Northeastern residents...what were you doing 10 years ago?

[Guest Swifty]

On this fateful day I had rented a plane and flew to St. Catharines to visit mom. The power went out; we continued our visit waiting for it to come back on. It never did, but I wanted to get back home. After confirming that the backup generators were working at my home field I took off after dark. I was treated to the most surrealistic scene I have ever witnessed in the air. Where city lights would usually guide my VFR flight path, it was dark. The usual Lake Ontario shoreline was not defined. Highways were lit up with cars' lights like they typically would be on any night flight, but that was the only physical feature that was lit up. More cars were on the highways near Toronto, and their lights reflected off the glass off the city's high rise buildings in a sinister Gotham City style. Then I noticed that some communities were hosting carnival fairs and all the midway rides were lit up, ferris wheels and tilt-a-whirls were swirling beacons in the night. On approach to my destination, with my fingers crossed, I clicked the mic button 5 times to turn on the runway lights and bingo, there was the runway. Thank goodness. It was a very memorable flight.

 

http://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/10-years-after-blackout-grid-is-more-reliable-but-still-vulnerable-to-failure-1.1409400

[Trader]

I was at work scrambling to make sure the back up generators fired up and that the boiler system was all OK.

Failure would mean shutting the company down for 6 -9 months and millions in repairs.

My home was only out for less than 24 hours.

[Evan]

Amazing story Dave. In my case, I joined a group at what turned out to be a great outdoor garden party and made a few new friends. Not even close to being as exciting as your experience, but It remains a good memory.

[Flyinfool]

Fortunately for me Lake Michigan did a good job of stopping the westward progress of the blackout. So for us it was just a blurb on the news.

[ragtop69gs]

Lost power at home 5:30 or so, so we decided to jump in the GS and head out to the Woodward dream cruise. I turned on the radio only to hear that the whole eastern half of the country was blacked out, we turned around and went home and went out on the boat.

[MidlifeVenture]

Heard the power was going to be out hurried up ad swapped a main panel in a house we were rebuilding no inspection needed to seal the meter.

[Huggy]

Got a paid holiday from WORK!!!!

 

[chabicheka]

Me and couple of friends had just entered a sports bar for a beer when that happened. we thought nothing of it, and since power had just gone out, beer was still cold, and there was still some daylight. For some reason that moment registered on the brain and still remember.

[Marcarl]

We were kept bust trying to keep the meat cold,,, and succeeded, with the occasional blurp of hydro that manged to come through just at the right times. At the market we were the only ones to sell any meat as we had had the forethought of having a voltage converter in each truck and so ran our scales. Our competition didn't even dare to ask to share our unit, so we just kept selling, alone,,, had they asked, they would have been welcome, but we were way too busy to even take notice.

[BradT]

Was in Milford PA and a horse ranch. No phones, AC, computers and then no power at all. Owner had a generator to cook for us and had a lot of candles he gave out.

 

Next day we drove around New York City, no traffic lights and most police were in intersections directing traffic.

 

Brad

[ragtop69gs]

Me and couple of friends had just entered a sports bar for a beer when that happened. we thought nothing of it, and since power had just gone out, beer was still cold, and there was still some daylight. For some reason that moment registered on the brain and still remember.

 

A Canadian with no cold beer !!! , now that really would be a disaster of major proportions. Good thing you drank it all before it could go bad