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are you watching the news right now? (5 pm been on since 4:3

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 4:06 pm
by m3rajk
it's now 5. i was watching since 4:30.. just decided to post....


here's what i've been talking to others about...

central canada and northeast us...

areas reporting as afected...most of connecticut...including hartford, nyc ny, toronto canada, ottowa canada, clevland oh, detroit mi, newark nj, albany ny, rochester ny, buffalo ny, syracuse ny, utica ny,toledo oh, western vt, lancing mi

nbc has it, so cbs and abc better have it too

started at 4:14 pm est

montreal seems unaffected

(inital report on nbc) a plant in upstate ny seems to have gone and caused a cascade effect

airports on backups. should be ok through tomorrow but faa is trying to plan on this not being over soon so that it doesn't have an issue

they just announced the reason turns out to be a manhatten powerstation went down and the vaccum caused an issue as other places in the grid tried to compensate

vermont, maine and massachusetts have their own grids... we connect to the others, but we have a buffer because of the 1960s one. one boston station just had someone from the mass dept of power say that originally new england was going to try to make it's own but decided to do it by state instead. so we can help, but if it's major we can keep ourselves out

berkshire county ma is expiriencing minor issues that are related

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 5:28 pm
by qartis
That's what happens when 50,000 people all decide to make toast at the same time.

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 7:47 pm
by phice
Along with flushing their toilets at the same time. :D

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 10:45 pm
by trollll
Just got back online... For the first hour this afternoon power couldn't really figure out exactly if it would completely cut out or just fade. So the computer went off, but the lights just acted like someone had started playing with a dimmer switch.

After a while it got fed up with that and just cut out completely. Didn't really worry about anything out here in the sticks, but had some family go into the NYC for the day (one of which we think got caught in the train on the way to Long Island).

Has anyone found out exactly what the hell happened?! Started off as an explosion, then to lightning, then a fire, then some guy named Paul comes on the radio from a power company and announces that it didn't get caused by natural forces.

Theories:
Aliens experimenting with the speed of decay
CIA tried to repeat MKUltra on a larger scale
Ferrets got in and gnawed some of the wires
Power company uses Windows 2000 or XP

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 12:06 am
by phice
If any of you had the pleasure to watch Conan (nbc) tonight, it was hillarious. :D I wish he could have spent the whole hour doing a show in the dark.

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 9:37 am
by macewan
heard about it in #debian before it hit the news

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 9:54 am
by m3rajk
according to cbs: the canada side of the niagra falls plant that is apparently run by both countries crashed, cutting off ontario. the the us started trying to help out canada, and michigan went out, followd by buffalo ny, and a chain reaction getting two us grids


according to nbc: a powerstation in manhatten went, as the others tried to compensate, the power drain caused them to go, causing a chain reaction that went out like a ripple in a pond. as the power generator meant to compenstate found the drain too much and blew, paces went out. the reason it was still on in some areas is they aren't attached to the grid right, so they didn't try to compensate correctly.


both said it's not a terrorist attack

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 11:24 am
by phice
nor does it relate to the msblaster virus.

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 2:35 pm
by qartis
Yea, I had to chuckle as I watched the Mayor of NY trying to innocently weasel the blame on Canada..

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 7:09 pm
by Coco
well according to the bbc the canadians claim a power plant set on fire, which the US denied. The us also denied any terrorist activities.

Then there was a strange little side note stating that the US nuclear Bureau (or whoever they are) switched off 9 east cost reactors.
Maybe that was the cause :?:

my guess would be there was a fire/explosion/whatever in a plant somewhere, and in a sudden fit of 9/11 paranoia all the east coast reactors got shut down

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 9:51 pm
by fractalvibes
Probably aliens - Gas Creatures from Jupitor....
Or simply an aging and antiquated infrastructure...
Or if they are using Windows, a ploy to get the power companies to download the latest service pack.....

Wish some authoritative source would set the record straight...

fv

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2003 11:06 pm
by trollll
I have a feeling that the authoritative sources feel the same way right now... Probably just a case of either someone royally screwing things up and their superiors not wanting the company getting blamed or a cover-up (or ignorance) of sabotage (first definition in m-w.com).

Posted: Sat Aug 16, 2003 2:13 am
by qartis
Yea, the US denied that it was linked to terrorists, and said that "reports came in of smoke emmenating from a manhattan power station, but that's natural when it's shutting down."

It has to be true, I saw it on TV.