[Renderofveils]

Boston had a major water main break over the weekend. Two million people had to boil their water before drinking it. That's pretty simple, really.

That's pretty simple until the pumps supplying the tap water fail. Then you've effectively got one average day's usage of tap water.

[ClearCase_guy]

Don't misunderstand me -- I was not making any general comment about the effects of an EMP!

The situation in Boston was that everything was fine -- phones OK, electricity OK, transportation OK, refrigeration OK, fine weather, a beautiful weekend in every way!

There was only one thing wrong -- there were microbes in the public water supply. But that was easily dealt with by putting tap water in a pot, putting the pot on your stove and boiling it.

THAT was too much for some people to handle.

An EMP would just wipe these people out.