Emergency Winter Flashlights
Depending on where you live, there are times you can be completely iced into your house during winter with no electricity. At that point, if you don’t have a flashlight then you’ll really want one. It’s important to prepare for an ice storm when winter comes and it’s important to make sure that you have a flashlight ready and available. There are some aspects you want to take note of when picking a flashlight that you would ue for an emergency.
Battery Life
Whether you use a flashlight everyday or you use a flashlight only in times of dire need and keep it stored until then, you want to make sure you have extra batteries during winter. Obviously, you want extra batteries in case yours in your flashlight die, but during winter it is especially important. The cold can make batteries die much more quickly and absolutely affect the charge. For this reason, you want to keep batteries around and stored in a place where the cold doesn’t necessarily reach. For example, if you keep batteries in the garage, consider moving them into the house during the winter months.
Long Runtimes
When it comes to an emergency flashlight, the brightest flashlight may not serve you as well as you’d think. Instead, you’ll want a flashlight that has multiple brightness levels and has longer run times. You’re more likely to use the lower brightness modes than the higher brightness modes in your own house in the dark during a power outage.
Battery Capacity Indicator
This feature isn’t really necessary, but it can be incredibly helpful. Knowing the charge of your battery allows you to plan your usage accordingly. During a blackout caused by an ice storm (or for any reason), this is a nice feature to have. It’s easy to overuse a flashlight and waste the battery and during a blackout you’ll want to check yourself and make sure you’re not doing that.
Two Awesome Emergency Flashlights
The ST15 is a great outdoor flashlight and a reliable illumination tool. It delivers 1100 lumens and features four brightness levels: turbo (1100 lumens), high (400 lumens), medium (100 lumens), and low (10 lumens). The turbo mode drains the battery in less than 2 hours so you’ll want to make certain to use the turbo mode only when you need to. The high mode lasts 5 hours which is a great runtime! The lowest level can last up to 210 hours so if you can stick with the lowest mode you’ll be all set! The ST15 also has a battery capacity indicator and a memory function. This function allows you to easily conserve the battery by having the flashlight automatically turn onto one of the lower brightness levels.
The XT11S is an awesome tactical flashlight that can be used in a variety of settings and blackouts is one of them. It hs a lot of the same features as the ST15 that we just outlined. It delivers 1100 lumens and has four brightness modes that mirror the ST15. The runtimes vary a little, however. The turbo mode lasts up to 2 hours and the low mode lasts up to 260 hours. The XT11S also has a battery capacity indicator and a memory function. The really unique feature of the XT11S is the programmable settings that it comes with. It’s default setting, the Conventional Tactical Mode which has one-touch turbo, one-touch strobe, and cycles through the brightness levels easily. The Hunting Mode has one-touch turbo, one-touch low, and cycles through the brightness levels easily. Finally, the Ultimate Tactical Mode has one-touch turbo, one-touch strobe, and deactivates the side switch and other brightness levels. Whichever you feel most comfortable using during a blackout is up to you. I would recommend the Hunting Mode because you have one-touch low to help conserve the battery.