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SIGHTINGS

Y2K - New Analysis Of Petroleum Risk

From Gold Dealers Discussion Group:

http://www.kitcomm.com/cgi-bin/comments/goldlive/display_short.cgi#start 10-1-99 10-1-99 ELOHIM (I am copying This was a previously posted document for those that may have missed it.) ID#33131: Copyright ) 1999 ELOHIM/Kitco Inc. All rights reserved

I did not originally post this excellent assessment of Y2k/oil, but everyone should heed this warning. I believe this will happen and the supply/demand model will become so distorted that oil will skyrocket and take gold with it. ____________

I just discovered this board on a link from a Gary North forum. I've never paid much attention to Y2K web forums, so I'm not completely familiar with some of your terms like trolling, but I think I get the picture. I am posting here because I do have some information that I think you may find pertinent, but before I do allow me to present my background as it may have a bearing on credibility, which many of you seem to require. ( And I would, too if I were you )

I'm middle-aged and been around the horn awhile. My career has been in PR/Advertising/Marketing-Sales... as well as in broadcasting as a news reporter, editor, news anchor. At one time I worked with Rush Limbaugh before he became a "somebody". He was a news-director at an all-news station at the time. A few years later, because of my PR/Ad and News Media background I found myself involved as a consultant for the political campaign of a now former President of the United States as part of the travelling White House staff ( political side ) . That means I've rubbed shoulders with some people in high places in the past.

More background: I grew up in an area that was "oil country" in a family involved in the oil industry. I also know a lot of people in the oil & gas industry.

I've been tracking the Y2K situation since late 1997, though I do remember discussions about it as early as the late 1980s. So, I'm not a newcomer to the scene. I've been diligently searching like many of you for any information and clues that will indicate what direction Y2K will actually take. I'll not bore you with a history of my early thoughts and research...other than to say my opinions see-sawed back and forth as to whether it was gonna be No Big Deal or A serious set back to society. ( No, I am not a TEOTWAKI believer ) What follows is a compilation of my reporter instincts to get the full behind the scenes story. In doing so, anonymity of sources is mandatory. These folks who confided to me, fear for their jobs if what they told me was made public. Whether it is justified or not, it was necessary for me to accept those conditions in order to get the full story from them.

Having said all of that, the very first inklings on hard first-hand data came from my conversations last year with folks I know in the Oil industry. Here's what I heard from one close relative who works in mid-level management for a major oil company in the refining division:

#1. Virtually all large Oil Wellheads are at severe risk to embedded chip problems. This is the first threat to the oil supply. This does not apply to small "stripper" wells as it was never economically viable to convert the operations to the expensive computerized systems. Also "stripper" wells supply very little oil to the industry.

#2. Transport of crude oil from the wells to refineries is at risk in the pipeline systems via SCADA embedded chip systems worldwide.

#3. Refining operations of crude oil is at risk due to 4 possible complicating problems: a--software. b--hardware=especially embedded systems. c-- loss of electricity ( more on this later ) . d-- loss of telecommunications in the refineries and also on the delivery systems.

Let's look at #1. in detail...the oil wells. Most larger oil wells, especially those owned by the major oil companies ( the majors ) have been modernized with extensive embedded chip systems. Now I've had a chance to discuss this with oil industry computer engineers that are embedded systems specialists working on changing out the rigs systems and also the pipeline and pumping stations SCADA systems. The real problems lie primarily in the Alaska, West Texas and the Gulf Coast fields where most rigs are LOADED with embedded systems. Engineers that I spoke with indicated that preliminary testing of systems that they could actually access was running between 10 and 25% dependant upon a variety of factors.

I was told that most systems are inaccessible except under extraordinary circumstances, especially off-shore oil wells with depths of several thousand feet under sea level. Most oil well systems are now considered impractical to test and or replace. One consulting engineer told me last December that many new customer's field managers still didn't know what the term Y2K even meant, and they didn't think their operations had any computer connections whatsoever. ( these old boys didn't have a clue what embedded systems were ) .

So this particular source tells me that the oil field industry throughout much of Texas and the Gulf Coast is in the dark about what they're up against. Those clients that were having assessments performed did not have a desire to assess or test embedded systems that were not easily accessed. If it was down in the "hole" forget it. Furthermore, most systems are in sealed systems and once opened can't be fixed in part because schematics are usually not available and or parts are further sealed and coated for further protection thereby making identification of key components virtually impossible. The bottom line = Most embedded systems were never...and are never...going to be checked or tested for Y2K compliance. Its a virtual impossibility PLUS...even if they did, most likely the parts to replace them will no longer be available and it's now become very difficult to find anyone who can supply a replacement system before 1/1/2000. Some easier testing was done on more accessible systems which are usually newer...and the fail rates have run to 25% in some areas.

