Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Power Failure?

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Posted by Richard Thomas (Member # 1815) on 08-14-2003, 03:55 PM:

We are having major power grid problems here in Southern Colorado. Anyone else having trouble?

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 08-14-2003, 04:28 PM:

The BBC Radio News broadcast just now (2200 GMT on Thursday 14 August) described as 'breaking news' reports of widespread power cuts in North America including New York (all 3 airports closed), Chicago, San Francisco and Toronto.

Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 08-14-2003, 05:07 PM:

Yes, it's a massive power failure in the Northeast, Midwest and Canada.

There was a fire at a Niagara Mohawk Power Co. plant in upstate New York. I was fortunate in central New Jersey -- the power dipped for about 10 seconds, went off for 5 seconds and then came back on.

NYC is crippled thanks to a major fire at a Con Edison plant in lower Manhattan. All subways are shut down. Kennedy and La Guardia airports are closed as is Newark airport in New Jersey. NJ Transit commuter trains are being redirected to the closest station.

Power is also out in Cleveland, Detroit, Toronto and Ottawa. The Toronto subway and airport are closed; cell phone service is out in Toronto; the Toronto newspaper websites (which I visit every day) are down. Parliament in Ottawa was evacuated.

However, some people are screaming "Terrorism! Terrorism!" For once the US gov't did the proper thing and said there was no hint of such.

Posted by Dave Williams (Member # 299) on 08-14-2003, 05:08 PM:

A Manhatten power station is on fire, and that has taken a five city grid off line, comprising of NYC, Ontario, Toronto, Detroit, and Cleveland.

The entire eastern united states is at risk, as the grid is tied together, however they feel that the cascade power failure is contained and under control at this time.

The western US and Texas are on seperate power grids, and would not be affected by this.

Dave

Posted by Richard Thomas (Member # 1815) on 08-14-2003, 05:17 PM:

Thanks Guys! By now I have seen the news. The real trouble we have here is the Grid re-start surges. They are massive and tend to kill equipment in a bad outage like this.

Zap!

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 08-14-2003, 05:42 PM:

Whew! I feel sorry for the folks on the Eastern Seaboard. Kinda reminds me of those rolling blackouts in California. I guess all the extra heat in the northeast has made everyone run their air conditioners on "turbo," contributing to the problem.

This kind of thing has been a selling point used by economic development interests in Oklahoma and other states with ample electric power and somewhat sparse population.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 08-14-2003, 06:22 PM:

No problems here in Denver.

By the way, if you are currently having an outtage, how are you posting? [Smile]

Posted by Adam Martin (Member # 641) on 08-14-2003, 06:33 PM:

I told Brad not to plug another server into that damn outlet.

Posted by Gordon Bachlund (Member # 124) on 08-14-2003, 06:56 PM:

Live better electrically! [Wink]

Posted by Paul Cassidy (Member # 951) on 08-14-2003, 08:41 PM:

Hope all is well out East , can image the problems they will face with the Heat and people stuck in Subways etc.

Posted by Josh Jones (Member # 447) on 08-14-2003, 09:58 PM:

wasnt there something in the 70's similar to this? I seem to remember seeing it on TV years back.

JJ

Posted by Ken Layton (Member # 133) on 08-14-2003, 10:16 PM:

Actually, the big blackout was on November 9, 1965. In fact they even wrote a "Bewitched" episode about it ("The Short, Happy Circuit of Aunt Clara") in which Aunt Clara knocks out the lights on the whole eastern seaboard.

Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 08-14-2003, 10:25 PM:

No problems up here in Washington State. However, It was a very nasty one on the East Coast ans some other areas. Here's the report from the Associated Press:

The largest power blackout in U.S. history rolled across a vast swath of the northern United States and southern Canada on Thursday, driving millions of people outdoors into stifling rush hour streets - then darkness.

New Yorkers escaped silenced subways. Nuclear power plants in four states shut down.

''We all are wondering what caused this,'' said New York Gov. George Pataki. President Bush ruled out terrorism. The blackouts set off finger pointing on both sides of the border.

At one point, Canadian authorities said it appeared lightning had struck a power plant on the U.S. side in the Niagara Falls region, setting off outages that spread over 9,300 square miles, but U.S. officials quickly disputed that.

The blackouts started shortly after 4 p.m. EDT, engulfing most of New York state and parts of New England, and spreading west to Ohio and Michigan. In Toronto, Canada's largest city, workers fled their buildings when the power went off. There also were widespread outages in Ottawa, the capital.

