A friend heard on WTOP that yesterday's campus-wide power outage here at UMCP had no connection to the big blackout that struck much of the Northeast, Midwest, and parts of Canada at about the same time.
I don't remember the exact date, but the last time we had a blackout on campus was a few years ago, and I think it involved a squirrel. What are the odds that our next power outage would coincide with the afternoon of a nationwide blackout? Furthermore, the nationwide blackout began at 4:10 PM, according to the papers. Checking the logs of our UNIX machines, I see that one, on a bad UPS, went down at 4:11 PM. Our last hit on the web server (a crucial ethernet switch was not on a UPS) came at 4:12 PM.
That's some coincidence.
By the way, it's still not known for certain why the blackout occured. One of the causes reported -- a lightning strike at a power plant -- has been discounted, as have various others reported at one point or another. I'm reminded of all the misreporting in the early hours of 9/11. Remember the fire (or was it a bomb) at the State Department? Something to keep in mind.
Posted by cradle at August 15, 2003 10:26 AMThe last black out at md couldn't have been caused by a squirrel. Rodents are particularly bad conductors. In fact, NIH has been developing a "perfect insulator" with rodent technology.
Posted by: Shannon at August 16, 2003 1:37 PMGonads and Strife!
Posted by: Brooke at August 18, 2003 1:27 PM