4 Ways to Get Water From Your Well When the Power Fails

July 27, 2020

Recently I have run across several people who are concerned about how to get water out of their water well in an emergency.  Without electricity, most of today’s water wells would become useless.  But remember people had functioning wells prior to electricity.

Table Of Contents

1. Hand Operated Pumps

Old-fashioned hand operated water pumps can still be purchased and are quite effective on wells less than 200 feet deep.  Some brands say that theirs will work to 300 feet in an emergency, but that the number of strokes required is less than desirable.

2. Solar Powered Pumps

If the water level in yours is over 300 feet, solar powered pumps will go as deep as 800 feet and wind powered pumps will go down to 1500 feet.  Here is a link to a prior post Solar Powered Well Pumps can Solve your Water Problems. 

3. Wind Powered Pumps

When I lived in the Midwest, every farm had a wind powered water pump.  You still see many of these in use in many areas.  The Aermotor Windmill Company which has made windmills since 1888, is still in business.  You can find their windmill on the internet or through a good drilling company.  Both of these methods will make your water supply independent of the electrical grid.

4. Well Bucket

A fourth method is to make a well bucket, they are simple and inexpensive to make.  Here is a link to a post that shows how to make your own, Make your own deep well bucket.  The buckets work better in shallow wells, you can use them if they are deeper, but it will be a lot of hard work

One thing, it is important to remember is that even if your well is over 300 feet deep; the water table may be much higher in the casing.  We have a well in our family that is cased to 200 feet deep but the water level is only about 13 feet deep. These buckets and hand pumps may work.

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