Freezing temps in Corpus Christi area for 48 hours

[Sportsdad60]

I'm a seasoned winter camper (Class C, previous 5th wheel) but now we have a residential fridge with our 310GK-R.
Temps in the 20's, wind chill will be 0 for the next 2 days due to 30 mph N winds.

Question:We shut off the ice maker per the manual.Should I do more for that expose blue water line under the slide going to Res fridge? I have some 1/4" foam tape I could deploy however its not heat tape though....

I think we're 'ready' for the next 48 hours.

I actually had to winter prep 2 Solitudes as our neighbors are in Lubbock for some medical procedure. They will be back in 5 days.

His rig
Disconnected the water source, turned the propane furnace on to 65 deg
Grey/Black water heating pads ON. (Might be some residual fluid in there even though they emptied their tanks before leaveing.

Our rig,
Filled up our freshly sanitized fresh water tank.
Furnace on (we're still living here!)
Disconnected from RV park water. No doubt it will freeze as its 2' above ground level, exposed to the N winds.
Stored OnTheGo soft water tank in the basement (basement and Nautilus is nice and toasty I might add....)
Fresh/grey/black water tank heaters on.

 

[Sportsdad60]

Okay, I had some 1/4 foam tape sitting in reserve from a couple years ago, deployed this and wrapped our res fridge icemaker water hose just in case!

 

[Ynot4me2]

Looks like you got things under control. Just be sure there's enough propane to last this cold spell.

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[Sportsdad60]

4am the power goes out for the entire area.
Not good as it is 21 deg with a 30mph wind blowing! Everything is an ice sheet, 1/4" of ice on the roads.
There are 450 RVs in our Pioneer Park here in Port Aransas and most of them are elderly.

I fired up our iddy biddy Yamaha I2000 and plugged in the 50 to 30 amp plug. Furnace is on, that's the important thing. Residential fridge is running off generator too.

We turned the hot water tank from elec to propane. Unplugged everything from outlets that could potentiallly have a vampire draw, including microwave. Made coffee the old fashioned way. We have a battery lantern we are using for light so the only draw off the generator right now is the Furnace.
We have plenty of propane but only 2.5 gallons of gas. The generator should run for about 10 hours. Then I'll have to siphon some gas out of our golf cart unless the power comes back on.

Update, the generator is running in Eco mode and doing fine.

 

[Jocmorales16]

I hope all is well with you guys. I’m an inexperienced winter camper and feel like I may be encountering a myriad of problems on my way back to Florida. All I could do last minute was turn on the furnace and some of our electric heaters into the cabinet near the fresh water tank and one near our black water tank/pipes. (We’re also living in it). Our freezer was disconnected due to a damaged converter (happened last week) our batteries were fully charged (with a battery charger) I refilled our 3 5 gal propane tanks and a spare 10 gal my bother had in his shed. The only bad thing I did was have water in our grey and black tanks. This morning we heard a pop. I have to do an inspection now to see where I’m leaking if it was a bursted pipe. If not then maybe it was a something falling on us?

 

[J Maguire]

I'm a seasoned winter camper (Class C, previous 5th wheel) but now we have a residential fridge with our 310GK-R.
Temps in the 20's, wind chill will be 0 for the next 2 days due to 30 mph N winds.

Question:We shut off the ice maker per the manual.Should I do more for that expose blue water line under the slide going to Res fridge? I have some 1/4" foam tape I could deploy however its not heat tape though....

I think we're 'ready' for the next 48 hours.

I actually had to winter prep 2 Solitudes as our neighbors are in Lubbock for some medical procedure. They will be back in 5 days.

His rig
Disconnected the water source, turned the propane furnace on to 65 deg
Grey/Black water heating pads ON. (Might be some residual fluid in there even though they emptied their tanks before leaveing.

Our rig,
Filled up our freshly sanitized fresh water tank.
Furnace on (we're still living here!)
Disconnected from RV park water. No doubt it will freeze as its 2' above ground level, exposed to the N winds.
Stored OnTheGo soft water tank in the basement (basement and Nautilus is nice and toasty I might add....)
Fresh/grey/black water tank heaters on.