Overall, these sources estimate that based on prior limited testing, they are expecting a 10 to 20% ratio of failure, or multiple embedded systems going down on each oil well. There will be no parts to fix them and no replacement systems available for quite a long while. These sources tell me that the major oil companies have adopted a FOF policy ( fix on fail ) because it is the only affordable and practical approach, plus there's no time to get it all fixed anyway.

Keep in mind also that these fellows said that even if it's only a .1 or one-tenth of 1% fail rate on embedded chips within a system there a lot of embedded systems on each well that is still enough to shut down virtually every large well in the USA, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States plus most off-shore platforms.

I didn't even mention the nightmares that confound such a situation IF the electricity is out and or the phones don't work. That only compounds the problem. Remember too, that for much of the oil industry this will occur in the dead of winter in regions where freezing temperatures will play havoc. Also, when a well goes down, for the length's of time like in Y2k... chances are new wells will have to be drilled to get back to the oil, especially if it is an old well that was using water injection techniques. So, wells are extremely vulnerable to shut downs.

BOTTOM LINE on Oil Wells: Expect a near complete stoppage in crude oil pumping on Jan 1, 2000.

#2. SCADA Oil Pipelines ( also true for natural gas ) . The same that was said about the well heads and embedded systems is true for the pipelines. It's just too complicated and the major companies decided to adopt the FOF policy and wait to see what breaks down and then try to fix it. Another consideration is loss of electricity for any significant length of time.

#3. Refining. The larger refineries are also loaded with embedded systems creating similar problems just like the larger oil wells. Many of these are again inside sealed lines and would require major renovations to test and replace components. Also, opening embedded systems even if compliant is like putting humpty-dumpty back together again and most likely would require replacement even if found to be compliant. So, most refineries are not getting adequate checks and testing of embedded chips and systems just like their wellhead counter parts. This is not as critical a factor for smaller, older refineries that have not been upgraded like the larger refineries.

Another significant problem for some refineries in North America is the loss of electricity in freezing weather. This is now thought to be a major concern, espcially for refineries in the middle parts of the U.S. Why? because when ambient temperatures fall below 40 degrees Fahrenheit the crude oil gels inside the lines and clogs the system. This creates, among other things a significant safety hazard with risks of explosions. Equally disastrous is that once the process has clogged the systems, production ceases and a "turnaround" begins once the temperatures return to a steady temperature above 40 degrees.

Now, this temperature factor is no problem normally because electricity is used to heat the pipelines and keep the oil warm enough to not gel up and clog the system. IF the electricity goes down on January 1, 2000 in refineries in the midwest or the northeast and the areas are experiencing normal winter temperatures, the loss of electricity for even an hour could be devastating if not dangerous.

Therefore, my sources tell me that debates/discussions have developed as to possible preventative measures that might pre-empt such problems. The only alternative ( if electricity is to be lost ) is to shut the refining operations down, or at least partially stop operations. These options however could carry even greater safety risks of explosions. One particular source tells me that these options have never been tried before at his refinery and there is quite a debate going as to whether the risk of explosion is worth the benefit. The benefit is that by shutting down prematurely or partially idling by clearing the oil lines, any power loss temporarily and then being restored could enable production to resume relatively quickly. IF, however, power is lost for 3 days... then, even a restoration of power will be a moot issue as most likely a 3 day outage will necessitate a "turnaround" maintenance program that usually takes about 90 days. BUT this would be predicated upon temperatures soaring back well above 40 degrees. This source indicated that if the power is out for 3 days or more it will likely be March before they can begin a turnaround and another 30-90 days after that before production could resume.

Now, the weather factor could also affect much of refining operations as far south as northern Texas and along the Gulf Coast of Louisiana. So, the largest chunk of US refining operations are at serious risk for extended interruptions of production that might last up to 6 months or longer. And that is if the electricity is off only briefly or is sporadic for only a handful of days. IF electricity is unreliable for extended periods til warm weather returns then there will likely be little oil refining production in the US for most of the year 2000...because until a refineries electricity source remains stable and trustworthy, there can be repeated lengthy production interruptions lasting far longer than the outage as more turnarounds to clean out the systems is required. So if its 3 months or 6 months of rolling brownouts or sporadic interruptions, refining will be most likely significantly hampered.

