How to Survive a Garage Power Outage

Learn how to open your garage door in the event of a power outage.

If you lose power to your home for any reason, you may have plenty of pressing concerns. For example, you might worry about food spoiling in the refrigerator or your home getting excessively hot or cold with the HVAC system off. You might not immediately realize that you have another problem: your electric garage door opener won’t work.

For many of us, the convenience of an automatic garage door opener is such a part of our daily routine that we don’t even think about it anymore. But if you need to hop in the car and get out of your home quickly following a power outage, your reliance on your electric garage door opener will quickly become very obvious! Fortunately, a power outage can’t actually trap you in your garage if you know how to open your garage door manually.

How to Open Your Garage Door Manually

Opening your garage door by hand may not always be easy, but at least it is not complicated. The first step is to locate the manual door release. This usually looks like a cord with a handle attached—often it is red so you should be able to spot it easily.

Next, you will simply pull the cord to release the door. It may only go up partway at this point, but you should be able to coax it the rest of the way up into an open position using the handle on the outside of the door or by pushing up on the bottom of the door.

Once the power comes back on, you may need to open and close the door several times to get it to catch on the opener tracks again so that your electric garage door opener will work properly.

It’s a good idea to go check right now to make sure your garage door opener has a manual door release cord. If it does not, your local garage door service company can install one for you.

Backup Power Options for Garage Door Openers

Of course, you could spare yourself the hassle of manual garage door operation entirely if you install a backup power source for your garage door opener. Many different backup battery systems are available, but it is recommended you choose a brand that matches your garage door opener—for example if you have a Liftmaster garage door opener, get a Liftmaster backup battery.

Another option is to convert your electric garage door opener to solar power. In this case, your garage door won’t be affected by interruptions to the power grid at all.

If you would like to learn more about updating your garage door opener, please contact the pros at Dynamic Garage Door.