Your approach sounds solid. You're certainly getting your money's worth on the adventure side of things. Sending some warm thoughts to you which you may need to wrap in foam to keep warm as well.

 

[Sportsdad60]

Power came back on! No water for a couple of days though. I have a full 80 gallon tank though.

 

[J Maguire]

Power came back on! No water for a couple of days though. I have a full 80 gallon tank though.

Good to hear the power is back on; water supply sounds good. Ha! Let the adventure continue now that the advantage has swung back in your favor.

 

[D2Reid]

I actually had to winter prep 2 Solitudes as our neighbors are in Lubbock for some medical procedure. They will be back in 5 days.

His rig
Disconnected the water source, turned the propane furnace on to 65 deg
Grey/Black water heating pads

Thank you for helping your neighbors during this unusual event. I love it when communities come together to survive these kinds of things.

My only suggestion would be to check the sewer hose. Any kinks or dips will cause them to collect water and then freeze. They are not very robust and spit easily when in freezing conditions.

 

[Sportsdad60]

So, we have had 2 hrs of power in 13 hrs.
This place looks like an 18 wheeler overnighted lot at a Loves truck stop! most hooked up to the 7 pin to keep the batts charged, a lot of folks with new generators. I was happy to help out a couple with some leftover pigtails to get their 30 amp rigs connected to generators.

We got more gasoline today for our generator, long lines at the nearest 2 fuel stations in CORPUS Christi. Corpus has power but Port A is still out. I guess who gets power is where the money is on these rolling black outs!

There are going to be a lot of RVs here with pipes bursting like popcorn when it warms up to 40 tomorrow.
Thankful for the Grand Design layout, a heat duct goes right into the "wet bay" and basement where the water pump and squid lines are. Basement is a nice 45 degrees when it was 17 deg outside this morning.

 

[Ynot4me2]

I'm wishing you all all the best. This is the type of weather expected here in Canada not in Texas.

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[GeoffnCheri]

Thanks for posting your "on the ground" experiences and your approach and preparation. This helps all of us when we get the unexpected.

 

[Sportsdad60]

Update:

We locked up and left our 5th wheel in Port Aransas, Tex RV park.
We have the RV space rented until April 1st.
Headed to Lubbock Wednesday, 550 miles north, to stay with our Port A RV neighbors, they had traveled back last week for a planned doc visit.

It's a poop show down there. We bailed out when we got down to our last gallon of gas for the generator and our last couple gallons of propane. We brought our prop bottles with us, all 3.

Every filling station and propane filling stations were out of fuel as far north as Menard TX 400 miles north. No one can leave that area because there is no fuel! The food shelves are empty, no semis on the road either so infrastructure is hosed for a while.

We were fortunate to fill up my 38 gallon diesel tank on Tue after waiting in line for fuel. That allowed us to "escape" to Lubbock where everything is normal here, they are not part of the big texas co-op electrical companies here.

It was very creepy wednesday driving miles and miles past wind farms that are not turning, 6 feet of ice on the blades at LEAST!

Up here in the panhandle, a lot of power comes from New Mexico.

Thankful we had a lifeboat here, in lubbock!

Today I bought a 45 gallon external fuel tank to tie into my 38 gallon tank for my diesel truck.
This allows me to extend my towing range to 750 miles roughly.
I'll have it installed on Mon.
Tuesday we both leave and head back to the RV site with propane, food and fuel.

Our contacts in the park said the septic is now working, they have power, they have propane, they have water (boil order though) and one service station has diesel.
Grocery stores still empty of supplies. That will take a while I suppose.

 

[Ynot4me2]

Update:

We locked up and left our 5th wheel in Port Aransas, Tex RV park.
We have the RV space rented until April 1st.
Headed to Lubbock Wednesday, 550 miles north, to stay with our Port A RV neighbors, they had traveled back last week for a planned doc visit.

