Emergency management officials in my state (Great Lakes) have been conducting industry "roundtables" (transcripts posted on the Internet) with telephone, electricity and gas providers.

One official from the gas company (which relies on telecom) stated that our state was luckier than many because we only have a few providers of utilities--as opposed to some states, which have hundreds.

Apparently, he was inferring that interconnectivity between utilities can be problematic, and the fewer entities involved--the better.

I also learned that in the event of an outage, power is "triaged," to hospitals, residents and finally--businesses.

Of course, everyone is concerned about the status of suppliers, such as Shell, Amoco and various "little guys." (The old axiom, "I know I'm not crazy, but I'm not sure about you.")

Have you checked on this where you live?

-- FM (vidprof@aol.com), April 06, 1999

Answers

FM, after experiencing a couple of hurricane-related emergencies in a couple of states, I can tell you that power is indeed triaged. However, I think it goes: emergency services/hospitals, high-crime areas--and I'm not so sure that residents are next! Seems to me in Durham they chose the areas that would be most benefited (i.e., densest in individual users as opposed to units of power) by repairing lines and restoring power. Certainly, the businesses in town had power restored before those (many!) residents outside the city limits were approached.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), April 06, 1999.

residents on the "Serious Illness/Disability requiring Power" list are right up there with Hospitals/Emergency Services. Or so CEI/First Energy tells their customers.

Chuck

-- Chuck, a night driver (reinzoo@en.com), April 06, 1999.

I think you forgot a couple of categories. There's "where the linemen's families live;" "where the management lives;" and "where the local government members live."

Jeannie

-- jhollander (hollander@ij.net), April 06, 1999.

Jeannie - do you really believe that? Do you honestly think that's how it works? Nothing comes before emergency services and hospitals in this case.......nothing.

That's about the most ludicrous statement I've read to date on this forum. And there have been some doosies!

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), April 06, 1999.

You're losing your objectivity and are becoming hateful, Deano. The original message talked about three catagories -- hospitals, residents and then businesses last. Jeannie said, 'I think you forgot a couple of catagories.'

Jeannie didn't say the mayor's house would come before the hospital. In a list of several catagories though, I can see the mayor's house being moved up to the middle of the list -- somewhere between hospitals and your own home.

-- (logic@makes.sense), April 06, 1999.

Actually 'logic' I misread Jeannie's post. So it has nothing to do with objectivity and hatefulness - how in the hell did you read hateful into that?? I just simply misread it........my apologies.

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), April 06, 1999.

If not the mayor's house--at least where the mayor is SUPPOSED to be if things go bad--i.e., someplace where he/she will be giving orders.

(Although I must admit when our mayor lived in our neighborhood, people say our streets were plowed first. That was before we moved here. Sure doesn't happen now!)

-- FM (vidprof@aol.com), April 06, 1999.

Don't forget the Water co.

-- Justin Case (justin case@Aloha.com), April 06, 1999.

If you look back at last year's Northeastern ice storm, you'll find that businesses were given preference over residences. It seems that the governments involved feared the possible economic losses caused by businesses being closed due to no power, over possible human losses caused by homes with no power during th heart of winter. I don't have confidence that a larger-scale power outage will be met with any different priorities, favoring residences over businesses.

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), April 06, 1999.