Bottom line on Refining: Don't count on much gasoline or other petroleum products for the 1st quarter of 2000 and perhaps continuing thoughout much or all of 2000. IF the grid goes down and stays down for a long time... then it will be a LONG time before you get gasoline. KEEP IN MIND... this is ALL CONTINGENT UPON EVEN GETTING CRUDE OIL TO THE REFINERY IN THE FIRST PLACE...which is highly doubtful.

Now, I've not even touched on the problems of the Foreign oil and non-compliant tankers. I don't have good first-hand source reports on this. I can only rely upon what I've read from internet sources. These reports do not appear to be good either. Saudi Arabia and the Gulf region along with Venzuela are in as bad a shape as we are. The tanker issue may well further complicate the import picture as well.

Overall Conclusions on Oil:

OPTIMISTIC case: ( Power stays up--and NO outages anywhere and the Phone systems have little or no problems ) IF Oil Wells experience breakdowns far lower than current testing indicates then there may be only a small drop in crude supplies, and little or no refining disruptions... meaning small shortages and A LOT HIGHER PRICES... best guess... 50 cents to a dollar more per gallon ( ? )

Middle of Road case: ( Power failures for 3 days with rolling brownouts thru January and early February, and normal winter temps everywhere ) expect U.S. Crude oil production to drop by half or more. Expect many if not most refineries in the US to shut down for extended periods until April or May when normal operations could resume in refineries IF the oil wells are fixed. We'll assume that they are at this point. Then expect serious shortages and rationing of fuel for the first 6 months of 2000.

Bad Case: ( Power failures but not total loss of grid, brownouts roll on through spring and summer... phone service becomes unreliable for first 6 months ) . Expect little to no crude production, period. No importation of oil in significant quantities either for the first 6 months. This means refineries will sit idle til they have product to refine. If the embedded systems run a 25% fail rate as some research has indicated in past testing, and power is unreliable then chip system manufacturers will be unable to make replacements. New wells would have to be drilled and systems converted to manual...but still electricity is required to get it to the refinery. Likely then to not see much crude oil til late 2000, and then about 90 days more before refining can catch up. This all assumes that foreign oil and tankers also can be brought back around this fast also. Therefore, figure on about 1 year of very little fuel for transportation except for emergency services, military and bare minimum industry needs. Very little available for consumers, most likely.

Worst case scenario... ( power grid gone, can't restart. Phones gone due to power losses. ) ... NO oil, no gas. Get a horse. Til the power grid comes back up there just won't be any fuel. Time frame: 1 to 10 years??? [If the power grid is down and stays down for a year and then several years of rolling brownouts and blackouts].

Will it be no big deal? Or, will it be a return to the lifestyle of 100 years ago? While, no one knows for certain, the odds would tend to favor a scenario that is more than just a bump in the road. More than likely, the Oil Industry going down will severely impact the power grid...and may well take down the power grid, despite power plants stocking up on coal. Why? because, a lot of power plants run on fuel oil. Not to mention diesel trains not having fuel, nor trucks that carry consumer foods and goods. Yikes! Now do you see why things could all hinge upon oil rather than electricity???

Final thoughts on this post:

Now in my investigations over the past year, I've also researched the electricity situation conducting interviews with not only the Corporate elites but more so with the boys in the field, running down those embedded systems. But that's another sad story for another time. Same also for the phone companies.

Meanwhile, based solely upon the oil industry vulnerabilities, the oil problems could well bring down the system irregardless of the utilities. Keep this in mind as you ponder the Y2K problem. It does certainly seem to me that Y2K will trigger an oil shortage that will rival and likely exceed the 1974 oil embargo crisis. Remember it triggered a terrible recession. Think about what all this might do under current circumstances of 1999.

-- alice (queenofhearts@wonder.land), October 02, 1999

Answers

Alice, I hope your article severly overstates truth.

If oil is disrupted, it WILL be TOTWAWKI for you and me. I manage a factory and let me tell you, even a week down will impact operations for a long time. This in turn impacts profits, which will impact you when jobs are lost.

While not sticking my head in the sand, I choose to hope for the best. Yet I have prepared for the worst.

Someone tell us again, why would a date sensitive chip be located in the bottom of a well and shouldn't these chips go down as they age anyhow so wouldn't they have established ways to replace faulty chips?

