This is the first my electricity has become stable. I hope it will stay on all night now, becuase without the AC it will be misereable. Signing off soon… try to keep occupied/cool everyone!
Mine’s all blinky…I can’t help but envision a monkey at the power station flicking a switch everytime the lights go out for a sec and come back.
Yeah…all day stuck with no computer makes matty go batty.
Whew … I’m glad my vacation to the eastern states was last week and not now!
envisions being stuck in her room of the 39th floor of the Mariott Marquis and shudders
Glad to hear the power is coming back, though! 
I predict a baby boom in 9 months :yikes:
*Originally posted by David Kelly *
**I predict a baby boom in 9 months :yikes: **
Where is the ROTFLMAO icon?
Lets make a list of everyone who was without power… I had power here in sunny Minnesota.
Wow, finally just got power back here in West Islip, NY (Long Island).
Let me tell you… it is unbelievable all the things that we do in our everyday life that depends on electricity. You never really realize it until it is all totally gone. I can’t even begin to explain the feelings that I was having – I dont think that I have ever been more bored in my life, ever. There is absolutely NOTHING to do. I mean, no lights, no TV, no computer, can’t open the fridge, can’t cook, stores are all closed, can’t get gas, street lights out (causing total chaos in the streets at intersections). Cell phones weren’t working, sometimes even normal phones didnt work.
I was actually sitting in the dentist’s chair when it all happened. I was only in the chair for about 5 minutes, the hygenist had just briefly looked around in my mouth and was taking my first x-ray. She left the room to press the button, and as the machine’s “buzz” was interrupted halfway and everything turned off. I thought maybe it was just a blown fuse at the office. Next thing I know I hear the office talking about that the whole block is out – even the traffic lights. They try to call the power company, but the phones are dead; sirens are ringing in the background. Everyone there tried their cell phones but they just wouldnt connect to any number. Someone tries their car radio – many stations arent even running, one was reporting that power was out all the way to Manhattan.
They excused me from the office, I went outside to find people lining the sidewalks, all outside the buildings they were in, talking (well trying to connect anyway) and giving strange looks at their cell phones. The streetlights are out, cars horns are blaring, people are just randomly walking across the street in front of cars. “Power is out in Michigan!” you can hear. I try to leave the parking lot, but without traffic lights it was extremely difficult… the entire ride home was filled with packed roads, chaos, etc. A 30 minute ride took me over 2 hours, thank god I had enough gas. On the radio: Malfunction at a Niagra Falls plant… me: “then why dont we have power down here at LI, we have our own power plants, why dont we just disconnect from the grid and power ourselves for now” – the thoughts on everyone’s minds, on a hot 85 degree afternoon, people are restless and sweaty. Oh yea-- fill up some bottles with water and dont use the water after that… who knows how long the pumps that create water pressure will remain on backup power. And dont leave candles unattended b/c you wont have phones to call 911 – which may not even be running – and the fire dept will have no water pressure to put out a fire.
Yea so that was my day… complete and utter chaos. I’ve never experienced anything quite like this before (although 9/11 was another very emotional catastrophe, it is a very different type of situation to go through – both are flat our horrible). I still cannot understand how something like this could go so terribly wrong in this day in age… it just doesnt make sense. Oh well, now it’s over (hopefully forever).
I found it rather humerous,only because I was stuck at home, and spent all night trying to get a generator going. We did get it going before power came back though, which beat my estimates :p.
We actually had power going from one generator in my driveway across the street and down a couple of houses, as well as into my house. Only to power three frigdes, but it was worth it.
Oh, and by the way. If you ever have a clogged fuel line, don’t put a rubber hose with a larger ID in the line, cause after a few hours of crazy vibrations, it’ll come off and spray gasoline everywhere. My hands still smell like gas…
The one thing that really pisses me off. We missed the meteor shower by like, a day! Why couldn’t the power go out a few days ago and be clear skies… 
Oh well, now I’m off to brave the LIE to get to the last day of my internship. Hoepfully most of the lights are on, as Long Island is on it’s own power grid for the day.
FEDERAL POWER REGULATORS did not identify the power plant, but CNN reported that a fire had been reported at a transformer at the Consolidated Edison plant in New York City. Most of the affected cities are linked on the same regional power grid.
Actually no fire just smoke because of the plant shutting down. Anyway I was on a date with my girlfriend when the power went out. It was fun especially since the power was off for the lights and there was not many cops to be seen.
I just love how history repeats itself.
First the robbery/homicide on the Xerox campus and then this. I’m just glad they both didn’t happen at the same time.
Yeah, it sucks when you drive 25 miles to get somewhere, learn that the place is closed, but wait for an hour to turn around, and then drive 25 miles back home.
On the plus side, I figured out that a Honda Accord has slightly better acceleration than a Volvo (I can’t remember the type now :). My friend’s car was faster in the end though… :(.
