One year ago today, many Butler County residents awoke to the realization that restoration of their electrical service, which was disrupted by a powerful windstorm the evening before, wasn't going to happen as soon as they anticipated and hoped.

Electrical outages here usually are an "hours event," but this one was different. People here learned soon that service-restoration estimates were being discussed in terms of days or even a week, not hours.

With that news, thousands of families realized that they weren't prepared for what would lie ahead. The prospect of losing refrigerated and frozen food or, in the case of people who rely on well water, having no water because well pumps need electricity to operate, were only two of the headaches many people faced.

Many families who never had thought about ever needing a generator suddenly found themselves wishing they had one. But generators were not to be found, because people converged on stores that sold or rented them as soon as they opened on Monday morning, Sept. 15.

Most of that week provided a long, frustrating experience, no doubt prompting some county residents to more fully appreciate what people in hurricane-prone areas deal with so often. What occurred here on Sept. 14, 2008, was just the weakened remnants of Hurricane Ike, which had battered the Gulf Coast before moving northward.

Above a front-page article in Sunday's Butler Eagle recalling the events of a year ago was the message:

"Last September's powerful windstorm cut off power for thousands of residents for days and generally wreaked havoc. But it also left many better prepared should such an event strike again."

But, unfortunately, many people are as unprepared today as they were last September.

Those who have taken steps toward better preparedness probably are feeling more comfortable with a couple of months left in this year's hurricane season. Still, no one can predict the severity of the coming winter.

The silver lining in last year's adversity is that it provided a real test for future emergencies. The efficiency of the county's 911 system was tested, having received more than 1,100 calls between 7 p.m. Sept. 14 and 1 a.m. Sept. 15 last year.

The storm raised awareness of the need to address weak or dying trees that are close to power lines. Unfortunately, there haven't been enough efforts aimed at reducing that problem.

For stores that sell items that are invaluable in emergencies — things such as generators — the remnants of Ike provided a lesson in how to quickly obtain additional supplies.

A New Castle man who deals in generator repairs, and who was interviewed for Sunday's article, said he has expanded his parts stock as a result of last year's experiences.

Ike caused some utilities such as Central Electric Cooperative to improve their communication capabilities.

Meanwhile, Allegheny Power, which is part of a regional assistance group, was able to evaluate its major response capabilities, and perhaps that September exercise proved valuable for a Feb. 11 windstorm that became the power company's worst disaster of all time.

That power outage affected 373,000 customers, compared with 156,000 during the September storm.

In the first few hours last September, county residents were oblivious to the scope of the damage, even amid downed trees and powerlines. They assumed they were seeing isolated damage that could be repaired relatively quickly.

Unfortunately, it wasn't isolated and it couldn't be repaired quickly. And, as the days wore on, they became painfully aware, if only by way of their freezers and refrigerators, of the storm's heavy costs.

Ivan, the strongest hurricane of the 2004 Atlantic hurricane season and the 10th-most-intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded, wreaked havoc in Western Pennsylvania as a rain event. It too tested emergency response.

With experience on both of those fronts in such a short span of time, people in this county should take severe-weather predictions seriously and be prepared. Butler County is hundreds of miles from the Atlantic coast and much farther from the Gulf of Mexico, but it's no stranger to severe weather.

Sept. 14, 2009, came and went without incident, but the date served as a reminder that severe weather events can, and do, happen here.

At the same time, some people might becoming wary of any storm whose name begins with an "I."