BTW, if in fact oil flow does stop, I hope whoever had lied to the public gets publicly....... Hoping oil flows, ww

-- wayne witcher (wwitcher@mvtel.net), October 02, 1999.

This article is quite old. It has been posted before. Most of the "if this..." statements are in fact accurate. But the information is old.

-- Gordon (g_gecko_69@hotmail.com), October 02, 1999.

This same individual has posted on a number of occasions as "RC". Can't hot link, but look for this subject in the archives.

If all of our systems (including embedded) were able to recognize '00' as meaning 2000 rather than 1900, we wouldn't be here discussing this crisis, ww. You've got problems, do you have gas? Are you SURE you've prepared for the worst? Better quit 'hoping' so hard and start 'thinking'. As for your other question about chip replacement, if they employed every employee working in every fast food outlet around the world, they might have enough hands to get the job done.....of course they might run into a little problem known to many an employer as, "experience". Want to discuss the date next?

*OCTOBER 1999*

-- Will continue (farming@home.com), October 02, 1999.

Wil,please explain about *October 1999*.

Alice,thanks for posting article.It's one thing to read bits and pieces of a puzzle,here and there, and quite another to see the whole picture hitting you between the eyes.I thought I was ready but,after reading this,I know I'm not.The first thing that comes to mind is OH SH*T,then getting another water filter and more food.

-- Maggie (aaa@aaa.com), October 02, 1999.

The original article was posted here on June 15 in the thread:

Oil/Gas are the real problems in Y2k?

Jerry

-- Jerry B (skeptic76@erols.com), October 02, 1999.

It doesn't matter if the information is dated if it's still correct in that the oil industry is not able or willing to fix its embedded systems. I have seen other oil insider reports that make similar statements and like this one, they are convincingly written. If only we could know for sure what's being done or not done!

My hunch is that the power grid will be essentially compliant but may be brought down by fuel unavailability and indirectly by a global banking meltdown that I consider to be very likely.

-- cody (cody@y2ksurvive.com), October 02, 1999.

Once more around the mill with the MYSTERY CHIPS THAT CAN NEVER BE CHANGED story. Old story, new clothes.

THERE IS NO SUCH ANIMAL. NOBODY WILL GIVE YOU A GUARENTEE FOR A CIRCUIT BOARD OR SYSTEM RUNNING FOREVER. IT AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN.

How else can you look at this? If you built a system that had parts that could not be replaced - then the first time something fails, that system is doomed. Look at the NASA satellites - they can't replace parts (excepting LEO devices) and when one fails, it gets written off. You don't do that with an oil well.

So any system that has been built in such a manner is considered expendable. You don't bet your life on expendables lasting forever. Get a grip.

-- Paul Davis (davisp1953@yahoo.com), October 02, 1999.

Well, if it isn't Polly Paul, raising his head from the depths of the sand in which he usually keeps it buried. Just because no chipmaker will guarantee that a chip will never fail (which no one is claiming anyway; that's just one of your usual straw men) doesn't mean that people haven't placed them where they can't be easily changed or inspected. I've worked in the corporate world and they're just as stupid as anyone else, perhaps even more so.

-- cody (cody@y2ksurvive.com), October 02, 1999.

Cody -

Some corporate types may be clueless, but engineers generally are not.

If you have examples where a multi-million dollar piece of equipment would be rendered useless by the failure of an impossible-to-reach $20 chip then let us have them.

Otherwise...........

-- Johnny Canuck (j_canuck@hotmail.com), October 02, 1999.

Of course these chips can be reached and replaced. Of course. They put them down there, they can pull them back up. If they want to. Ahhh, but at what cost, and just to check for that 1 in 20, or whatever, that "might" not be compliant. No, no, no. Not going to do that. Stop production and generate multi-million dollar expenses? Hell no! Fix on failure, that's what. Yup, yup, yup. Smart thinking, huh pollies? No failures coming, so no use wasting time and money on it. That's the way to handle this, all over the place. Yup, yup, yup.

-- Gordon (gpconnolly@aol.com), October 02, 1999.

