Keeping the house safe until the heat comes back.

Protect the pipes, then pick one room and heat that rather than the whole house. Open the cabinet doors under sinks on exterior walls, let a faucet drip, and keep the doors closed on rooms that have no plumbing in the walls.

The two things that turn an uncomfortable night into a serious one are a burst pipe and carbon monoxide, and both are avoidable.

The plumbing, first

Pipes at risk are the ones in unheated space and in exterior walls: under sinks on outside walls, in crawl spaces, garages, attics, and any run in an outside wall.

• Open cabinet doors under those sinks.
• Let the faucet furthest from the incoming main drip steadily. Moving water is much harder to freeze, and an open faucet relieves the pressure that splits pipes.
• Keep interior doors open to rooms with plumbing, even though closing doors saves heat elsewhere.
• Disconnect garden hoses and close the interior valve for outside spigots.
• For a long outage, shut the water off at the main and drain the system. Open the lowest faucets and let it empty. This is the definitive answer, and it is what an unoccupied house should do anyway.

What to do if one freezes anyway, including why the split often does not leak until it thaws.

One room, done properly

• Pick an interior room with the fewest exterior walls and no plumbing in them.
• Close its door, and close the doors of rooms you are not using.
• Block the draft at the bottom of doors with a rolled towel.
• Close curtains and blinds at night to cut radiant loss through glass, and open the ones facing the sun during the day.
• Put something under you as well as over you if you are sleeping on a floor, since most heat is lost downward.
• Everyone in the same room. People are heaters.

Layers, and the ones that matter

Hats and thick socks disproportionately, because the head and the feet are where people lose heat and feel cold. Several thin layers beat one thick one. Keep clothing dry, since damp clothing removes heat rather than holding it.

Eat, and drink warm drinks. Alcohol feels warming and increases heat loss, which matters more than it sounds when a house is genuinely cold.

Safe heat sources

Electric space heaters, used properly:

• One per circuit. Two on the same circuit trips a breaker at best.
• Plugged directly into a wall outlet. Never an extension cord or a power strip.
• Three feet of clear space around it, on a hard surface, not on carpet if the manufacturer says otherwise.
• Never left running unattended or overnight in a room with someone asleep, unless it is a model designed for it with tip over and overheat protection.
• The full set of rules.

A wood stove or fireplace, if it is serviced, the flue is clear, and you know how to use it. Never with the damper closed, and never burning anything other than seasoned wood.

A vented gas fireplace, if it is working.

Anything unvented, anything designed for outdoors, and anything that was not designed for heating a room at all, is not a safe heat source.

The people who need more than layers

Cold is genuinely dangerous for infants, for anyone over about 65, and for anyone with a chronic heart or lung condition or reduced mobility. For them the threshold to leave is much lower.

If the house cannot be kept above about 60 Fahrenheit and someone in one of those groups is in it, going somewhere warm is the correct answer, not the cautious one. Check on neighbors in the same categories.

If the property is genuinely uninhabitable, keep every receipt: many policies pay additional living expenses in exactly this situation. What that covers.

If you rent

No heating in freezing weather is an emergency repair obligation nearly everywhere, usually with a statutory response time. Report it in writing the same day as well as by phone, keep a copy, and log every call and visit. How the responsibility divides.

Before the next one

• Know where the water main is, and be able to find it in the dark.
• Insulate pipes in crawl spaces, garages, and attics.
• Keep the heating serviced annually, and keep the records.
• Fit carbon monoxide alarms on every level, battery powered.
• Keep flashlights and batteries somewhere findable.

The short version

Pipes before people, because people can add layers. Cabinet doors open, a faucet dripping, doors open to rooms with plumbing. Heat one interior room with an electric heater plugged straight into a wall, one per circuit. Never a stove, a grill, or anything unvented, and get vulnerable people somewhere warm early rather than late.