Computer gremlins, confusion preceded big blackout

The Globe and Mail ^ | 9/4/03 | Associated Press

[y2k_free_radical]

please explain plant motorization

[Diddle E. Squat]

It was hot in London, and it was hot on the East Coast.

Actually, IIRC the heat spell had already ended in England, and it the temperature was in the 70's at the time of the blackout. The East Coast was not unusually hot on its blackout day, either.

[sarasota]

I'm on a grid system that has brown/blackouts routinely. It takes down half the town at a time. From a nuclear plant in the area we supply Chicago and I have a hunch that they shut down parts of the system routinely to keep it tested--if that makes sense? Happens on sunny days as well as stormy ones.

[dfwgator]

"Microsoft gah-gah"

[r9etb]

The East Coast was not unusually hot on its blackout day, either.

I'll take your word for it as to the temps in England. However, temps on the East Coast were in the mid- to upper-90s on blackout day (I made a point of checking the the weather maps as soon as the blackout hit the news).

[Sabertooth]

Hey, I used to drive one of those commuter Gremlins.

[Ol' Sox]

Just making a lot of stockbrokers walk home from work doesn't strike me as a likely target. What'll they do next?

I think they're just practicing at creating a captive audience. If people can't get away, then the effectiveness of small, dispersed radiological, bio or chem weapons becomes much greater.

I really wish my mind wouldn't cook up ideas like this.

[flamefront]

Terror? Maybe. But at least we know the FirstEnergy SCADA data collection system terminals run MS Windows and were on the net at the time the Lovsan/Blaster worm was messing with millions of computers.

[meyer]

Terror? Maybe. But at least we know the FirstEnergy SCADA data collection system terminals run MS Windows and were on the net at the time the Lovsan/Blaster worm was messing with millions of computers.

Which SCADA computers were those? The FE system is a GE-Harris unit with proprietary software run atop a Unix platform. The only place that Windows might show up is on remote read-only terminals.

[flamefront]

Exactly. If you can't read the status of the system, you cannot respond properly as an operator. It doesn't matter the the UNIX servers worked OK. Just like the nuclear plants showed.

[FreeInWV]

Is that the same plant where Homer Simpson works?

[meyer]

Exactly. If you can't read the status of the system, you cannot respond properly as an operator. It doesn't matter the the UNIX servers worked OK. Just like the nuclear plants showed.

But it was the servers that locked up, not the 500 or so remote terminals of various style and vintage. Some of those major transmission stations have direct microwave links to the control center. Others use fiber optic, or insulated ground wire. Few major stations use the phone system at all. It wasn't a failure of a few RTU's that may have some kind of MS software (which I highly doubt), but a total failure of the server to communicate with all of the RTU's.

Plus, station data was still being received at the Midwest ISO, through a separate server system. They knew which breakers were opened or closed, but apparently either didn't see the urgency of the situation or didn't understand that FE couldn't see the problem.

I've seen that main computer down for nearly 24 hours on one occasion, and down for several hours at a time on many other occasions - its a POS IMHO. I referred to it on another thread as "self-hacking" due to its reputation.

[kinghorse]

Your thinking the same thing I'm thinking?

Yep.

The good news is, unless there was some extortion aspect we aren't being told, the whole thing was a failure. No mass hystery. Commander Chaos and his evil minions, if they exist, failed.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

When my husband was stationed on a Fast Attack Submarine, preparing for deployment, the GPS system wrongly gave their location as Kansas City, not Norfolk. Needless to say, they didn't leave port until the system was repaired.

[menotyu]

Wasn't there a guy in New Zealand a few years ago who was trying to extort money from the sanitation dept? Through his laptop he was able to control the gates that open the raw sewage or something of that nature. He was a former employee with skills and remote access. I hope they are checking into this possibility.

[menotyu]

PLAN FOR THE BEST, BUT PREPARE FOR THE WORST !

[meyer]

I guess I kind of mislead you - when I referred to read-only terminals, I was referring to terminals on executive's desks where they can see data from the SCADA system, but cannot send data or operate anything. It gives the executives a new way to stick their big noses in something that many of them know nothing about.

[Unknowing]

If the terrs could knock out power in a similar way during a cold day in the wintertime, the weather might injure many of the stranded people. Workers who have the ability might pre-position a sleeping bag or some blankets at their workplace, just in case.

[Dirk McQuickly]

load was only 75% -- sorry -- the size of this disruption, followed one week later by the unprecedented outage in London is a near-miraculous coincidence by standards of probability.