I spoke to the Y2K guy at our local water/sewage treatment plant yesterday. This is a very small plant, serving approximately 10,000 people. In order to check out their contingency plans, they ran one of the generators for a "longer duration" (unspecified, but less than 12 hours) in order to test the durability of the generator. Unfortunately, the chimney in the building for the generator's exhaust wasn't built for long use, and it caught fire. What would have happened if the power were out, as it could be next year? This seems like the ultimate Catch-22 to me: you need the electricity to pump the water to put out the fire caused by the generator used to pump water because there is no electricity! Rick, is this type of scenario being even remotely considered by the companies you work with? Our small town's entire water and sewage system is contained in this one building which could easily have been lost. Although the electric utilities are working hard to be ready, this seems to me to be one of those scary scenes which could occur because of the interdependence of all of these various systems.

-- Anonymous, August 25, 1999