Anyone got any contacts in Taiwan? This could use some verification efforts. I would have bet $10 bucks on the Chinese, but second hand source from Yourdonite forum has it Y2K inspired. Cmon someone must know someone in Taiwan, we have all this stuff that was made there! ;> Jim

More on the Taiwan blackout from c.s.y2k greenspun.com : LUSENET : TimeBomb 2000 (Y2000) : One Thread -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Just checked in to c.s.y2k and thought you might be interested in this post. Several questions were asked and then a followup post answered them. This is obviously unverifiable second or third hand knowledge, but Teague is a regular poster to c.s.y2k. Just passing it along FYI. From:Teague Harper Topic:More On The Taiwan Power Outage Message:1 of 15 Sent:Fri, 30 Jul 1999 17:48:17 -0600 I just received another frantic call from my son in Taiwan concerning the huge power outage that occurred there yesterday. He said he talked to an American friend (engineer) who works for Taiwan Power who told him that the problem Y2k related. He told my son that if he was smart he would get the Hell out as soon as possible. This information has ignited a fire under my son and daughter who are both anxious to come home. they are going to both divest themselves of all their investments over there and get out. When I talked to my son today, he was shocked and panicked. He finally gets it. My daughter said she was so scared when it happened that she just cried all night. The power company has told the people that this will be happening several more times in the next several months. They know they are screwed! Teague PS Don't hand me any bull that this story is just hearsay - My son told me the guy's name. He just wants to remain anonymous. ----------------------------------------------- From: Teague Harper Topic:Re: More On The Taiwan Power Outage Message:6 of 15 (In response to Mark) Sent: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 13:41:59 -0600 Mark wrote in message <37A2766C.A3DCDF6E@mindsprin.com>... Is there any annecdotal information you can add to this story, Teague, especially about how well your son knows the engineer? About any comments the engineer made about the official story being given to the people? About any comments the engineer might have made about the likelihood of them fixing the problem? Anything, even how your son happens to know the guy or why the guy would take the risk of telling your son anything so incindiary? Yes - now that I've calmed down, I think I can tell the story with more precision. BTW, Zach was supposed to call me last night, but I havn't heard back from him yet. My son has been in Taiwan for almost six (not consecutive) years now. He served an LDS mission there then came home and got his degree in Chinese at the University of Utah. He has been back in Taiwan for almost four years now. He met and married a girl from Tiawan that he met in Utah while going to school. After he went back to Taiwan, he opened an english school. He has also worked as a translator for various governmental and business people. He is fluent in the language and loves the people there. And, my daughter Sarah has been over there for almost four years. In his position, he meets many people from all over the world. He made friends with and American (name deleted) who works as a consultant for Taiwan Power. He was talking to the unnamed gentleman yesterday and just casually commented about the power outage. The guy got very serious with him and told him NOT to believe what was being broadcast through the media. He said the problem was "man made" that it was "Y2k" related. Then he told Zach to get the "Hell" out of Taiwan and said the whole damn "thing" was going "go down". My son was totally shocked. He had no idea it was going to get that bad. He asked me to start looking for him a job so that he'll have something to do when he gets home. He told me it would take a few weeks to unwind his p osition and tie up some loose ends. Then he said that they were broadcasting that people over there should EXPECT more blackouts during the next few months. (Why if this was a real one time problem? Hummmm?) It appears to me that Tiawan Power is just beginning to understand the full extent of the mess they are in and are doing everything possible to maintain the status quo as long as possible. But, It's just a matter of time before everyone gets the picture. During the outage, my son and daughter told me that the convenience stores in Taichung and Puli where they each live were stripped of merchandise. They had never seen anything like this before and it spooked them - big time. Anyway, to the best of my knowledge this is what I know. I know it is still just a second hand story, so believe what you will. But, I now know what real panic looks and sounds like. Even though we were on the phone, I could see it in my son's eyes and hear it in his voice. A harbenger of things to come? And, I am at last vindicated for my Y2k views; because, now he thinks I was and am inspired. So, if you think your advise has fallen on deaf ears, think again. Just pray your loved ones wake up in time.

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), August 01, 1999 Answers sorry about the formatting

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-- Anonymous, August 01, 1999

Answers

Jim, it would be interesting to hear from others in Taiwan. The official word through the AP and Reuters press releases, in chronological order after the outage, had this to say:

July 29, 5:13 P.M. (AP) "The outage may have been triggered by accidents at a power stations near Chiaming and Lungchi, in south-central Chiayi county, 125 miles south of Taipei, Premier Vincent Siew told a news conference. The outage knocked out electricity around the island, Siew said. "

July 29, 8:41 P.M. (Reuters) "The cause of the blackout was under investigation.... Premier Vincent Siew, making an emergency visit to Taipower headquarters, said the operators hoped to restore most power sometime during Friday"

July 29, 10:15 P.M. (Reuters) "He [Taipower vice president Lai Shih-chang told Reuters by telephone] said the possible cause of the massive blackout that struck around 11:30 p.m. (1530 GMT) on Thursday was the collapse of a high-pressured electricity tower in southern Taiwan due to a landslide."

July 30, 7:30 A.M. (Reuters) "Taipower said the outage may have been caused by the collapse of a high-pressure electricity tower in southern Taiwan due to a landslide, which triggered a chain reaction through the power grid."

July 30, 9:00 A.M. (A.P.) "The blackout occurred when a utility tower collapsed in Tainan on Thursday night, causing a domino effect that cut power to 7 million households around the island, the state-run Taiwan Power Company said."

July 31, 4:42 P.M. (AP) "After four hours of darkness they located the utility tower that caused the trouble lying on a caved-in mountainside in southern Tainan County. It was a vital tower that transferred power generated in the south to the power-short north, officials said."

-- Anonymous, August 02, 1999

Well, either way, Y2k or collapsed tower, it shows how quickly a huge area can go down. Perhaps both situations are the truth over there. Perhaps the power went out due to the tower and that triggered the engineer to spill his thoughts about their Y2k progress. Let's see.

-- Anonymous, August 02, 1999

Gordon, I am with you on this one as far as showing how quickly an area can go down. It has happened in the US as well, and portions of the grid are particularly vulnerable with system capacities near peaks. I am confindent that Y2K will not cause significant outages, but I am not confindent that other causes will not - the grid is vulnerable to weather, equipment failures, and sabotage.

This incident also provides an example of how first news reports often have errors, the initial reports said something like all of Taiwan was out, leaving 22 million without power, later reports I saw said something like 7 million. The good news is they got it back rather quickly, I think they said 4 hours.

Regards,

-- Anonymous, August 02, 1999

Actually FF the 7 million number referred to households not people.

I noted that little foible myself today and thought about how many people wouldn't catch it. Instead they would assume it was much less of a problem than initially noted. Unfortunately, that would be non-factual.

-- Anonymous, August 02, 1999

Good point, Jim. Whenever our local utility PG&E has an outage their spokesmen ALWAYS refer to the number of "customers" who lost power, NEVER to the number of people who were affected as in, "500,000 customers lost power for seven hours when a substation south of San Francisco had a problem." Sounds alot smaller than, "one and a half million people had no power," doesn't it? I always keep in mind that one 'customer" = three 'people'. Apparently, the same verbal game is played by the electric utilities in Taiwan.

-- Anonymous, August 03, 1999