Posted on 08/21/2013 5:41:40 AM PDT by Old Sarge
WASHINGTON — The electric grid, as government and private experts describe it, is the glass jaw of American industry. If an adversary lands a knockout blow, they fear, it could black out vast areas of the continent for weeks; interrupt supplies of water, gasoline, diesel fuel and fresh food; shut down communications; and create disruptions of a scale that was only hinted at by Hurricane Sandy and the attacks of Sept. 11.
~ SNIP ~
One goal of the drill, called "GridEx II", is to explore how governments would react as the loss of the grid crippled the supply chain for everyday necessities.
~ SNIP ~
Most of the participants will join the exercise from their workplaces, with NERC, in Washington, announcing successive failures. One example, organizers say, is a substation break-in that officials initially think is an attempt to steal copper. But instead, the intruder uses a USB drive to upload a virus into a computer network.
The drill is part of a give-and-take in the past few years between the government and utilities that has exposed the difficulties of securing the electric system.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I’m pinging a combined Prepper/Threat Matrix list.
According to my read of the article, this is a simulation, like a military CPX, and these 150 companies will not be physically shutting off the grid.
But who knows what they’ll feel empowered to do...
After 4 days without power - most large American cities would be in the MadMax Zone...
Preppers’ PING!!
So good of the Times to bring this to everyone’s attention.
Osama Obama picked the perfect time to declare his “war on coal”,the fuel responsible for almost half the electricity generated in this country.
The first priority would be to ensure that the NSA could spy on the survivors.
Sarge —
the NYT almost gets it right but doesn’t. See the excerpt below:
“protect equipment against an electromagnetic pulse, which could come from solar activity or be caused by small nuclear weapons exploded at low altitude, frying crucial components.
An attack using an electromagnetic pulse is laid out in extensive detail in the novel “One Second After,” published in 2009 and endorsed by Newt Gingrich. In another novel, “Gridlock,” published this summer and co-written by Byron L. Dorgan, the former senator from North Dakota, a rogue Russian agent working for Venezuela and Iran helps hackers threaten the grid. In the preface, Mr. Dorgan says such an attack could cause 10,000 times as much devastation as the terrorists’ strikes on Sept. 11, 2001.”
The article speaks of a nuclear detonation at *low* altitudes generating EMP that damages the grid. Wrong mostly, but right (see SREMP below). HIGH altitude 40+ KM is the best method. The bad guys have to get it up there, but the most modeled EMP attack is high altitude.
Refer to this article http://www.fas.org/nuke/intro/nuke/emp.htm and how the most damaging pulse - the HEMP - is generated via the Compton effect induced by a high-altitude burst. A low altitude burst does indeed produce a powerful EMP, called Source Region Electro-magnetic Pulse [SREMP], which is powerful locally, but the extent and permanence of the damage pales in comparison to a high altitude 40 - 40 KM) HEMP.
There are two pulses generated (some prefer to describe 3 pulses, E1-3, but E2 is akin to lightning in its effects and is not anticipated to act as a killer pulse) by nuclear EMP - the HEMP is VERY short duration, with nanosecond rises in voltage/induced current, and lasts about a millisecond. THIS (E1) is what fries the digital circuits of the modern era. The second pulse (E3) is longer duration and induces powerful voltages/currents in the long ‘antennae’ of the power grid, rail lines, etc. Together the two are electronically and even physically disabling to electronic and electrical infrastructure.
Furthermore, solar wind EMPs should only generate the ‘long wave’ EMP, (E3 and perhaps some E2) and pose little threat to any unplugged and moderately shielded electrical/electronic gizmos. One can easily protect your stuff from a solar storm EMP, and we should have days if not plenty of hours to prepare.
One Second After is of course more of a SOCIAL essay/novel - ‘lord of the Flies’ in the 21st century on a large scale. Gridlock is more about thwarting a different attack vector. The outcome is the same — a failure of civility within 9 days.
See also http://www.fas.org/nuke/intro/nuke/emp/toc.htm
http://www.fas.org/irp/threat/mctl98-2/p2sec06.pdf
http://empcommission.org/
http://www.futurescience.com/X5DNA/X5DNA.html
Too few people know the extent of the problem.
“Too few people know the extent of the problem.”
Lisa Murkowski, the left leaning Republican Senator from Alaska understands it fully. She killed the effort in Congress to harden the power grid against EMP attack.
http://www.newsmax.com/KenTimmerman/lisa-murkowski-emp-energy/2010/10/14/id/373768
The higher you go, the less damage is done. It would take large numbers of these EMP’s to knock out the grid. The Soviet Union tested it on their own people.
Terrorists hitting power substations or embedded viruses is more likely. California is particularly vulnerable.
ping
You are right. The higher the nuclear blast happens, the wider is the area affected and it doesn’t take a massive nuclear blast for it to happen.
As Worries Over the Power Grid Rise, a Drill Will Simulate a Knockout Blow
From the article:
utility workers, business executives, National Guard officers, F.B.I. antiterrorism experts and officials from government agencies in the United States, Canada and Mexico are preparing for an emergency drill in November that will..."
Thanks, Old Sarge.
We have a whole house generator installed with enough propane for about a month.....tested it out during Hurricane Sandy. Also have a backup generator which runs on gas.
Check out # 11.
Congressional staffers will get a waiver from it.
