becausethere was not enough natural gas
.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
So what's something that we can do to overcome that
obstacle?
Speaker 3 (10:15):
Buy a diesel yeah buy a diesel.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
You know, because, like Bart said, I mean the
people at the front of theneighborhood where that line was
coming in.
They would get, you know, thegas supply by the time it got to
the end of the neighborhood,which is the end of the gas line
.
There was not enough supply topower that generator to keep it
running.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
So when people are looking for home generators,
what should they look for?
How do they decide what kind toget for their home?
Speaker 3 (10:39):
So you really give your specs and the size of your
house, the square footage, thetonnage of your air conditioners
is the biggest thing if you'reelectric or natural gas on
heating stoves.
So you get with themanufacturer of who you're
looking at buying and they'llactually do the calculation.
We go, put our meters on We'vedone it for the family here.
(11:01):
We'll take a load survey andthen we'll see what the max draw
is and kind of based off ofthat load analysis, what size
generator you need and then wekind of weigh the pluses and the
minuses of natural gas versusdiesel, depending on where
you're at.
You know, I think down to buyingGalliano.
It's not that big of a deal.
But when you get to Houma andjust the congestion and all the
(11:25):
generators it becomes more of aburden on an already weakened
infrastructure.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
And so for those obviously a lot of people
listening to this are usinggenerators.
What's the number one safetymistake that people make?
Speaker 2 (11:37):
The number one safety mistake that I find people make
is ventilation the carbonmonoxide poisoning.
It can kill you in five minutesand you don't even know it's
happening.
I think that's the biggestmistake that people make is they
don't properly ventilate theirgenerator and they don't
properly have enough airflow tokeep it cool and to keep the
exhaust going in the directionthat it needs to go into.
(11:58):
I've seen people where theydidn't have enough ventilation
and it got sucked up into theirsoffit and then went into their
house and then their carbonmonoxide detectors on the inside
of the house went off.
Thank God they had them,because if they hadn't had them
they would probably not be hereto talk about it.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
How do you know if there's enough ventilation?
What do we need to look for?
Speaker 2 (12:20):
You just got to make sure that the generator.
When you install a generator,the manufacturer will tell you
how far it needs to be away froma structure and I think most
parishes and states have rulesof how to install a generator
and it makes sure that you haveenough ventilation.
So if it's inside of a fence,that's not a ventilated fence.
It might be, you know, a woodenfence that doesn't have airflow
(12:43):
.
If it's next to a corner, it'sgot nowhere to go, so it's going
to go up and it's going to getsucked in.
Because of what's going on inyour house with your air
conditioning and all of that,you know it eventually gets
sucked into there.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
I know a lot of the generics now have them pointing
down just to kind of hopefullyspread it out versus just
straight up.
Having, like Bubba said, havingit pointed straight up to the
eaves is just a direct shot intoyour attic, and then I mean
it's just a matter of timebefore it gets, it finds its way
into the home.
And I mean it's just a matterof time before it finds its way
into the home.
Another one we find, though,with people trying to, I guess,
(13:15):
get brave and we call themsuicide cords, is where you have
a double male cord and you pluginto your generator and then
you try to plug back into thehouse instead of just feeding
multiple extension cords intoyour generator and plugging in
your essentials, yourrefrigerators, your freezers, a
window unit, and they havesplitters for those.
(13:38):
But when people try to backfeedinto their home, not only are
you putting the home electricalat risk, you're putting the guys
on the poles at risk if youdon't knock off your main
breaker.
So if you don't have a doublethrow, which is an on-off-on,
you're either on shore power offor on your generator power,
which isolates your utilitypower from your home, and it's
(14:00):
just.
You see a lot of back feeds andpeople don't really realize
that it'll actually go back uppast and back to the pole and
you got guys who are trying torestore power and you can put
their lives in danger as well.
And to me that's one of themost besides the ventilation,
because you hear more tragicdeaths about the ventilation
than anything.
But you also hear about peoplebackfeeding and not doing it
properly, thinking they know andunderstand electricity and how
(14:22):
it works but not realizing thatthey're actually going beyond
their own home back to thesource.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Yeah, because you know, even though you put, say
they plug, they backfeed 110into one of their wall sockets,
even though you put 110 intothat wall socket, by the time it
gets to alignment it could be13,000 volts.
You know the transformers canwork backwards as they work
forward.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Yeah, they step up and down.
So they're coming from thepoles stepping down to your home
to 240, 120.
And, like Bubba said, by thetime you shoot it back, it's
there to bite them.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
We should add the disclaimer that if you're not
qualified to work on generators,don't do it.
Do not, please don't.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
That's correct.
If you're not sure what you'redoing, please do not.
And I've seen too where peoplehave taken a plug and taken the
plug and twisted one of the legson one of the plugs to make it
work, where they might have hada 15-amp receptacle and had a
220 plug, and they'll take thatplug and twist it to make it
work and it's not doing anybodyany good because you're going to
(15:20):
hurt somebody.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
So we talked about the biggest safety hazards.
What about any misconceptionsthat people have with generators
?
