The ice started as rain. By six that Tuesday evening in late January the power was gone, and the first thing I thought about was not the refrigerator. It was the phone. I spent thirty years driving a rural mail route through whatever the sky handed me, and I knew how fast a quiet road turns into a quiet week. A storm the summer before had already taught me that I had no way to keep a phone charged.
One of the five things I bought that fall was a Jackery Explorer 300, a battery box small enough to carry in one hand. I did not buy it to run a house. I bought it to run two phones and one lamp, and last January it did exactly that for three days without a single recharge. It started at 100 percent and finished around 30. Here are ten reasons the Jackery belongs in your outage plan, in the order I would tell a neighbor.
The box that kept two phones alive for three days
292 watt-hours, 300 watts rated output, about 7.5 pounds with a handle. It is not a whole-house backup and it does not pretend to be. It is the reason both phones were still on when the road finally thawed.
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Three days, two phones, one lamp, and no recharge
Tuesday night it sat on the bedroom floor beside the bed. From Wednesday on it sat on the kitchen counter by day, charging both phones, and went to the den with us at night, running one small LED lamp. Friday at noon the power came back on and it still had about 30 percent left. I never plugged it into the truck. I never went looking for sun. I had topped it off in December the way I always do, and that was the only reason it was full when the rain started.
It weighs about what a bag of groceries weighs
About 7.5 pounds, with a handle across the top. I carried it from the kitchen to the bedroom and back again without thinking about it, and I am 61 with a mail carrier's knees. That matters more than the spec sheet suggests. A backup you cannot lift is a backup that stays in one room, and in a cold house you will not stay in one room. We slept in the den the last two nights because the wood stove was there, and the box came with us.
It runs the lamp, and the lamp is what you actually miss
Everybody plans for food and nobody plans for the four o'clock sunset in January. One lamp on the counter turned the kitchen back into a kitchen. We could see to get supper together instead of standing over the sink with a flashlight in our teeth. The Jackery ran that lamp for three evenings along with both phones and still came out the other side with charge to spare. A lamp is not much. It is also the difference between a long night and a frightening one.
No exhaust, so it sits on the counter instead of the porch
Ray up the road has a gas generator, and he said it was running fine. It also runs outside, away from the house and away from the windows, because that is the only way to run one, and I would not have it any other way. The Explorer 300 has no fuel and no exhaust. It is quiet enough that I forgot it was running. It sat on my kitchen counter by day, with no fumes to think about, and I never gave it a second thought.
Nothing to buy at the last minute
Every generator story I have heard starts the same way. The cans were empty, or the station was closed, or the line ran out to the highway. I keep nothing on hand for this box. No gas, no oil, nothing that goes stale in the shed. When the forecast turns, I carry it to the counter and plug in the lamp. That is the whole of the preparation, and it takes under a minute.
It gets topped up on four dates a year
I charge it on the first of March, June, September and December. Four dates, written on the paper calendar on the refrigerator. That is the entire maintenance schedule. A battery you have to remember is a battery that will be flat on the night you need it, and I know myself well enough to say so. Four dates I can remember. A monthly reminder I would ignore by June.
Four hours on the wall while the forecast is still talking
From the hall outlet it fills in about four hours. Freezing rain was in the forecast by Tuesday morning and the ice did not arrive until evening, so I had the whole afternoon to get it out of the closet. That is not much warning, but it is enough warning, and it beats the twenty minutes you get ahead of a line of thunderstorms in April. It was on the counter reading 100 percent before the power went.
The outlets match what is actually in the house
Two AC outlets, one 100W USB-C, two USB-A, and a 120W car port. In three days I used the USB-C for my phone and a USB-A for Hollis's, and the two AC outlets sat empty until the lamp came out after supper. I have never needed more than three of those at once, and I doubt you will either. The car port socket I have not used at all.
The battery chemistry is the part I asked about first
The listing says LiFePO4 and more than 4,000 charge cycles. I am not a battery engineer and I will not pretend to be one. What I can tell you is that since last October I have charged it on the four dates and it has taken a full charge every time. That is the only test I can run in my kitchen, and it has passed it.
It is honest about what it will not do
It will not run the refrigerator, the range, the heat pump, or a space heater. I never tried any of them, because the numbers on the label say not to, and I would rather know a limit before the storm than find it at midnight. 292 watt-hours sounds like a great deal until you sit down and divide it up. A backup that tells you its size is easier to plan around than one that hints at everything. This one tells you plainly.
What I'd Skip
If you are shopping for something to run a refrigerator, skip this one and buy a generator instead, and run it outside and away from the windows. If you want a box that will carry a space heater through a cold snap, skip this too, because it will not, and a letdown at midnight is worse than the disappointment at the store.
Skip anything sold as a whole-house backup that weighs less than a case of bottled water. And skip the urge to buy two of these before you have used one. Mine was about three months old when the ice came, and it covered the one job I actually had, which was keeping the phones on and the lamp lit. Follow your local officials and any evacuation order, and do not treat a battery box as a promise of safety, because it is not one.
Three days without power, two phones and one lamp, and it went from 100 percent to about 30 without ever being recharged.
Phones and light, three days, no fuel and no noise
It is not a generator and it is not a whole-house backup. It is the thing that kept our phones on and one lamp burning while the road stayed iced over. That was the plan, and it held.
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