Power began to come back as evening wore on, but officials said full restoration would take much longer.

Outages ranged over an area with roughly 50 million people.

New Yorkers scrambled down endless stairways in skyscrapers where elevators stopped working, and some subway commuters were stuck for several hours underground. In the city that took the brunt of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, people filed into the streets with little fuss and looked for ways to get home.

''I'm trying to keep calm,'' said Aaron David, 27, who works at the United Nations. ''But I was here for 9-11. This doesn't happen every day.''

Traffic lights were out throughout downtown Cleveland and other major cities, creating havoc at the beginning of rush hour. Cleveland officials said that without the power needed to pump water to 1.5 million people, water reserves were running low.

New York state lost 80 percent of its power, said Matthew Melewski, speaking for the New York Independent System Operator, which manages the state power grid. Both New York and New Jersey declared states of emergency.

As darkness fell, city dwellers turned to candles and flashlights as scattered parts of the electrical grid came back on. People gobbled ice cream from street vendors before it melted, and gathered around battery-operated radios for updates.

Su Rya, 69, in batik shirt and shorts, guarded a store on 125th Street in Harlem. But when asked about talk that looting might break out, he said, ''That's barbershop talk. It's a different generation now.''

Marveled another man, ''You can actually see the stars in New York City.''

There were outages in several Vermont towns and in northern New Jersey, where Gov. James E. McGreevey mobilized 700 National Guardsman and ordered 300 extra state troopers on duty. In Connecticut, Metro-North Railroad service was knocked out. Lights flickered at state government buildings in Hartford.

Broadway shut down. Night baseball, too.

The Mets were trickling out for batting practice in New York when the blackout hit and the game was canceled. Hours later, the visiting San Francisco Giants were still waiting in the parking lot for their bus. Some 500 miles west, the Toledo Mudhens' International League game with the Norfolk Tides was called off, too, to be made up as part of a doubleheader Friday night.

''We have been informed that lightning struck a power plant in the Niagara region on the U.S. side,'' said Jim Munson, speaking for Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien.

But Brian Warner of the New York Power Authority said its Niagara facilities were not hit by lightning and ''at no time during this incident ceased to operate.

In San Diego, Bush said ''slowly but surely we're coping with this massive, national problem,'' and added that he would order a review of ''why the cascade was so significant.''

Bush said he suspected that the nation's electrical grid would need to be modernized.

In Massachusetts, Kim Hicks of Baltic, Conn., was on the Cyclone roller coaster at a Six Flags amusement park in Agawam when the power stopped. ''We sat there about 20 minutes and they finally came to walk us off,'' she said. The park regained power a short time later.

In Albany, N.Y., several people were trapped in elevators in Empire State Plaza, but most had been freed by 5 p.m. People in New York City lined up 10 deep or more at pay phones, with cell phone service disrupted in some areas. Times Square went dark

In Cleveland, Olga Kropko, a University Hospitals labor and delivery nurse, said the hospital was using its backup generators and had limited power. ''Everyone is very hot because the air conditioning is off,'' she said. ''Our laboring moms are suffering.''

John Meehan, 56, walked down 37 stories in the BP Tower in downtown Cleveland, wearing his suit and carrying a briefcase. ''It makes you wonder, was this terrorism or what?'' he asked.

The FBI and Homeland Security Department both said the outages appeared to be a natural occurrence and not the result of terrorism.

Police in Mansfield, Ohio, spread into the streets to keep traffic flowing. ''A lot of officers are out there trying to make sure nobody gets hurt, to try to cut down on the accidents,'' said jail officer Randi Allen.

The blackouts easily surpassed those in the West on Aug. 11, 1996, in terms of people affected. Then, heat, sagging power lines and unusually high demand for electricity caused an outage for 4 million customers in nine states.

An outage in New York City in 1977 left 9 million people without electricity for up to 25 hours. In 1965, about 25 million people across New York state and most of New England lost electricity for a day.

On Thursday, Amtrak suspended passenger rail service between New Haven, Conn., and Newark. Some northbound trains from Washington - a city that did not lose power - turned around at Newark.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg asked the city's more than 8 million people to be calm, go home, open windows and drink water.

''Be sure you don't make an inconvenience into a tragedy,'' he said.

