Major Power Failure Narrowly Averted

Parts of the eastern United States and all of the Province of Ontario in Canada were apparently seconds away from another major blackout on May 27th., similar to what happened in the August 2003 blackout that left 50 million people in Ontario and the eastern U.S. without electricity, according to a spokesman for The International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers said Tuesday. Of course the management of Hydro One, admits there was a "system blip", but says it didn't come close to causing a large blackout, said a report in the Toronto Star Wednesday. Of course both sides issuing statements have a personal axe to grind in this situation since the Union represents 80,000 workers, including more than 1,000 Ontario engineers who walked off the job at Hydro One four weeks ago. Even the Ontario Government who denies the story has a personal interest here. In a letter to the US Senate, the union stated: "The principal factor of the May 27th event leading to the loss of 2,300 megawatts of power and voltage collapse was the result of the failure of two separate computerized protection systems that had been installed to prevent this very event." However, considering that the power companies are in the pocket of politicians on both sides of the border here, and the way the companies and politicians did nothing but point fingers and refused to that the blame in 2003, I will take the word of the Union in this matter. MORE....