Alice,

I'm the fellow who wrote the piece you've posted. I wrote it back in June. Since then it seems to have really made the rounds. In fact, I'm amazed at just how many times it has gone around. It was originally written here at the TB2000 forum. It was slightly edited and upgraded for the gold-eagle.com folks. Thereafter, I have lost count. It just showed up again on the Sightings forum a couple of days ago and now you indicate a website that I've never heard of. That's okay, I don't mind. It is however old news. Shortly after that post I did a follow up posting and you might find it interesting to read not only my posts but all the responses that followed including those of "Cheryl" a transplant to Oregon with some keen comments on her encounters with the Oil biz...and also Cary from Texas who presents another couple of interesting notes. These two folks go a long way towards validating and reaffirming what I said in this above first post and the ensuing follow up post. Here's the URL for that follow up thread: http://greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0010Vc

NOW...since all of those posts last summer... I provided an update at the end of August... here is the URL for that

http://greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001KHH

And also, here are some other recent threads further confirming my analysis of the oil situation. Of course, Paul Davis doesn't dare debate me on this straight up. Paul has NO CLUE about the oil biz but he'd like you to think that he knows more than my sources who are actually the ones doing the work.

European Oil Companies now stockpiling fuels:

http://greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001UB9

Update on the Saudi Ports:

http://greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001Uxp

There's more on this issue in the archives but I don't know the URLs...

It would be nice if the Moderators or System Operators here would create another subject for simply the Oil Industry...It really deserves its own category and not be lumped in with shipping and transportation because Oil is a lot more than just fuel for cars. It is also fuel for Power Plants and is a key ingredient in plastics among its many other uses. How about it, Diane??? Can we get a separate category for the Oil Industry in the archives???

-- R.C. (racambab@mailcity.com), October 03, 1999.

Wayne -- my GUESS is that chip failure rate is low and random, and so the occasional failure doensn't effect total output much. Now, come 2000-01-01, the failure rate could be high and pervasive.

R.C. -- Yes it would be nice to have additional categories added, but that would accomodate new posts only. What about the older posts? They will still be buried in the archives under some other category. There was talk once of a search engine for this site, but I think the site would be a "monster" for an engine to find what you really want. What say, Diane, Chuck, or PHIL? :-)

-- A (A@AisA.com), October 03, 1999.

Johnny Cannuck,

you say that engineers can't act dumb!!!! Are you so sure?? Just about every day of my life I run into silly, stupid, dumb-shit engineers that know NOTHING about engineering other than their own little, narrow, own-fart smelling field of 'expertise'.

Johnny, did you know that last week's Mars probe crashed because our beloved engineers didn't reach agreement on Imperial/Metric units??

Engineering is way too serious a matter to leave it solely in the hands of engineers. Trust me on this one.

Take care

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 03, 1999.

The same shortsighted mentality that created this whole Y2K mess in the first place by setting up and continuing to use 2-digit dates instead of 4-digit dates is perfectly capable of putting non-compliant chips in places that would be difficult and prohibitively expensive to reach. There's plenty of stupidity to go around.

-- cody (cody@y2ksurvive.com), October 03, 1999.

What kind of chip would be "Down-hole" in a producing oil and/or gas well. The well is drilled and cased/completed with any chips being on top. Why would anything be down-hole for instance in a 15000 ft Gulf Coast high pressure gas well?? Well service companies are in the business of going down hole to clean out parafin build-up and I don't thimk they hit any chips.... there seems to be a fundamental flaw here relative to the complexity of replacing a non-compliant chip which is based on the assumption that it would be inaccessible. If I am correct, then this would diminish the credibility of the whole premise.... but I stand to be corrected by an experienced operator or well completion expert.

-- Larry (rRamon@cyberramp.net), October 03, 1999.

Larry,

Downhole operations imply much more than just paraffin clean-up. You have Electro Submersible Pumps (ESPs), you have Retrievable Test & Squeeze Packers (RTTS), you have many other sorts of dosifiers and pumping equipment, you have acid jobs, cement trucks, all sort of work-over dowhole pieces of equipment, perforating guns, etc., etc., all run by harwarde, software, embedded chips, let alone reservoir engineering programs, logistics, seismographic devices and programs, you name it, oil & gas has sensors anywhere/everywhere trust me on this one.

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 03, 1999.

George, I agree that the technology involved in exploration/drilling is highly computerized but the equipment you mentioned is involved in exploration (ie logging, seismographic etc.) and completion (perfing, cementing).

The initial posting seemed to imply that a producing well would be lost to production if a downhole chip failed...would suggest that the string would have to be pulled or another adjacent well would have to be drilled.There are a lot of chips in computers involved in logging and drilling (ie. directional drilling etc,) but I don't think there are ANY down hole chips after completion. Anything computer related would be at the well head and would not be as catastrophic or time consming as I infer from the posting. I would think that the well would be shut down for a short period and remediation would be accomplished in fairly short order. The pipelines and refineries are a different situation , but even the adverse repercussions to the refineries contemplate the flawed assumption that the technology is downhole ...therefore, unless proven otherwise, I would have to take this posting with a grain of salt.