As for the cause, he said: ''It was probably a natural occurrence which disrupted the power system up there and it apparently for reasons we don't know cascaded down through New York state over into Connecticut, as far south as New Jersey and as far west as Ohio.''

Nine nuclear power reactors - six in New York and one each in New Jersey, Ohio and Michigan - reported they were shut down because of the loss of offsite power, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Bethesda, Md.

Flights at six airports - Kennedy, LaGuardia, Newark, Cleveland, Toronto and Ottawa - were grounded, according to the U.S. Transportation Department.

In Times Square, Giovanna Leonardo, 26, was waiting in a line of 200 people for a bus to Staten Island.

''I'm scared,'' she said. ''It's that unknown 'what's going on' feeling. Everyone's panicking. The city's shutting down.''

The blackout closed the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel, which 27,000 vehicles use daily, and silenced the gambling machines at Detroit's Greektown Casino. Patrons filed into the afternoon heat carrying cups of tokens.

Posted by Ken Layton (Member # 133) on 08-15-2003, 01:03 AM:

This is indeed a huge power outage. I'm sure some of our forum members are offline because of no power. [Frown]

But just think if Jack owned a bunch of payphones there...all the money he could be making!

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 08-15-2003, 01:51 AM:

Josh/Ken: Driving into work this morning, the radio said that there had been two major power cuts in New York (whether they meant just New York or a wider part of the Eastern Seaboard I don't know): in '65 and '77. Apparently there were lots of political noises of the 'it must never happen again' variety and large amounts of investment to back them up... but sure enough, it's happened again. As the article posted by Paul notes, current speculation is that the initial cause was a lightning strike on a power station.

The Americans are saying it happened in Canada and the Canadians are blaming the US... [Roll Eyes]

Posted by Carl Martin (Member # 1146) on 08-15-2003, 02:33 AM:

funny how

quote:
The Mets were trickling out for batting practice in New York when the blackout hit and the game was canceled. Hours later, the visiting San Francisco Giants were still waiting in the parking lot for their bus.

traveled across the atlantic and resulted in

quote:
The BBC Radio News broadcast just now ... described as 'breaking news' reports of widespread power cuts in ... San Francisco ....

no outages here in cali, far as i know....

carl

Posted by Phil Hill (Member # 371) on 08-15-2003, 02:47 AM:

It's Canada's fault! They forgot to turn off breaker #23. NO wait, lighting struck the Niagra plant on the US side! No Wait, A US power-company employee was on crack and... No wait! It's an act of God... No wait, ...a bird flew into the Eastern 500kV lines and .... etc!

What another bunch of horse sh!t from "news" media and the politicians...AGAIN! Bush included!

"We must pass laws to regulate the power companies so this doesn't happen again" Yeah, right, you fu*king political idiots! What happened the LAST 2 times when the power grid took a major hit? Those "leaders" haven't a clue as to what's technically involved in power generation and distribution.

Let's all jump on the band wagon and save our power (life juices)from the money-grabbing corporations that control & sell all them thar electrical appliance stuff that sucks all of our precious power. [puke]

This rhetoric will die in a couple of weeks just like the power died out today...

>>> Phil

Posted by William Hooper (Member # 71) on 08-15-2003, 03:03 AM:

Non-general lighting has made for some excellent pictures coming out of the blackout areas:

Yahoo slide show

Posted by Mike Rendall (Member # 1499) on 08-15-2003, 03:25 AM:

Forgive me if this is a daft question - If one power station goes down does it completely wipe out most of the commercial and industrial centres in the west of the states?

In the UK, the national grid allows power to be spread around from the available power stations, if one was to be out of service for one reason or another, the other power stations could take up the load.

Is it not the same for the US? or has something major gone wrong with their grid? It seems odd for all of these problems just if one power station in niagra falls goes off-line.

(maybe it's the blaster virus!)

Posted by Bill Mantz (Member # 754) on 08-15-2003, 03:38 AM:

Thank God I live in northwest New Jersey 10 min from the Deleware Water Gap the only thing I noticed was that when checking my email the light in the room I was dimmed and came back on full less than 15 seconds I belive at that time is when the grid went down because 20 minutes later I jumped into my car to go to my cosigns house end when I got there she told me about the power faliers like I said at the begining thank god I have power because today It was hot and VERY humid so I can run my air conditioner and computer to see whats going on here on Film-Tech

Posted by Phil Hill (Member # 371) on 08-15-2003, 03:54 AM:

The problem is when the grid is operating normally, and a generation station drops off-line for whatever reason, the other stations must pick up that load. The system was supposed to work such that ***IF*** there was an overload to the remaining stations, the overload would automatically trip-out/black-out big blocks of local customers to prevent overloading other generator stations connected to the distribution grid.

