Before we start, it’s important to state the following as clearly as possible: if you are in an area that is under mandatory evacuation orders because of an approaching hurricane, stop reading this article and get out. Don’t try to ride out the storm. If you don’t leave now, you might die. Your stuff isn’t worth your life. Get out now. You can read this later, when you’re safe.

From personal experience, one of the most jarring things about being stuck in a storm is the disconnection from reality and the removal from normalcy. Familiar and safe surroundings become menacing when power is lost and the wind is howling. Especially for folks used to being online all the time, losing power in a disaster and being cut off from communication can be terrifying.

While there’s not much to do for a multi-day power outage aside from buying a generator—a solution that comes with its own problems, since generator-related deaths tend to outnumber storm-related deaths in any given US-landed hurricane—there is a quick way to bridge the power gaps posed by a few isolated hours without power here and there: hook your infrastructure components up to an uninterruptible power supply.