-- Larry (Rampon@cyberramp.net), October 03, 1999.

Larry, your point is well taken but still, downhole ESP pumps, production packers, and others, are pretty much downhole, right? Yes, they can be retrieved, but at what cost? By "cost" I mean a wide range of implications, of course, not just money.

Who says these pieces of equipment can be upgraded just like that? Think operational synch, logistics, wireline and hoisting equipment, personnel, availability of replacement parts, broken or partial communications, etc., banking problems(?) all at the same time. Talking about spare parts, several downhole equipment manufacturers have either gone out of business, or discontinued their production lines, or don't even know about Y2K.

Off-shore platforms are a different story, as the production well- head is sub-sea, lying on the ocean bed. We're kind of stuck on this one. Think Venezuela, the North Sea, Nigeria, Brazil, etc.

No sir, it ain't going to be easy, particularly because of top management negligence and engineers on the field not really caring, despite the fact that their asses and lives are on the line. Does this species deserve to survive Larry ?

Take care

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 03, 1999.

As usual all of the bickering over "what's gonna happen or what's not gonna happen if" is pointless ... come Y2K either you are prepared to handle "come what may" or you are not.

In the mean time, scaring ourselves to death with a lot of "what ifs" is a waste of time ... there are very few incidents in life that do not call for similar preparations with just a few variations ... i.e. if you expect a specific incident you will naturally gear up more towards that incident than others ... other wise our basic needs remain the same in terms of water, food, clothing, fuel, adinfinitum.

So, keep your cool ... focus on your preparations and time will take care of the inevitable, wheather you like it or not ... either Y2K comes or it don't and there isn't one thing you can do about it except make some sensible preparations for it ... just in case it does cause disruptions in your life.

I'm probably twice as old as anyone posting here ... you will survive ... we survived the Crash of '29 and the depression that followed until WWII pulled us out of the financial crisis and threw us in to the middle of a world crisis ... we survived all of the shortages and the rationing of WWII ... we survived the baby boom and the housing shortages, etc. of post WWII ... we survived Korea, which burst many a family bubble about WWII having made the world "safe for Democracy" ... we have survived the threat of the "Cold War" with no more serious damage than a few back yards torn up to provide family bomb shelters ... we have survived Viet Nam, the war nobody loved, and the civil strife that it brought to our nation, though our sadness is still mirrored in the black marble of the monument that bears the names of our losses ... we have survived the racial upheaveals from Little Rock to Memphis and beyond ... we have survived the LA riots ... the alledged meat and gasoline shortages of the early 1970's ... we have survived all of this and we will be required to survive much more before our individual lives are through ... the loss of family members, the loss of jobs, the loss of material posessions to the elements, etc., etc., etc.

The one thing you do not want to lose is your faith in yourself ... and your ability to survive ... the person that thinks "they can't hang on" or is intimidated by the mere prospect of the circumstance they may face is indeed the person who is going to not be able to hang on and who will not survive.

You are better equipped today to survive than anyone else in history ever was ... you are smarter ... you are better informed ... you have superior equipment to survive with ... etc... adnausium.

I'm no Pollyanna ... on the other hand I'm no Walter Mitty ... and I'm certianly not going to be a wimp either ...its just not in my genes ... if there is anybody out there that is going to let themselves be whipped by a computer chip before the battle is even begun, then the world is probably better off without you...one less government dependent bawl baby to put up with and fork over taxes on my hard earned cash inflow to support their thumb sucking habits.

On the other hand, if you have it in your genes, it's time to look the situation straight in the eye, make an assessment of what its going to take to whip it and then get on with whatever it is that you can personally do to help solve the problem ... any thing else is useless.

If you are going to be something out of all this, be prepared ... not just because its "Y2K" but because preparedness is a common sense thing to do, no matter what the reason for the season.

You young folks out there still have a lot to learn ... I don't even pretend to know it all ... but I know this much ... if we waste our time standing in the middle of the road whining about Y2K you are just as likely statistically to get run over by a big yellow truck, because you'll be so involved you will let yourselves be blind sided by the unexpected.

If you want to "prepare for something" then prepare for everything ... that's something you CAN do ... obversely, if somebody has five minutes to kill ... you tell ME ... what it you can personally do to stop Y2K ?