If such an overload condition or fault would exist at a particular station, then that one station will automatically drop-off the grid... thus furthering the overload to the remaining generators unless the customer blocks were cut.

Unfortunately, due to reasons yet to be determined, the loads were not dropped in a timely manner and a cascading overload condition dropped many stations off line and thus caused the wide-spread black-out.

Hopefully, the techs will learn from this and make provisions to mitigate this in the future.

>>> Phil

Posted by William Hooper (Member # 71) on 08-15-2003, 06:32 AM:

Mike:

Unlike in the UK, cities in the US are hooked up to the power grid in series, not parallel.

Posted by Kris Brunton (Member # 432) on 08-15-2003, 08:01 AM:

Our power came back on slowly throughout the city (Belleville, Ontario) at around 10 pm last night. News reports out of Toronto are claiming 50% of Toronto is up but remianing may not be up for another 24-48 hours???

I have heard every explanation there can be, I don't think anyone knows yet as to the cause.

I must say that it was a very odd night last night with no lights on at all. Lots of people were ot walking, standing outside there house, etc. I heard that gas stations that were able to operate due to generators were charging about $1.10/litre (as compared to about .75/litre). [Mad]

We closed our shop today and sent everyone home except for a few techs that are taking care of alarm calls and a couple of people in the office to answer calls.

Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 08-15-2003, 08:21 AM:

I'm wondering what transpired in the severely understaffed multiplexes [see other thread] when the power failed. Of course the battery powered floodlights must have kicked in (if they were properly maintained), but what was the reaction of the audiences?

I seem to remember a requirement that managers prepare emergency plans in case of blackout, fire or other disruptions, in which each employee had a station and assigned duties, from the senior manager on down. Yet I have never seen such a plan in print, nor observed a drill in a theatre. (In schools I have participated in many mandated monthly drills, with building evacuation timed by the principal with a stopwatch. If time exceeded prescribed maximum, the drill had to be repeated.)

Some time during the last year someone posted pictures of a theatre destroyed by a tornado, with three cars deposited in the auditorium, where an assistant manager led the patrons and staff to a structurally sound area, and there were no injuries.

I wonder how many theatres are run with consideration of the safety and welfare of their patrons and staffs, to the extent of
designing and implementing emergency plans today?

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 08-15-2003, 09:28 AM:

Our company has an emergancy guideline book that all managers are required to read and follow in case of emergancies.

What I don't understand is why nuclear powr plants had to shut down. Don't they provide power for cities. I guess they require outside power sources to controle the plants.

Posted by Rachel Gilardi (Member # 1016) on 08-15-2003, 10:12 AM:

The huge blackout in '65 was on my grandmothers birthday and she was a part of it. This blackout yesterday was on my birthday, luckily I had lights! [Smile]

I thought it was odd how on the news here in Wisconsin they specifically said Boston was down and on the map it showed that where I used to live in Mass was also down. When I called home, both Boston and my old City were still up and running. Different news in different areas... [uhoh]

Posted by Dino Panagiotopoulos (Member # 1579) on 08-15-2003, 11:50 AM:

Rachel same thing happened to me last night. The Detroit news station was reporting and said that Windsor was still without power and would not be for at least till the next day. Its funny how I was sitting there watching on my tv with my POWER on.

Another thing I find funny is how everytime something like this happens, the first thing politicians point to is terrorism to try and put their citizens on the defensive. Its like theres no room for natural occurences anymore. Just my observation.

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 08-15-2003, 12:50 PM:

As far as I saw on the news, the politicians/media were very quick to emphasize that terrorism was NOT suspected.

Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 08-15-2003, 01:25 PM:

The cause is not certain, but basically what they think happened is at one point, 300 megawatts of power were traveling east on the Lake Erie loop and suddenly reversed direction, resulting in an estimated 500 megawatts suddenly moving west, he said. It was uncertain what caused the sudden shift.

That must have been one helluva collision!

The electricity capacity was adequate when the blackout hit, and weather was not a factor.

Whatever did it, the cascade effect took 9 seconds to complete. There were some indications that the first transmission lines that were tripped were in the Midwest. However, the big boys are not certain that is where it started.

