It's 12:01am 1/1/00, and our power is still on? Does this mean everything's a-okay? Can anyone elaborate on the issues surrounding this scenario? Apologies if this has already been discussed.

-- Anonymous, September 16, 1999

Answers

Electricity doesn't make "00" > "99".

-- Anonymous, September 16, 1999

Dina,

Frankly, I am hoping, and wishing real hard, that the electric does stay up and running, or that if it goes off it won't stay off for too long. Then I will check the telephone. Then I will wait and see if fuel, including heating oil, is still readily available. Then I will see if there are any problems with my bank or investment accounts. Anyway, electric is just one link in the infrastructure. And from what I gather from some expert opinions, you won't really know if things are going to get bad for a few weeks or months. If things are still looking pretty reasonable by the end of March, I'll be happy.

-- Anonymous, September 16, 1999

There are too many other factors to account for with the end of this year. The computers won't necessary shut down at that moment, but the ones that are not compliant will start passing out bad numbers for awhile, some will go unnoticed, and some will crash. But there are other problems as well. I've heard that they are expecting a minimum of 250,000 new viruses to be released for the millenium. Countries like China and Russia have both said that they would start a nuclear war with their 'enemies'. Idiot terrorists like the guy who was caught up here in B.C. will try and blow things up (his idea was to buy oil stocks, then bomb the Alaskan Oil Pipline and then watch the stock prices grow as the shortage hits). Some countries are way behind in their remediation, and this could stall imports and exports that we depend on. People are likely to pull money out of the stock market (Jim Lord says 5% chance of no change, 45% chance of recession, 50% chance of recession). A number of airlines have already said they would not fly during the turn over for fear of the lack of Airport radar remediations. Osama Bin Laden has 20 Nuclear warheads now, according to the FBI. Sadam has Bio/Chemical/Nuclear weapons and has alot of reasons to use then in the States. We have Solar Flares to take out the Satellites. We have shortages of Oil/fuel at some of the fossil fuel plants right now. People are likely to wait until the last second to grab food, so there may be shortages at the end of this year. There are a bunch of Millenialist Cults that want something to happen, and will try to make it happen. And then you can listen to the really scared people who are even more worried than me...

-- Anonymous, September 16, 1999

Sorry for the above, I've been awake since 3:30am and therefore I am a little shaky today..

-- Anonymous, September 16, 1999

I think you "get it", Sean!!! Even if EVERYTHING that can be found is found and fixed, there are going to be tons of stuff no one has thought about/known about that are going to rear their ugly heads and kick us in the butt! Its just too much and having to do it too fast. Do what you can to prepare yourself and family and thats all you can do. We are going to have to take our lumps and go on with life. Face the fact that some of us may be doing it in the dark. We have no choice. But I find that I cope much better with crises when I have a full belly!!

Taz

-- Anonymous, September 17, 1999

Dina;

The short answer to your question is No! we are not out of the woods if ALL the Power in the US stays up over the roll over.

The roll over will test the LOCAL preperations. It will not test the supply line. As we have read on this forum many Utilities are low on fuel (Coal in particular) due to rail SNAFU's. If the Oil and Gas pipe lines are challenged then... No fuel, No Power.

Y2K is death by a thousand paper cuts. The rollover will not be the ATOMIC BOMB that stops the party. Rather things will start (contiunue in some projections) to roll down hill very rapidly.

Remember the Gas shortages of the 70's. It will be the Energy shortages of the 2K in SPADES! By November next year, we should know if it is safe to breath or if we are toast.

There are people I know who predict that the Stock markets will drop next year due totally due to Technical Analysis, Y2K may just be the pin (Knife) prick that bursts the bubble, and if that bubble bursts, life as we have known from 1982-present will Change....BIG Time

I sound like a real PERMA Bear here but I am begining to understand THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT. It is not the end of the world, it is just a MAJOR change in the way I will have to interact with the world.

It will be different.

May you be safe.

Things will get worse before they get better....

-- Anonymous, September 17, 1999

Hi Dina. Excellent question.

Here's my take on the "When will we be out of the woods" thing:

The first critical date for a local power customer is when the first part of the grid rolls over to midnight. Depending on where you live, that could be up to two hours prior (at 10pm). And don't sigh a breath of relief just when the last time zone in your grid passes midnight--some grids are going to be in a special posturing state for several hours past midnight.

If by around 0600 hours 1/1/2000 there aren't any problems, then we've made it through the first critical time.

The second critical time comes when industries that have been in shut-down mode start to ramp back up during the first week of January. Fortunately, we've been hearing different times for different industries. For example, the big manufacturers might ramp right up around 0600 hours on Saturday, January 1. But many won't get back into full production until January 3. And many get that day off as vacation, so they might not start until January 4. And by January 4 we'll know what the supply chain is like (just as helium suggests above). If the coal is still comin' down the railroad tracks and the natural gas is still flowing on January 4, then the second critical time has passed.