Speaker 2 (15:27):
I think one big misconception is the generator
can run everything.
If they don't know the size oftheir generator and the size of
the load that they need fortheir house, they can overload
that generator.
They can overload extensioncords.
You know people will buy acheap extension cord, which is
probably a 16-gauge cord, wherethey probably need a 12 or a
(15:47):
number 10, you know AWG cord.
Just make sure that when you'rebuying the extension cords
don't buy 100 foot if you onlyneed 25 foot and make sure that
the size is proper, because-.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
What difference does that make?
Speaker 3 (16:00):
So Volt drop at the end of the run and you I'm sorry
Bob, no go ahead.
So you have a volt drop.
I was going to actually justadd on to that right before you
asked that question, becauseI've had it.
If you have a, like, say, anoutlet at your house and you put
a small receptacle um a smallextension cord like 100 feet of
16 and you try to plug aircompressor into it, air
(16:21):
compressor will not run.
You'll have power in there, butyou have such a large, large
voltage drop from the source tothe to the end.
Because that's why you sizecopper higher.
When you have longer runs yougo up in copper size wires like
16, 14, 12, 10.
The smaller the number, thebigger the cable.
It's just opposite of what youwould think.
(16:42):
And when you're using thosesmall cables you get a voltage
drop and then you end up burningup electronics TVs for
information critical things.
They just won't even runcompressors on your air
conditioners or on yourrefrigerated freezers.
But you'll be surprised whatyou actually can run Like a
6,500-watt unit.
(17:04):
We properly installed.
We've ran three freezers, tworefrigerators, a window unit, a
6,000 BTU window unit, everyceiling fan.
In my brother's home we did thisfor, oh what hurricane hit home
prior to Ida.
Gustav, was it Gustav?
(17:25):
Yes, it was Gustav, and we didit.
I went over there and isolatedhis home and ran it through a
30-amp plug and to keep ourgrandmother comfortable, we were
able to keep her right in frontof a window unit, oscillating
fans, ceiling fans, tvs and thatwas all done with a 6500 gas
(17:45):
unit that we had wheeled outinto the driveway to allow it to
stay cool and run.
You don't want to, like Bubbasaid.
You know, besides justventilation, it's got to have
some intake, it's got to havefresh air coming into it.
It was amazing what youactually can run.
But you know, while we're doingthat, we're always checking our
amperages and making sure weweren't overloading everything.
So it's pretty resilient if youcan keep the loads balanced and
(18:08):
monitored.
And do not try to put afive-ton home whole home air
conditioner on a.
It's not going to, it's notgoing to start, it's going to
set a break on that littlegenerator that's going to shut
down and probably damage someelectronics on your air
conditioning unit itself.
Speaker 1 (18:24):
So do you guys have any examples of where
preparedness or lack ofpreparedness really had a big
impact on someone or yourworkplace?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
I've seen where, like family members, don't do the
preparedness and then, once thestorm is over, they can't get
their generator to run.
So you know they're calling me,of course, and I'm running all
over town, you know, trying tofind parts, trying to figure out
what's wrong with the generator.
Most of the time it's fuel.
(18:54):
It's fuel gummed up in thecarburetor.
Sometimes it loses residualmagnetism which is caused from
either sitting up too long orthe generator, you know, when
it's running it shuts down undera load, running out of fuel or
whatever.
But lack of preparedness onpeople that don't know seems to
put people like me and Bart andother electricians I don't want
(19:16):
to say in harm's way, but putsus in a situation where, because
of the people that we are, wefeel obligated to go and run all
over town while our wives andfamily's sitting at home we're
trying to take care of otherpeople.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
Yeah, you got your own family to take care of, and
also after hurricanes've gotyour own family to take care of,
and also after hurricanes it'sdangerous to be out on the road
as you all know, it's amazinghow much my phone rings during a
hurricane Sure.
Everyone's your best friend,huh.
Oh hey, buddy, how you doing.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
Oh yeah, it's a hurricane, I see.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
So what's one quick win for Hurricane Prep that our
listeners can do this week?
I would say take your generatorout, start it, load it and what
I mean by load it is plugthings into it.
Make sure it's putting outvoltage, let it run for 15, 20
minutes.
Then take the load off, turnthe fuel off, let it run out of
fuel.
Put some stabilizer in yourfuel tank Seafoam very good.
Yeah, make sure you put somestabilizer in your fuel tank
(20:15):
Seafoam very good.
Make sure you put somestabilizer in your fuel tank.
And then next month, if ahurricane doesn't come, that's
great, but next month do itagain.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
Bart anything.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Like Bubba said, be prepared.
Have those spare supplies onhand.
Know how to operate yourequipment.
If you don't know, call beforethere's a hurricane, you know.
Don't be afraid to make thatphone call, I mean we Call bark
before the hurricane.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:37):
It.
Just it helps me stagger allthe phone calls.
No but it and we don't mind.
I've never not tried to helpsomeone on the phone or, and if
we couldn't get to that point,drive out there and take care of
it.
Like I said, if it's customerand co-employees or fellow
co-workers, friends, anybody, Imean I've helped the competition
(20:58):
.