But, a private company that monitors the grid said its technology showed the problem started in Michigan. "That was the epicenter," insisted David Trungale, vice president of SoftSwitching Technologies Inc., of Middleton, Wis.

One reason it may be so difficult to pinpoint the cause is the speed in which the cascading outages raced across the Northeast and Ohio Valley as well as southeastern Canada.

Trungale said his company's monitoring stations recorded a power disruption in Connecticut only 2 seconds after the first problem was recorded in Michigan. He declined to describe the Michigan site further.

"It all happened in about 9 seconds," said Michehl Gent, the NERC president.

My comment is this:

As I look back at this, it is truly amazing how we have our lives revolving around a hunk of steel and copper spinning around in a magnetic field. I'll almost bet that if we suddenly did not have electrical power at all and it was gone to never return, many people would not survive. I wonder how long an average 30-year old would live if he/she was thrust back into the era of 150 or more years ago..... [Eek!]

What do you guys think?

Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 08-15-2003, 01:57 PM:

I was reading my email when the power suddenly stopped shortly after 4 PM. All circuit breakers were ON so I knew it was a power failure. Cell phones and cordless phones were useless, though older land line phones worked normally.

My wife was concerned that her frozen pediatric vaccines would defrost and suggested we drive in the dark to her office and transport them to a hospital freezer, since the hospitals all had emergency generator power. But I heard Mayor Bloomberg (on one of the Bloomberg pocket radios he distributed free, which receive only the station he owns--Bloomberg Radio 1130 WBBR!) He predicted almost all of Queens County and most of Brooklyn would be back on line within an hour, so I dissuaded my wife from her risky plan.

Instead, power was not restored in Queens until late the following morning. I hope her vaccines are still viable!

My daughter spent the night in the City, until in the morning she was able to get home via bus, since all the subways will not run for another half day at least. All the tracks and switches, etc. must be checked before a single car can roll. The buses and all toll roads are/were free during the emergency.

When the TV came back on, all nearly all the UHF stations were off, probably because the Empire State Building on 34th street is still without power. That's where their broadcasting antennas are located, since 9/11. TV News showed hundreds of office workers, commuters and tourists sleeping on the steps of the huge Greek Revival Central Post Office Building, and on the floors of bus, RR and airport terminals. Yet all maintained a positive outlook, and aside from three incidents of people arrested for looting sneakers, cell phones and rental tools, one fatality and several fires from candles, the city came through the blackout reasonably well. This was my third blackout, my wife's second, and my daughter's first.

Posted by Christopher Seo (Member # 7) on 08-15-2003, 02:11 PM:

quote:
300 megawatts of power were traveling east on the Lake Erie loop and suddenly reversed direction

Paul, here's a really naive question: isn't AC already reversing direction 120 times per second? [Confused]

Having grown up in Hawaii, I recall more than one blackout... I think Oahu has perhaps two major power plants. I think I'd survive in a world without electricity... probably take up homesteading.

Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 08-15-2003, 02:28 PM:

Christopher, I think they were trying to say to the effect that the 300 megawatt source traveling east was over powered by a 500 megawatt source coming from the west. Kinda of like having a 300 megawatt source on one end of the line and then at the same time, apply 500 megawatt source on the other end without disconnection the orginal 300 megawatt source first.

That would make some neat fireworks! I'll bet somewhere there was one helluva arc-off in a switching circuit somewhere. [Big Grin]

Some think it might have been a switching failure or human error or maybe violations of standard operating procedures.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 08-15-2003, 03:04 PM:

quote:
Kinda of like having a 300 megawatt source on one end of the line and then at the same time, apply 500 megawatt source on the other end without disconnection the orginal 300 megawatt source first

Isn't that done now? How else can multiple generation sources add to the grid at one time.

... unless they weren't synched up... ?????

Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 08-15-2003, 03:23 PM:

Yeah... If the line was in sync and the potential was the same, there probably would not have been a problem whether or not the switch disconnected one source.

I think where the problem came to be is there was quite a different potential involved. Maybe there was an out-of phase condition there, too. Maybe a regulator failure which could have allowed a significant undesireable voltage condition between the east feed and the west feed. Could be a Higher voltage line fell on a lower voltage line. I know things will really get screwy if a 7,200 volt service line breaks free and falls on your 240 volt household feed line. [Big Grin]

It was perplexing enough to the officials that they still don't know what actually happened or what caused it. The power grid is extremely complicated. Much more than I can comprehend.

Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 08-15-2003, 03:24 PM:

Chris,

The Honolulu Advertiser reported this morning that the kind of blackout that had occurred in the northeastern United States and Canada is very unlikely to happen on Oahu with our two power plants. There could be isolated outage but not island wide. The entire northern island of Kauai in the state however could however experience a total blackout because they do not have a power system like Honolulu's.

-Claude

Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 08-15-2003, 03:49 PM:

Rachel, you are not alone. My brother on Long Island had his birthday yesterday and I was going to call him last night -- but the Island was caught in the blackout and he's probably still without power.

New Jersey has done OK. PSE&G reports 5,000 people still out; the utility said on its website that some of this is due to normal incidents (squirrel meets transformer). To help people get home last night Gov. McGreevey lifted tolls on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway.

NYC is hit-and-miss. Parts of the city have power; the subways are still closed; a USA-Puerto Rico basketball game (Olympics qualifier) at Madison Square Garden was postponed.

Ontario is the worst off. The power grid has warned of rolling blackouts through the weekend; CIBC, one of Canada's biggest banks, had to evacuate its home office; the Canadian National Exposition will not open until Monday.

And of course, the blackout means theaters are closed! NYC and Toronto will be hit hard as they're the biggest moviegoing towns in the US and Canada.

Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 08-15-2003, 07:45 PM:

In NYC some 800 rescues of people trapped in elevators were made by the Fire Department and thousands of people walked down from high-rise buildings, including tourists atop the 86th floor observation deck of the Empire State Building.

Additional thousands were led out of subway trains stalled between stations via steel ladders rising five stories to the sidewalk level. Those trapped under the East River were led along the tracks to the nearest exit.

Much of Ontario is still blacked out. As for TV broadcasting, just as happened when the Twin Towers went down,
broadcast channels Fox 5, PBS 13, 17, 25, 26, 27, 35, 39, 41, 47,
53, and 68 show "No Signal" or a completely distorted image in the NYC area.

[ 08-16-2003, 07:44 PM: Message edited by: Gerard S. Cohen ]

Posted by Rick Long (Member # 213) on 08-15-2003, 11:40 PM:

My lights came back on at 10:12 P.M. Friday night.

I was working as a projectionist in Trenton Ontario, during the last great blackout (1965). Trenton is an air-force town and had its own emergency generating system. Shortly before 7 P.M. the non/sync record player began to shift speed up and down (above and below normal r.p.m.) This worried me as I knew at the time that the line frequency was drifting. It soon locked in, however, and the show carried on as normal.

It rather pissed me off when I found out that I was the only one of 30 projectionists in Local 432, I.A.T.S.E. that did NOT get the night off due to a power failure. Power in other, bigger Ontario towns, failed completely.

Re; the reports of price-jacking at gas stations, this was later discovered (or at least claimed) to be the result of the electronic gas price signs resetting themselves to 0.99. Prices at stations I passed tonight, on the way to the only neighbourhood store with cold beer, were normal.

We sat out in the backyard, talking with friends and neigbours to cool off after dark. Although there were minor "crimes of opportunity", in some cities, no major looting occured.

As others have already stated, I am afraid that politicians may put this one "under study" -read: on the back burner till everyone forgets about it.

Had this somehow been part of a terrorist scheme, it shows how under-prepared we would have been.

Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 08-16-2003, 10:16 AM:

NYC got all its power back last night and all the subways are running as of this morning. Long Island is all but fully back.

Somehow I de-emphasized Cleveland and Detroit among the areas that got hit hard. Cleveland ran out of water -- the National Guard had to truck in drinkable H2O. Detroit had to have water and gasoline trucked in from western Michigan -- gas stations ran out of gas!

Ontario has been the hardest hit: Gas stations ran out of gas and some areas still have rolling blackouts. Not to mention a total FUBAR by the provincial and federal governments. The Globe and Mail and Toronto Star websites have plenty of stories about all this.

At least the Beer Store in Ontario was packed with people carrying cases of cold brew. Blackout cheer, eh?

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 08-16-2003, 11:45 AM:

Toronto's subway system will not be restarted until Monday morning (maybe)
The CNE which was to open (Canadian National Exobition) has had its opening delayed until Mondya and all shopping malls and major power users are order to stay down until monday at the earliest
My power came on sat monring at 446am and then went on and off several times
Friday on 3 theatres in toronto were open that i know of
About an hour after the blackout a major transformer farm in Burlington Ontario caught fire due to a loss of cooling and we have been advised that major rolling blackouts will continue for about 2 weeks

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 08-16-2003, 02:36 PM:

OK, Gordon, tell us: are you behind all this?

Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 08-16-2003, 06:55 PM:

Blackout Investigation Blend of Plane Crash Probe, Lab Experiment
"NEW YORK, 6:15 p.m. EDT August 16, 2003 - Teams of engineers, mathematicians and computer specialists have started to comb through hundreds of millions of pieces of data in an effort to reconstruct the largest blackout in U.S. history."

What engineers really meant during those Blackout 2003 interviews:

Engineer says: A number of different approaches are being tried.
Engineer means: We are still grasping at straws.

Engineer says: We're working on a fresh approach to the problem.
Engineer means: We just hired three kids fresh out of university.

Engineer says: Close project co-ordination.
Engineer means: We know who to blame.

Engineer says: Major technological breakthrough.
Engineer means: It works OK, but looks very hi-tech.

Engineer says: Customer satisfaction upon delivery is assured.
Engineer means: We are so far behind schedule that the customer
is happy to get it delivered.

Engineer says: Preliminary operational tests were inconclusive.
Engineer means: The darn thing blew up when we threw the switch.

Engineer says: Test results were extremely gratifying.
Engineer means: We are so surprised that the stupid thing works.

Engineer says: The entire concept will have to be abandoned.
Engineer means: The only person who understood the thing quit.

Engineer says: It is in process.
Engineer means: It is so wrapped up in red
tape that the situation is hopeless.

Engineer says: We'll look into it.
Engineer means: Forget it! We have enough problems for now.

Engineer says: Please read and initial.
Engineer means: Let's spread the responsibility
for the mistake.

Engineer says: Give us the benefit of your thoughts.
Engineer means: We'll listen to what you say as long as
it doesn't interfere with what we've already done.

Engineer says: Give us your interpretation.
Engineer means: I can't wait to hear this!

Engineer says: See me/Let's Discuss.
Engineer means: Come into my office, I'm lonely.

Engineer says: All new!
Engineer means: Parts not interchangeable with the previous design.

Engineer says: Rugged.
Engineer means: Too heavy to lift!

Engineer says: Lightweight.
Engineer means: Lighter than rugged.

Engineer says: Years of development.
Engineer means: One finally worked.

Engineer says: Energy saving.
Engineer means: Achieved when the power switch is off.

Engineer says: Low maintenance.
Engineer means: Impossible to fix if broken

Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 08-17-2003, 05:45 PM:

Now you know why I have a 31.5KVA 3-phase emergency Diesel generator. I have to keep my beer cold when Puget Power can't keep their shit on line.

Anyway, the power outage didn't effect us. Most of our outages are due to high winds that blow tree limbs onto the lines. Another cause is if some dilrod decides to plow their car into a power pole and knock it over.

We usually don't have too many thunder storms, but when we do I am ready to light off my generator. The power grid in Puget Sound is not designed to handle lightening strikes like the mid-west is.

According to the news, the cause of the cascade failure was due to failure of 3 345 KVA lines in Ohio. They are still at loss as to why the three power line failures caused such a huge cascade in the Lake Erie loop.

Posted by Bill Gabel (Member # 1105) on 08-18-2003, 08:30 AM:

I got my power back around 1pm on Friday. I had a few friends crash at my apartment on Thursday night. We drank a few bottles of wine and listened and watched news reports on TV. (Battery powered TV) [beer]

I had gone to the bank 2 hours earlier and I had cash with me. A few people at work got home about 4-5 hours later, they live in Brooklyn and New Jersey.

Here in the city it was like one big block party. [beer]

[ 08-18-2003, 11:59 AM: Message edited by: Bill Gabel ]

Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 08-18-2003, 05:27 PM:

Somehow we all made it through the Monday after the blackout. Detroit just lifted a "boil water" order that affected almost all of Southeast Michigan.

Ottawa was blacked out yet Gatineau (across the river in Quebec) still had the lights on. According to the CBC, Quebec has its power grid on AC but sends power out of province via DC.

In a strange coincidence, the heavily-hyped arthouse flick American Splendor opened in a "Blackout Triangle" (Toronto, NYC, Cleveland). The only outlet to point this out was Variety. Even with that American Splendor opened with a big average.