Thursday, August 7, 2008

Live Small and Prosper: The 5th anniversary of “The Blackout” is 7 days away

Part 2

On August 14, 2003 because of the blackout that hit Ontario and much of northeastern U.S. many neighbours became my friends.

Shortly after 4 p.m. the lights went out at London’s downtown YMCA, the treadmill I was on stopped running and so did I - very abruptly.

Many days later CBC News Online reported:

The cause of the blackout, according to Canada-U.S. joint task force, can be traced back to FirstEnergy Corp. of Ohio. FirstEnergy's EastLake plant shut down unexpectedly... triggering problems on its transmission line that triggered a cascade effect that caused the blackout.


[See photo in context]

After showering in the dark (and in the nude as I recall) I biked home on my Raleigh 5-speed and noticed the blackout’s effects had cascaded onto my neighbour’s porch.

“Drink this before it gets warm,” he said, and handed me a beer.

Ten minutes later two friends arrived carrying more beer and a crank radio.

Stay tuned for Part 3

[Read Part 1 below for context]

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is almost as good as a soap opera. What a tease you are!

G. Harrison said...

hi Jesse,

I'm glad you tuned in.

the topic is topical and the suspense is killing me.

what will I say next?

cheers,

gord h.