Major power surge in NY? (Blackout is in NYC, Detroit, Ottawa and Toronto, per Fox News)

8-14-03 | Joe Hadenuf

[Joe Hadenuf]

Hannity station went dead for about 20 seconds. Said he had never seen anything like it.

[GOPrincess]

Try as I might I do tend to consider things like this with the proverbial tinfoil hat these days... Hard not to think about it. Was thinking that life was sure different a couple years ago when we'd all be thinking okay, a power failure, interesting. The world sure has changed in a little less than 2 years.

[mhking]

smoking ban is being flaunted!

"Hey Bloomberg! Smoke this!"

[Dan from Michigan]

FOX-2 "LIVE" in Ferndale just on. Reporter was sharing how a local bar was having a black out party.

Ferndale black out party......

no comment.

[Petronski]

CNN just reported that smoking ban is being flaunted!

[copycat]

I'm wondering what could have caused the "big draw to the North" if that rumor is true. Canada is a much looser environment for Al-Queda to operate in, and Chretien is pretty quick to point elsewhere.

[Chad Fairbanks]

It wouldn't be Bill Gates' fault anyway - it would be the fault of a malicious little coward who released a worm into the wild... Just because something is 'exploitable' in a malicious way, doens't mean someone HAS to exloit it... but maybe that's just me... :0)

[Joe Hadenuf]

Nope .. looks like NYer's are dancing the streets

I bet they are. Seeing that there are probably at least 150,000 hardened criminals loose on the streets, trust me, if it gets ugly, they will put a short leash on the media.

[GOPrincess]

"CNN just reported that smoking ban is being flaunted!"

The horror! Boy, the power goes out and society loses all its inhibitions, huh?

[Windcatcher]

The guys at the PECO station in Philly also reported a slight dip at 4PM, nothing serious, but that's all. I guess that's when the Valley Forge computers disconnected everything from the northern grid.

In other news...two planes diverted to Philly, one from London, the other from Las Vegas. The one from London refueled and flew on to NYC. The other one stayed grounded, and the passengers were put up for the night. There's upwards of a dozen hotels ringing the airport, so it isn't a problem.

[prairiebreeze]

We unfortunately will always have to consider the ominous possibilities from now on. But it's important to not LEAP to those dire conclusions and hang on for dear life like some earlier posters on this thread were doing.

Life used to be lots simpler.

Prairie

[Miss Marple]

I still think that statement by Chretien is strange. Why would he say lightning? Who would have told him that?

Why isn't there an answer yet?

I still think that there is something fishy, and somehow Hillary is involved.

I think I had better go to bed. I am getting late-niight paranoia! LOL!

[ChadGore]

Best line of the night: "CNN just reported that smoking ban is being flaunted!"

[FairOpinion]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50765-2002Jun26

Cyber-Attacks by Al Qaeda Feared
Terrorists at Threshold of Using Internet as Tool of Bloodshed, Experts Say

One al Qaeda laptop found in Afghanistan, sources said, had made multiple visits to a French site run by the Societé Anonyme, or Anonymous Society. The site offers a two-volume online "Sabotage Handbook" with sections on tools of the trade, planning a hit, switch gear and instrumentation, anti-surveillance methods and advanced techniques. In Islamic chat rooms, other computers linked to al Qaeda had access to "cracking" tools used to search out networked computers, scan for security flaws and exploit them to gain entry -- or full command.

Most significantly, perhaps, U.S. investigators have found evidence in the logs that mark a browser's path through the Internet that al Qaeda operators spent time on sites that offer software and programming instructions for the digital switches that run power, water, transport and communications grids. In some interrogations, the most recent of which was reported to policymakers last week, al Qaeda prisoners have described intentions, in general terms, to use those tools.

Specialized digital devices are used by the millions as the brains of American "critical infrastructure" -- a term defined by federal directive to mean industrial sectors that are "essential to the minimum operations of the economy and government."

The devices are called distributed control systems, or DCS, and supervisory control and data acquisition, or SCADA, systems. The simplest ones collect measurements, throw railway switches, close circuit-breakers or adjust valves in the pipes that carry water, oil and gas. More complicated versions sift incoming data, govern multiple devices and cover a broader area.

What is new and dangerous is that most of these devices are now being connected to the Internet -- some of them, according to classified "Red Team" intrusion exercises, in ways that their owners do not suspect.

Because the digital controls were not designed with public access in mind, they typically lack even rudimentary security, having fewer safeguards than the purchase of flowers online. Much of the technical information required to penetrate these systems is widely discussed in the public forums of the affected industries, and specialists said the security flaws are well known to potential attackers.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Come on down!

[GOPrincess]

"Chretien is pretty quick to point elsewhere"

I've noticed he's sure anxious to point to the U.S. without much apparent basis...

[mhking]

WABC & WNBC have come back up on DirecTV along with WNYW; WCBS is still down.

[lelio]

"CNN just reported that smoking ban is being flaunted!"

... Women and children hit hardest

[Diddle E. Squat]

Baloney, Hillary is praying for violence, to shock the public and allow her to lead an angry cry against Bush. Perhaps the tunnels were closed to keep the Dems from busing in union thugs from Philly...

[CedarDave]

WNBC now reporting looting in the Crown Heights area of Brooklyn. 20-30 arrests -- Footlocker looted. Fulton Street mall also.

[Petronski]

Times Square sure looks strange.