You know, when our guys getoffshore, it's not just our guys
and the customers.
A lot of our really goodcustomers are comfortable with
us guiding our people, but also,like some of our competitors,
are like man, we didn't haveenough guys, he's had to get
this guy.
Can you please help him?
Of course, you know we neverturn anybody away and that's the
biggest thing you know.
(21:19):
And, just being a part of Danos, the servant leadership that
comes from the top down, that'swhat we try to implement with
our coworkers, with ouremployees, with our techs with
our coworkers, with ouremployees, with our techs, with
our friends, customers,everybody.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
I love that.
So this may similar question,maybe the same answer, but
what's one thing you hope everylistener remembers after our
conversation?
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Preparedness and keeping your maintenance
supplies, making sure you havethe proper maintenance supplies.
So making sure you know you runthat generator, making sure you
know it works, making sure youhave the proper extension cords,
making sure your extensioncords are intact, making sure
you have the proper extensioncords, making sure your
extension cords are intact, thatthere's not a ground cut,
there's not a nick in the wire,just being prepared for when
(21:58):
something happens.
I guess the Danos hotline985-219-3313.
Speaker 3 (22:05):
Bart Badger on call please.
I love that plug.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Are there any resources available to employees
or listeners to find out moreabout how to prep their
generator or get ready for stormseason?
I?
Speaker 3 (22:17):
think usually all your user manuals, your
technical information sheets onif you have the equipment.
I mean chat GPT.
I just learned about chat chatGPT.
I know we've been using it fora while but that is awesome.
I did test it on a generator soit did.
It didn't get it 100% correcton the theory of a generator,
but preparedness is is prettypreparedness is okay.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
All right, we'll make sure.
I know we can't trusteverything it says yeah, there's
.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
There's hundreds of documents out there for
hurricane preparedness andhurricane safety and generator
safety.
Esfi, which is ElectricalSafety Foundation International,
has a good one.
Sleca has something out there,energy has something out there
for people in other parts of thestate.
Slimco, demco I'm sure all ofthose have something out there.
But yeah, there's stuff allover the Internet, but always,
(23:05):
if you're not sure, call aqualified electrician and don't
ever try it yourself.
If you're not sure, call aqualified electrician and don't
ever try it yourself.
If you're not sure, if you haveany part of being unsure of
yourself, do not and make sure,because you know eventually
you're protecting yourself, yourfamily and others if you make
sure you get a qualifiedelectrician out there.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
That's great Great resources, great advice.
Anything else that we didn'tcover that y'all think was worth
mentioning.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
The biggest thing is don't try to get on the road
during a hurricane if youhaven't been prepared.
Just at that point you justkind of got to grin and bear it
and wait till the sun comes backup and kind of just dust it all
off and find out what's goingon.
After the fact Evaluate yoursituation.
But definitely if, say, agenerator goes down in the rain
(23:51):
and the storm's passing through,probably not the best time to
be running that unit, you wantto have it for after the fact
You'll probably have powerthroughout a good portion of the
storm.
But trying to run those unitsin sideways rain, wind-blown,
heavy, heavy sheets of rain theywill fail.
They're water resistant to adegree on the design.
(24:12):
They're not waterproof.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
They're not made to run during the middle of the
storm.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
No, ma'am.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
No ma'am.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
And another thing you know carbon monoxide detectors.
That's very important.
I know we always talk aboutfire and smoke in your house,
but your carbon monoxide Carbonmonoxide detectors are very
important.
Everyone should have these intheir homes.
I have five in my home.
You're probably only requiredto have maybe two at the most.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
I think I only have one right at the garage door.
Yeah, I think I have one too.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
I'm going to go add that to my Amazon cart after
this conversation.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
Be careful with those , because Lysol spray will set
them off and fault them, justFYI.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Noted.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah, and I had an issue one time where I had ran
my generator outside of mygarage.
I turned it off.
30 minutes later I brought itback into my garage, went inside
, took a shower.
I happened to be home alone atthe time.
I was in the shower and I couldhear somebody beating on my
door.
It was the fire department.
The residual carbon monoxidethat was still in the exhaust
(25:15):
system 30 minutes later mycarbon monoxide detectors was
able to pick that up.
So make sure you know you keepit outside long enough, let it
cool off, if you got to put afan on it or whatever.
But yeah, that did happen to meone time.
So just make sure.
But I guess my point is makesure you have carbon monoxide
detectors to protect you.
(25:35):
So, important, yes, veryimportant.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Well, thank you so much for joining us today.
I know this has been veryinsightful for me.
I know our listeners will alsofind it insightful.
Bart, what's that hotlinenumber again?
Speaker 3 (25:47):
985-219-3313.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
Awesome, and that is for our customers.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
For our customers, employees, techs anybody who
needs help.
Please ask for Bart Patrick.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
Or Bubba, or Bubba, sorry Bubba.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Well, thanks again, Really appreciate it.
I'm going to go home, get somemore carbon monoxide detectors
and pull out my generator andrun that before we really have
to face it during a storm.
Appreciate it, guys.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Thank you, thank you.
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