It's a poop show down there. We bailed out when we got down to our last gallon of gas for the generator and our last couple gallons of propane. We brought our prop bottles with us, all 3.

Every filling station and propane filling stations were out of fuel as far north as Menard TX 400 miles north. No one can leave that area because there is no fuel! The food shelves are empty, no semis on the road either so infrastructure is hosed for a while.

We were fortunate to fill up my 38 gallon diesel tank on Tue after waiting in line for fuel. That allowed us to "escape" to Lubbock where everything is normal here, they are not part of the big texas co-op electrical companies here.

It was very creepy wednesday driving miles and miles past wind farms that are not turning, 6 feet of ice on the blades at LEAST!

Up here in the panhandle, a lot of power comes from New Mexico.

Thankful we had a lifeboat here, in lubbock!

Today I bought a 45 gallon external fuel tank to tie into my 38 gallon tank for my diesel truck.
This allows me to extend my towing range to 750 miles roughly.
I'll have it installed on Mon.
Tuesday we both leave and head back to the RV site with propane, food and fuel.

Our contacts in the park said the septic is now working, they have power, they have propane, they have water (boil order though) and one service station has diesel.
Grocery stores still empty of supplies. That will take a while I suppose.

Unbelievable what is happening. You made the right move.

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[Dadeo6472]

OMG, Texas please get your act together in the next 48 hours!

We have spent the last week slowly heading from Upstate NY down to Padre Island National Seashore for a long planned trip. It's been freezing cold at every stop. Snow, ice and salty roads all the way from Syracuse. We are now outside Mammoth Cave National Park in our little 18RBE and the temperature is forecast to plunge (again) to between 5 and 10 degrees. Our water and propane tanks are full as every place we've stayed so far is built to deal with cold. This place, I am not so sure is going to be happy-land tomorrow when the temps get above freezing for the first time in a week. This afternoon I filled from a spigot the RV park owner thinks won't freeze because he's covered it with an friggin upside down trash can!!! There's no heat tape and no insulation. Prediction: That spigot is going to freeze. In this RV park there's about 2 inches of inches of hard blue ice topped with 4 inches of hard packed snow on all the grounds, none of which is plowed. Getting into the park was not a problem as we have 4WD with mud and snow rated tires. While all the main roads are clear in KY it's a comedy show as people try to drive on the side roads and driveways with their two wheel drive cars with "all season tires". Yes, it's gonna get cold tonight but the forecast is for above 35 tomorrow and 50 on Sunday. I expect there will be lots of defrosting going on in the wrong places!

We had planned on driving down the Natchez Trace to a KOA in East Texas, arriving in east Texas Tuesday. Now... not so sure we shouldn't wait another couple of days. The place we are going has power and water, they claim. We shall see!

 

[Dadeo6472]

Well last night did it for us. I stupidly had the propane set to only one of our 30 gallon tanks, which we emptied (after a week of freezing temps) last night while we were sleeping. There is no water to the back of the camper. No toilet flushing, sink or shower. Kitchen has cold water only. I guess the pipe to the back of the trailer froze. I am more worried about the pipe bursting than I am about the lack of water. The water heater is back there under the bathroom counter. Should I turn it on or leave it off? Should I turn off the water pump too? We are going out today. I think it may be prudent to leave heat on and water heater and pump off!

 

[Txfivver]

OMG, Texas please get your act together in the next 48 hours!