And it was a 55 MPH road, so we weren’t breaking any laws (on Long Island, you’re supposed to go, minimum, 10 MPH over the speed limit, seriously :p).
My power went out at around 5 pm. Some friends and I went and had a picnic. Then I came home and went running. At 8:30 I sat in the dark with flashlights with my family and we listening to a Canadian radio station. At around 9:30 our power came back.
I was logged on mobile AIM via my cell phone the whole time
I think people overreacted to the whole situation
Hm. I just installed a new cd-burner. Finished writing a 700mb cd in 2 min 50 sec… on my second CD, with 3 seconds left, BZZZT (power goes off). I thought it was my computer (which crashes a lot now), but then I realized that my power surge light was out… this occurred at roughly 4:10pm (what, Kristen?? How’d you have 50 more min of electricity??!)
I went to my violin lesson at 4:30pm… Obviously, there were no lights and it was incredibly hard to read all the 16th and 32nd notes in the Etude i was studying. My dad arrived at 5pm to pick me up and noted that he took almost the entire 30 min to just loop around the block back to me because traffic was sooo bad (this is about 2mph he was driving at).
At home, we turned on the radio and kept NPR on all the time. We turned on the gas grill and started making food - pissed me off that all stores had to close because of this. My mom came home and finally realized that electricity was out around 6pm because she works at Cornell and they have their own generators…
After dinner, I set up the badminton net and played with my dad for half an hour. Luckily, there wasn’t any breeze that I could feel, but even so, the feather shuttlecock still went askew if hit above 10 feet. Lol.
I went to my room later, pocketed my pocket torch (thanks for buying it, Vicki - did you have power in Michigan?) and made sure I had that on to light candles with. I sat around listening to music for a while, and then decided to go read a book by candlelight for a while - I saw Order or the Phoenix lying around and read the last couple hundred pages for the heck of it. Went to bed, and I have no clue when the power went on in the house because I slept for 12 hours. Gimme a break, I just finished summer school and our 2-day, 3 hr/day regents yesterday.
last night after CT and the rest of the east coast got their power back about 40 houses in old lyme remained w/o power for and additional few hrs. and yes i am one of those lucky peole i live in one of those 40 houses!!! so what did we do? we went to the movies!!! it was quite amusing when everyone in the car was yelling “they have light!!!” when we drove by the houses who already had their power back
Hey All,
As a Blackout Survivor of 2003 I must say Us New Yorkers Took The OUttage Really Well. Though Some took It as a memory of 9/11. As one person told the news the difference between today and 9/11 is that at least on 9/11 The Trains Were Still Running.
NYCTA aka MTA Has delt with this issue very professionally and calmly and b/c of this no one was injured or hurt when leaving a Dark Train going into a Dark Subway Tube. For Thos In New York City: Trains NYCTA, LIRR, Metro North Will Eventually Be Back Up The MTA Wants to insure the rails are in good repair as well as signals and switches. As soon as the City (5 Boroughs) reaches 100% in power restoration the MTA will begin onducting its 6 - 8 testing of all Subway Equipment!
I suggest everyone stocking up on Batteries and Lights because I forsee The Blackout Occuring again.
You know what I want to see - photographs from space of the NE/midwest United States around 9pm last night. Must be sooo weird to see these big patches of black where you’d normally expect to see millions of spots of light.
Chestefield/New Baltimore, MI is back up and running…for how long is another story…
They said LI would probably not have steady power throughout the day, but all day has been perfectly fine. The fact that it’s a really nice day out, 84, and not too humid, probably helped, a lot. My lights haven’t even flickered a tiny bit once.
I think that our problem is LI doesn’t produce enough power for itself for the really hot summer days. But, if no one uses A/C, we can provide enough power on our own grid, which is what I heard they did (we’re quite literally an island, in the power sense, now :p). Doesn’t matter to much for me, as I don’t have A/C anyways, and my house only has 100 Amp service, so we can’t even use that much to begin with.
*Originally posted by Mike522 *
As a Blackout Survivor of 2003
Don’t you think you’re being a bit dramatic?
I was talking to an employer at a job fair here at Kettering University in Flint, MI when the power went out. It came back on in less than a minute. (I’m fairly certain they had backup generators). The campus hasn’t lost power since, but from what I have heard on my amateur radio, power in most of the rest of the town is still out.
We are currently under a boil water advisory. Because of the water, the school made an announcement that they are providing bottled water, but they only had enough for 1 bottle per person. I don’t know how long they expect that bottle to last us. I guess it is a good thing i have several cases of Mountain Dew and Code Red.
Up here in the Great White North we are still suffering. There are some parts of Toronto working but a lot still down. Outlying areas (my home) still no power. Not able to reach people in Huntsville Ontario(further north). I will be getting lots of OT once power starts coming up. Glad I am at work with AC to spare.