Pong
Fedzilla was just running a drill in Boston, too, when a couple of real bombs set off by known government persons occurred. Just sayin’
Folks, it's worse.
We will not have three days of Walmart stockpiles to feed the hordes and keep them sated.
We will not have a week of normality before the Gibsmedats come boiling out of the urban kraals.
We will have only HOURS.
1965 - Los Angeles - the arrest of a young black man in Watts incites a crowd, which spawns a riot, within one hour of the arrest;
1968 - across America - the death of Martin Luther King touches off rioting in several cities within hours of the media broadcast;
1977 - New York - the grid goes offline at 9:30PM, the looting starts around 11PM;
1992 - Miami - Hurricane Andrew’s winds haven’t even died down before the malls are ransacked;
1992 - Los Angeles - the verdict is announced for the Rodney King Trial, and almost immediately, the city burns;
2005 - New Orleans - the looting started even before the storm made landfall;
2011 - London - a protest over a slain gangbanger turns violent and within four hours, Greater London descends into mayhem;
2012 - Long Island, NY - in the wake of Frankenstorm, enterprising looters dressed as powerline repairmen sneak past the martial law cordon and pillage, with 24 hours of the storm;
Hours, people - not days, hours.
The very first thing to do if/when an EMP strike or grid attack occurs is to fill water containers. The water supply is pumped into tanks which send water via gravity generated pressure. What is in the tanks is what will be available even when the pumps to refill the tanks no longer operate, so fill water containers FIRST. I have bladder tanks for my bathtubs, to store potable water ...
Appy —
Actually, there is an optimized altitude that varies slightly by yield and nature of the weapon. That’s about 40-50KM.
So if you were to go REALLY high, then yes, the damage is lessened. But in this case a nuclear device of the right sort optimally excites the atmosphere for the Compton effect at about 40-50KM, and it’s a line of sight effect from there. The pulse is strong enough that the general rule of “energy dissipates proportional to the cube of the distance” doesn’t matter here. If you’re in the line of sight of a nuclear EMP, your unshielded IC’s are screwed by HEMP.
The SHREMP pulse of a low altitude burst is devastating, but a much smaller radius, and is a direct-effect killer, no Compton effect add on.
They both suck really bad. That’s a net.
I’m not as worried about terrorist doing it as I am our own government doing it and blaming it on terrorist, but alas our government would have become the terrorist.
The democrips already are the destroyers of OUR Republic. They deserve zero trust now.
Read “The Harbinger” by Cahn
“After 4 days without power - most large American cities would be in the MadMax Zone...”
I think most Americans can stick it out 10 days to 14 days IF THEY KNOW THE POWER IS COMING BACK ON A PREDICTABLE DATE.
If the people don’t know when it is coming back on, then most everywhere will go Mad Max within hours or even minutes.
Nonsense, the Southwestern US and Tijuana just went through it in 2011.
Upcoming on the reading list, actually...
A ringing endorsement!
We have a whole house generator installed with enough propane for about a month.....tested it out during Hurricane Sandy. Also have a backup generator which runs on gas.
Do you have black out curtains so no one can see your lights and how far away can the generator be heard?
What is being discussed is a power outage of a much larger scale than only 11 hours.
Most gennies are quite loud. No way around that.
You’re right.
Keep your powder dry and stay safe. :)
Hmmmmm. What do all of those stories have in common. Let me see.......
Here’s a link to a satellite tracking website that currently shows the track of KMS 3-2, a North Korean satellite that makes several passes over the US daily. If it contained a nuclear device, it would likely detonate when it is over Kansas or Minnesota.
http://www.n2yo.com/passes/?s=39026
Well, it is kind of a DARK tale...
Well thread cop, read the post that I was responding to, it was about a single night.
I will make my own posts thank you, especially in regards to the largest black out in recent years, you can make your posts.
The newer top of the line model generators have excellent mufflers, and are quiet compared to the older models. My 14KW kohler sounds like an idling modern car.
As for blackout windows... keep a couple of cans of flat black spray paint!
BTW laplata... Welcome Home!
I’m with you. The grid is going down at some point but its way more likey to be a cyber attack or blackouts due to shutting down 292 coal fired power plants. If so electronics will not be destroyed. If you have an alternative electrical system such as solar you will still have power at your house. Cars will run but gas will be a problem. It will take awhile to get generators up and running at gas stations. Long term outage will be a major pain in the butt though. We are putting in solar and converting all appliances to propane.
We got along just fine with none of them when I was a kid.
Went through what? And what do those areas have in common with urban environments like NYC, DC, Baltimore, or Los Angeles. I don’t follow you.
Yep... All those city folks gotta learn sometime though!
How much noise does this generator make? Can it be heard over 50 or 100ft away?
Can your house, with the generator that makes noise, and the smells of cooking food, be seen from any road or major thoroughfare?
Since the The Old Gray Whore only whores for elite liberals... I wonder if there’s something else to this...
If you’ve ever been anywhere where there was NO electrical noise and NO running cars you wouldn’t believe how far that ‘idling car’ noise will travel...
I've been tempted to look up when the next seven year cycle is but I haven't decided if I really want to know. I'm sure plenty of people have already done the math.
A large region of the United States went through a total power outage, San Diego/Tijuana was affected, have you heard of that little metro area?
The blackout involved about 7 million people and the people did not go nuts.
How is it that preppers missed this massive blackout?
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