For the most part, things were calm. Unfortunately, though, it seems like power outage is an excuse to loot. I sure hope the grid stays up next January!

Hundreds of Thousands Plunged Into Darkness in New York

7.28 a.m. ET (1128 GMT) July 7, 1999

By Mark Stamey NEW YORK  Manhattan north of 155th Street was plunged into hot, steamy darkness last night when electric power was lost on Con Edison's entire Washington Heights network.

The power failure began about 10:20 p.m. and affected 68,000 Con Ed customers  hundreds of thousands of people.

There were smaller power failures last night in other boroughs: about 100 Con Ed customers lost service in scattered parts of the Bronx; some 500 customers were without power in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn and about 1,300 lines were out in parts of Richmond Hill, Long Island City and Flushing, Queens.

In upper Manhattan, street lights and traffic signals were out, the No. 1 subway was shut down north of 145th Street, and the A train was out north of 168th Street.

Cops from precincts around the city flooded the area, and officials said the area was generally calm.

But there was at least one incident of looting. A crowd of people forced open the gate of a bodega on Sherman Avenue and looted the place.

"A lot of boys broke in and took a lot of money," said a woman, who identified herself as a friend of the owner. "They took everything."

Mayor Giuliani rushed to the police command post on 189th Street and Amsterdam Avenue.

Power in part of the neighborhood  the West Side north of 190th Street  had been off much of the day.

The lights in that area came on at around 10:10 p.m. for a few minutes before the total blackout, which a Con Ed spokesman blamed on "excess demand that brought down the Washington Heights-Inwood network."

Officials weren't sure when power would be restored.

For the entire article: Link

-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), July 07, 1999

Answers

Im surprised that the whole city didn't go under because of the power outage. I thought the equation was

NO POWER+PEOPLE=LOOTING

You can't call people breaking into one store a riot.

-- Mrwaycool (lootinganono@coolpeepsareus.com), July 07, 1999.

I'm sure the store owner does think there *was* a riot. How many stores, exactly, does one have to loot in order to meet the standards necessary to be classified as a riot?

The next thing you'll tell us is that they weren't actually 'looting', just *excited*.

-- Wilferd (WilferdW@aol.com), July 07, 1999.

For contrast...

Power OUT In San Francisco (December 1998)

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id= 000IIh

May be the difference between night and day power outages. Or the energy of emotions as in the L.A. riots. Or not.

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), July 07, 1999.

FWIW, I'm predicting riots throughout the country New Year's Eve in celebration of the New Year/Millenium, akin to the Devil's Night arson/riots in Detoit and the disturbances often seen when a local pro team wins a championship.

I believe that such New Year's Eve behavior will put thugs in the looting frame of mind if there is another excuse such as a blackout soon after.

The good news is, in the past we have seen very little of such behavior in cold climate mid-winter locations.

-- GA Russell (ga.russell@usa.net), July 07, 1999.

Just saw 'Adolph' Guliani on the tube. He was blaming the power compaines saying "we have summer every year and they should be prepared for it". As if people were entitled to electricity like it was air...

They say they'll have power back on 'sometime tonight'.

-TECH32-

-- TECH32 (TECH32@NOMAIL.COM), July 07, 1999.

See also...

Midnight Crossing: Calling all "Big Brain" Y2k Debunkers: Debunk this!
FROM THE JULY, 1999 ISSUE OF AIR FORCE MAGAZINE:

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id= 0013HA

[snip]

The biggest fear is that, even in modernized nations that have been working diligently to lessen the impact of Y2K, a cascading effect will occur. In the worst-case scenario, even systems that have been meticulously tested as Y2K compliant rapidly will be infected with the Y2K bug as a result of their connection to noncompliant systems through the Internet or other networks. Further, they, in turn, will contaminate others.

The Digital Snowball

The result could be a digital snowball that wipes out whole sectors of the infrastructure on which modern societies have been built, from major communications and transportation nodes to entire power grids.

[snip--to end]

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), July 07, 1999.

Mrwaycool, perhaps you didn't read this line:

"Cops from precincts around the city flooded the area, and officials said the area was generally calm."

This was a localized power outage, NOT the whole city. If it was the entire city, cops from other precincts would not be flooding one area.

-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), July 07, 1999.

...more pathetic Doomers grasping for straws "another sign of TEOTWAWKI". It would be hilarious if it wasn't so sad...

April 1, 1999. On this date, Canada, Japan, and the State of New York begin their fiscal year. This will, of course, include dates beyond Y2K. As a result, planning systems, especially budgets that have not been repaired will fail as they attempt to process Y2K dates. Since New York City is the media capitol of the world, problems there will grab headlines worldwide. Problems in Japan will remind everyone again of how interconnected our world is. The Japanese will also be forced to admit that there systems might not make it. I expect the stock market to react and begin (or continue) its downward spiral. Public confidence will continue to wane and the number of Y2K optimists will continue to dwindle.

July 1, 1999. On this date, forty-four U.S. states begin their fiscal years. The problems that began in New York will now spread exponentially across the country and around the world. The public will feel the global and pervasive nature of the Y2K Problem for the first time. This will be further exacerbated by the fact that many states have not had the resources to adequately address their Millennium Bug problems. Consequently, the failures will be real and widespread.

From the 12 Oct 1998 issue of Westergaard - Michael Hyatt

-- Y2K pro (2@641.com), July 07, 1999.

Been gone too long but have to reply to Y2KPro on this one...it would be funny IF... Management was not putting pressure on my friends to keep quiet... The problems are being buried and "workarounds" being devised (note the term not being used: "solutions")... and of course, the obvious observation-maybe some states actually fixed their accounting problems, but let's worry about the serious ones, like power, gas, transportation, and the number one Y2K issue being ignored, denied, and lied about:
JIT INVENTORY
Once this intricate system breaks down, our economy tanks. If Sun Microsystems thinks that it is prudent to lay in a 3-6 month supply of raw materials for production, but say, conservatively, that 25 % of any of the Fortune 1000 manufacturers fails to do so, how long will this country function? How much production will occur? And who will really care if the lights come back on one week after January 1, if you don't have a job on March 1????
When the cyberklintonpollyanas can answer this question, then and only then will I begin to reduce my preperations. But being someone who has visited the islands and Mexico, take my advice people: be scared, be very scared.

-- John Galt (jgaltfla@hotmail.com), July 07, 1999.

...more pie in the sky paranoia from an engineer of fear. Not a smidgen of proof of course...

-- Y2K Pro (2@641.com), July 07, 1999.

we don't need proof.we believe.proof means nothing to you,you believe.we won't convince you,you won't convince us.if we're wrong,we look dumb.if you're wrong,you die.I understand why you can't face that,scares me too.

-- zoobie (zoobiezoob@yahoo.com), July 08, 1999.