Posted on 12/07/2022 4:22:10 AM PST by MtnClimber
Every single day our electrical grid remains vulnerable, we are in grave danger.
Almost 50,000 Duke Power customers in Moore County, N.C. were left in the dark on Sunday night in what has been called a domestic act of terrorism. A curfew is running from 9 P.M. to 5 A.M. as schools close and crime spikes. Most customers remain without heat, refrigeration, and water.
Duke Energy spokesman Jeff Brooks said, "We are looking at a pretty sophisticated repair with some fairly large equipment and so we do want citizens of the town to be prepared that this will be a multiday restoration for most customers, extending potentially as long as Thursday."
Two power stations were targeted by direct gunfire.
The attackers knew "exactly what they were doing," said Moore County, N.C. sherriff Ronnie Fields. "It was a gate, and they went through the gate, got at the substation, and shot it as well. ... It wasn't random."
While the liberal media immediately started blaming "right-wing militants" because of a nearby gay pride march that afternoon, the broader implications of the attack have been largely ignored: our power grid is completely vulnerable to anyone with a gun and the knowledge of where to shoot.
Grid News reports that there are more than 55,000 such power stations throughout the country, and "[t]here were 70 reports of emergency electric incidents and disturbances caused by suspected physical attacks, sabotage or vandalism from January to August 2022, Grid's analysis of the most recently available data from the Department of Energy found. That figure represents a 75 percent increase from 40 such reports in all of 2015[.]"
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
My wife and I were joking the other day: at least kudzu is edible. LOL
“Not all countries like the United States depend on China for critical infrastructure. No one manufacturers core transformers in the United States, they all come from China for us.”
But this is a BIG COUNTRY with probably 10s of thousands of Core Transformers. One would think there would be a few lying around, somewhere, as they do fail once in a while.
As to your point...we get what we elect, and we have a bunch of people in DC who don’t see the need to retain critical manufacturing capability, since China will sell it to us, and for far less.
What is fun now is watching these ‘brilliant’ people learn that doing the same with military hardware production probably wasn’t that wise and that China is in no hurry to supply us with the needed piece parts.
Probably a swamp attack to push “well if everyone just had solar panels they wouldn’t have to worry about this” response from that idiot Granholm.
“Is this a physical (space) issue? Or is it because every transformer has to be “matched” with a specific generator?”
A bit of both, actually. Because transformers are built to order depending on the specific load requirements they’re not an off the shelf item in most cases. Then there’s the cost issue. These things aren’t cheap. And since they rarely fail very few companies keep spares on hand.
I’m talking about industrial transformers here. We have a separate division that handles utility companies. I’m sure lead times on the ones at substations are at least a year. No one keeps those just laying around.
L
“You would be shocked how few are lying around on the continent. They’re perishable and face the same risks from attacks that in-use transformers face.”
NOTHING would shock me when it comes to our stupidity. But even so, transformers do fail but I don’t ever remember a similar event taking 5 days to restore power.
My suspicion is that they are purposely stalling the repairs, in order to greatly increase the suffering, which would then be used to put away the right-wingers* who shot up the substation, for life.
*like gun shootings, whoever did it will be called a right-winger.
I keep wondering if all the elite leftists think they will NOT be affected by power loss, food shortages, etc...are they all heading for New Zealand? Or is that why Hates is buying up farmland?
Haha...GATES...altho my fingers do not lie
Beat me to it
Hardening against cyberattacks is doable, physical attacks it basically impossible and certain infeasible
And since they rarely fail very few companies keep spares on hand.
What is the service life of these "industrial" transformers?
I would expect that electric generating companies would order replacements based on service life and failure rates.
It could very well have been a disgruntled former employee. A friend who works for the local natural gas company has had emergency call outs for vandalism that could cause problems but each time he said that the vandal knew exactly what they were doing to cause an issue but not a widespread outage or overpressure in the lines to cause a rupture.
The next time someone tells you that people with small arms are no match in a fight with the government, remind them of the North Carolina Duke power grid.
Every bit of infrastructure has a weak point. Every fence has a gate. Every guard blinks. Defense has to be perfect 100% of the time, offense can gain ground with 1% success.
Hardening is a good start, but not enough. The grid must be expanded significantly to support the delusions of the “climate change” secular religious cult.
“What is the service life of these “industrial” transformers?”
Decades if they’re made well.
“I would expect that electric generating companies would order replacements based on service life and failure rates.”
From my limited understanding most of them fail due to weather related events. Lightning strikes and wind damage mostly. As I said we have a separate division that handles utility sales. So my knowledge is all second and third hand and could be wrong.
L
You ain’t seen nuthin’ yet. Wait until a few thousand terrorists are activated in this country. How many decades have we been welcoming the southern border invasion? The intelligence agencies are not very intelligent. But we knew that.
You don’t have to be a genius to see what’s coming. No one in Congress or the alphabet agencies cares. Good luck America.
In the NC case, my guess it was some union utility workers looking for some serious holiday overtime.
A few years back someone crawled into a Verizon fiber vault and cut the cables. Knocked out 911 service for a fairly large area. Don’t believe anyone was caught.
L
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