We have spent the last week slowly heading from Upstate NY down to Padre Island National Seashore for a long planned trip. It's been freezing cold at every stop. Snow, ice and salty roads all the way from Syracuse. We are now outside Mammoth Cave National Park in our little 18RBE and the temperature is forecast to plunge (again) to between 5 and 10 degrees. Our water and propane tanks are full as every place we've stayed so far is built to deal with cold. This place, I am not so sure is going to be happy-land tomorrow when the temps get above freezing for the first time in a week. This afternoon I filled from a spigot the RV park owner thinks won't freeze because he's covered it with an friggin upside down trash can!!! There's no heat tape and no insulation. Prediction: That spigot is going to freeze. In this RV park there's about 2 inches of inches of hard blue ice topped with 4 inches of hard packed snow on all the grounds, none of which is plowed. Getting into the park was not a problem as we have 4WD with mud and snow rated tires. While all the main roads are clear in KY it's a comedy show as people try to drive on the side roads and driveways with their two wheel drive cars with "all season tires". Yes, it's gonna get cold tonight but the forecast is for above 35 tomorrow and 50 on Sunday. I expect there will be lots of defrosting going on in the wrong places!

We had planned on driving down the Natchez Trace to a KOA in East Texas, arriving in east Texas Tuesday. Now... not so sure we shouldn't wait another couple of days. The place we are going has power and water, they claim. We shall see!

You'll be fine next week. Last night was our last night below freezing for the year probably. Here is the forecast for S Padre Island for the next week. This is more normal for South Texas in Feb.

 

[Ynot4me2]

Well last night did it for us. I stupidly had the propane set to only one of our 30 gallon tanks, which we emptied (after a week of freezing temps) last night while we were sleeping. There is no water to the back of the camper. No toilet flushing, sink or shower. Kitchen has cold water only. I guess the pipe to the back of the trailer froze. I am more worried about the pipe bursting than I am about the lack of water. The water heater is back there under the bathroom counter. Should I turn it on or leave it off? Should I turn off the water pump too? We are going out today. I think it may be prudent to leave heat on and water heater and pump off!

I'd definitely leave the heat on and the wh and pump off until thing thaw out. Only then would I only turn on the water pump and see if the piping pressurize.

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[Dadeo6472]

I'd definitely leave the heat on and the wh and pump off until thing thaw out. Only then would I only turn on the water pump and see if the piping pressurize.

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The water pump never froze, only one line to the back of the trailer froze, and it defrosted by noon. Temps never made it above freezing Saturday at Mammoth Cave. But just leaving the furnace on thawed it all out, and no leaks. Thank You, Grand Design.

No Natchez Trace. The road was completely closed and nobody was answering the phone today. We are at a KOA for the overnight near I-30 and 40 near Little Rock. Maybe we will come back the Trace.

Tomorrow we will head down to another KOA near Big Thicket, stay a couple of nights. We had planned to be at Martin Dies State Park, but they canceled reservation due to storm. From there it's off to PINS.

We took one tour thru Mammoth Cave, because that's all they are doing. We WILL be back to see more of the park, but the cave is mostly closed due to covid. Fantastic place. 400 plus miles of mapped cave. 20 miles is open (usually) to the public. There are estimates that another 600 miles of caves has yet to be explored. This place is much cooler than even I thought it would be, and we only got to see a mile of it. Very few bats, white nose syndrome had killed most of them.

Plans change...

 

[Ynot4me2]

The water pump never froze, only one line to the back of the trailer froze, and it defrosted by noon. Temps never made it above freezing Saturday at Mammoth Cave. But just leaving the furnace on thawed it all out, and no leaks. Thank You, Grand Design.

No Natchez Trace. The road was completely closed and nobody was answering the phone today. We are at a KOA for the overnight near I-30 and 40 near Little Rock. Maybe we will come back the Trace.

Tomorrow we will head down to another KOA near Big Thicket, stay a couple of nights. We had planned to be at Martin Dies State Park, but they canceled reservation due to storm. From there it's off to PINS.

We took one tour thru Mammoth Cave, because that's all they are doing. We WILL be back to see more of the park, but the cave is mostly closed due to covid. Fantastic place. 400 plus miles of mapped cave. 20 miles is open (usually) to the public. There are estimates that another 600 miles of caves has yet to be explored. This place is much cooler than even I thought it would be, and we only got to see a mile of it. Very few bats, white nose syndrome had killed most of them.

Plans change...

Glad to hear everything turned out ok.

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