I personally intend to make cup of hot cocoa, watch the ball come down over Times Square and if the lights don't go out I'll turn them off myself and go to bed.

On the other hand, if I find myself in a worse case scenario, I'll wind up the Freeplay and keep myself informed as best I can while I finish cleaning the excess oil out of the .45.

Y2K is coming ... one way or the other ... deal with it... just like our forefathers delt with every obsticle they ever faced in their lifetimes in a manner that brought us to where we are today.

If I didn't do so, I frankly, I don't think I could face my great grandfather, who gave up everything to fight as a Union gureilla in the hills of Georgia for three years during the Civil War, surrounded by Confederate Home Guard and regular CSA troops that burned homes, stole livestock, abused loved ones, etc., simply because when the day of my own personal trials and tribulatins came, I let myself be Wussy whipped by a computer chip.

Great Grand pa didn't have any computer chips ... hell's bells when you think about it

-- Glenn (peglenn@bellsouth.net), October 03, 1999.

I called a friend of mine that works in field management with Exxon (He is a DWGI) and asked what type of chips would be at the bottom of a well and for what purpose. He proceeded to overload me with model numbers for this and that. The one that stuck with me was a chip that is actually at the lower tip of the pipe and operates the safety shutoff system in case of a quake causing a massive pressure change. He also mentioned the cement thing but his focus was on the safety chip(?). I asked him about the date sensitivity. "hell, I don't know. These things come from Taiwan or India or somewhere". This guy is a great fella but I fear for the safety of Exxon if all management has this attitude.

-- Lobo (atthelair@yahoo.com), October 04, 1999.

Lobo,

Dumb engineers, would you agree?

Dumb management, would you agree?

Take care

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 04, 1999.

I'd just like to compliment Glenn on his most excellent post.

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), October 04, 1999.

Got fuel?

-- buying a bicycle (extra@tires.too), October 04, 1999.

It sounds like the dangers are both real and exaggerated.

If you have important equipment relying in total on, say, 1000 chips (a very conservative estimate), and if those chips have a MTBF of 100 years (also very conservative), then on average you'll have a fatal chip failure almost once a month. And while it's quite true that chip failures don't happen randomly (usually if it lasts 5 minutes it will last 20 years), equipment failure (for many reasons other than chip failure) is a real consideration in engineering. In practice, the cost of repair cannot be a significant fraction of the cost of abandoning the operation.

Gordon is only partially correct about testing equipment that is extremely expensive to access. Of course it's not cost effective to spend many millions to do limited testing. In such cases, the testing is done in the lab on identical equipment. This approach is quite limited with respect to environmental problems (hard to duplicate in the lab), but very reliable for y2k bugs. So we can identify equipment guaranteed to suffer y2k failures without stopping production to test the actual unit being used. I'm rather surprised nobody mentions this. Is it being done?

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 04, 1999.

It is rather surprising, Flint.

Re a few posts above, the situation of Y2k, or perhaps the situation of approaching middle age, has led me to the hobby of genealogy. I have a book with stories of my ancestors. Apparently they one time lived on corn meal for nine months. I believe this was during the dust bowl. This was a family with twelve kids. They bathed once a week, sharing bathwater. You'll survive (providing you've got corn meal). Our ancestors definitely lived through worse.

-- Amy Leone (leoneamy@aol.com), October 04, 1999.

Amy,

and Chris Columbus and his crew survived on apples, just apples. Sould we all also try that out? We would all lose weight which is what we want, right?

But Amy, the problem is common sense (the least common of all senses it appears) or lack thereof. 'Cause just what are we talking about here Amy??

Do you think the currently globalized consumer societies of this world are for corn and some water, just like in the dust bowl days?? Do you realize what the hell you are saying and its consequences for today's economy? Will people's expectations be anywhere remotely satisfied by what you are describing?

I can't believe this. Amy, you accept these things will/can happen within 90 days and you still keep cool ? Please tell Wall Street and the Beltway bunch so that they know what's coming to them and to all of us if you are right.

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 04, 1999.

Flint, no one mentions it because no such test facilities or set ups exist, because of negligence, ignorance, "Bill Gates will solve it" and the usual polly BS you can surely expand upon yourself.

And now there is no time to design and build such test benches either, let alone the uncountable number of equipment brands and types, the uncompatibilities between the different Y2K workarounds found for each (if any), and innumerable combinations of tie-ins and bolt-ons thereof.

Get it now Flint?

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 04, 1999.

[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[ Glenn ]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]

THAT IS THE MOST INTELLIGENT STATEMENT I HAVE READ ON THIS FORUM IN TWO YEARS. .....Thanks!!!!

-- (HolyCow@pasture.com), October 04, 1999.

George:

Working by myself, it takes me about 1-2 days to create the appropriate test setup for the embeddeds I work with, few of which are trivial. Normally the population of inputs to the system is limited -- perhaps a dozen to a hundred. Test dates can be set as desired, and all inputs run through such dates. Say about a week per device for one person to do full test coverage. And these tests apply to *every one* of the devices in the field.

Get it now, George?

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 04, 1999.

What you are saying Flint is so easy to do that an eight year old Macacus Rhesus monkey could do it too.

So what you are really saying Flint is that the international scientific, engineering and managerial community is made up of a bunch of incompetent, good-for-nothing, negligent, short-sighted morons. In that case Flint, you would be right.

The point is that Y2K doesn't care a smell-less FART about you or your funny, yet-to-be-designed, 11th. hour testing machines that nobody is aware of let alone has in mind using.

Get it now Flint?

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 04, 1999.

Oil patch both within the US and abroad can't tell Y2K apart from a typo error. "Why to what?" is a typical response.

Now Flint why don't you fax these guys the plans and drawings of your pie-in-the sky testing scheme. I bet they would find it as interesting as toilet paper.

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 04, 1999.

George:

You have become the unfortunate victim of your own rhetoric. So let's correct your misconceptions (which just happen to encompass everything you've written!)

[What you are saying Flint is so easy to do that an eight year old Macacus Rhesus monkey could do it too.]

No, I did NOT say this, you did. And as usual you're wrong. I am the *designer* of these devices. I have the source code to the ROM (which I wrote), and the schematics. Without these things (and the knowledge) the task would be difficult to impossible. But the designers and manufacturers of the devices *can* do these things fairly easily. I would be amazed if they aren't. I know they did so within the power industry.

[So what you are really saying Flint is that the international scientific, engineering and managerial community is made up of a bunch of incompetent, good-for-nothing, negligent, short-sighted morons. In that case Flint, you would be right.]

I said absolutely nothing of the sort, George. You made that up too. I'm saying that these people are intelligent (you need to look that up, George) and understand how to test (without which no device would *ever* see the light of day). Why do you continue to assume that if YOU aren't involved or aware, that THEREFORE it's not being done? Do you think none of the billions being spent have gone for embedded testing, that all we've read about such testing has been lies, and that those doing the testing have all been dreaming? Do you think at all?

[The point is that Y2K doesn't care a smell-less FART about you or your funny, yet-to-be-designed, 11th. hour testing machines that nobody is aware of let alone has in mind using.]

Wrong again, of course. (Don't you EVER get tired of being wrong?) These testbeds are not funny, they are already designed, they are not 11th hour (they already exist) and engineers are aware of them (hell, they *built* them) wherever devices are designed and built. Wow, you managed to be wrong four times in one sentence. Impressive stupidity.

[Get it now Flint?]

Always have. If your IQ doubles within the next year, you may get it yourself. But I wouldn't bet heavily on that.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 04, 1999.

Your yada yada isn't even impressing any more. You've lost touch with reality also. You never had common sense either.

So I give up with you Flint.

-- George (jvilches@sminter.com.ar), October 04, 1999.

George writes: [Amy, and Chris Columbus and his crew survived on apples, just apples. Sould we all also try that out? We would all lose weight which is what we want, right? ]

They survived.

[But Amy, the problem is common sense (the least common of all senses it appears) or lack thereof. 'Cause just what are we talking about here Amy?? ]

Man has never been able to manage technology. Witness Chernobyl, Challenger, recent nuclear incidents, need I go on.

[Do you think the currently globalized consumer societies of this world are for corn and some water, just like in the dust bowl days?? Do you realize what the hell you are saying and its consequences for today's economy?]

Today's economy? You can't take it with you, big guy. You should be grateful for what the Lord provides.

[ Will people's expectations be anywhere remotely satisfied by what you are describing? ]

Is that my problem?

[I can't believe this. Amy, you accept these things will/can happen within 90 days and you still keep cool ? Please tell Wall Street and the Beltway bunch so that they know what's coming to them and to all of us if you are right. ]

They have been amply warned and have chosen to ignore that warning and paint it as a hoax. You can't save people from themselves. I have to keep cool. Children depend on me.

-- Amy Leone (leoneamy@aol.com), October 05, 1999.