Leap day 2000 (2/29/2000) is the third critical date, as many systems don't recognize 2000 as a leap year. Most testing reveals that the failures are mostly nuisance type things, but it is still a critical date, in my opinion.

Problems could linger into the summer of 2000, depending on the economy. Remember, the power industry has trouble every summer meeting peak demands, and 2000 could be a tough one (we got pretty lucky in 1999, as some parts of the country did not have heat waves).

So in summary, be on the alert after the rollover; problems could occur in the January 4, February 29, and summer time frames.

Dan.

-- Anonymous, September 18, 1999

It delights my soul to see the people on this thread are understanding: Not enough/no fuel=no electricity. If the oil process from production to delivery of various fuel products is restricted then the country grinds to a halt after the product already in the delivery line stops. The information I have read states that our crude oil government stockpile in caverns will last two weeks. That oil goes to the federal government first (read military,) state governments next and the public last. I sincerely hope none of this happens.

-- Anonymous, September 18, 1999

Not enough/no fuel=no electricity.

Yep. Industry knows that. Government knows it too. But most of the public isn't anywhere close to thinking that thoroughly about Y2K. They have been discouraged from thinking beyond the immediate and the obvious.

-- Anonymous, September 18, 1999

Dan, your answer to Dina was the most concise and practical summary of the main risk periods in 2000 that I've come across. It's a keeper, and I will be sure to credit you if I have the occasion to use it in response to e-mail questions I receive. Many thanks!

In another thread a while back, Factfinder indicated that he thought there was a potential for problems during the rollover from Dec.31, 2000 to Jan.1, 2001, as this was a date some had not thought about testing for and he had seen, or found (I can't remember which at the moment)some test indications of problems for that time frame. What is your opinion about possible end of 2000 rollover glitches and would you consider that another time frame of risk?

I have also seen mention by a few utilities that testing would continue through and into 2000. It had not occurred to me until the end of year-2000 info was presented, that some of this testing might be to check 2000 year end dates if these had not already been addressed. Do you have any knowledge of this or am I extrapolating too much from Factfinder's information?

-- Anonymous, September 18, 1999

Bonnie: Thanks much for the kind words. I do appreciate it.

Regarding the calendar purist's "true" rollover to the new millennium, from 12/31/2000 to 1/1/2001: I know of several utilities that did test for that rollover. The potential for problems occurs because 2000 has 366 days in it, and a device that uses "ordinal" dating might not know this, because of not recognizing 2000 as a leap year. I only found one device that had a problem with it...it rolled the month from 12 to 13 instead of back to 1. This was more of a nuisance than anything else. Anyway, it is a date to test because of the above concerns, but I haven't heard of very many problems with this date.

As you probably know, there are many dates in 2000 that could be a concern: 1/1/2000, 2/29/2000, and 12/31/2000 are the more obvious ones, but there are others: 3/31 (first 31 day month after leap day), 4/1 (start of second quarter), 4/30 (first 30 day month after leap day), and 10/10 (first eight digit date in 2000, when stored as 10102000).

-- Anonymous, September 18, 1999

Dan has answered the technical aspect better than I could. On the other level- ie, could Y2K bring problems even if not a single electric plant in the *world* suffers even the smallest inconvenience- the answer is an unqualified yes. Power is important because it's hard to get much done without it. However, remember this: we managed to have no less than *five* recessions from 1970 to 1990/91, and power was never a problem in any of them (or any other recession of the electrical age). The very real Y2K potentialities in other parts of the economic system worry me far more than power, frankly.

-- Anonymous, September 20, 1999

Excellent prospect, Dan. But, I'm not so sure that we'll know by the fourth what shape the supply chain will be in. Locally? Maybe. But some supply chains (like oil) go around the world.

-- Anonymous, September 21, 1999

Drew, I have often thought how ironic it would be if the most-watched and worried about industry (electric) goes through the end of year rollover with few problems, and the proclaimed "most ready" industry (banking)has massive complications. Add the lesser watched industries of health care, education, oil and manufacturing into the mix and I fully expect surprises galore, whether the lights are on or not.

As was mentioned on another recent post about panic, the observation was that certainly there seems to be apathy among the general public, not a panic mode about Y2K. All I could think of was, "Yep, the only apparent panic is see is coming from within the banking industry itself, not the citizenry."

I have no doubt next year will be fun for at least one group of people -- historians.

>>>An aside here. My ISP has been having multiple problems and my husband would not let me put him off anymore about upgrades to my computer. (Why get used to new browser and software formats if you don't absolutely have to, is how I look at it.) Well, Y2K has brought it down to that "absolutely have to". As a consequence, I am experiencing various access and use problems, both external and internal. At the moment I cannot access my e-mail even when I can get into my ISP, so if anyone has sent me a letter, please understand that until these problems are fixed (soon, hopefully)I may be incommunicado. Now let's see if I can submit this post before I get kicked offline again!

-- Anonymous, September 21, 1999

A really good discussion here. For embedded systems, I am in rare agreement with the GartnerGroup, the key date is the 12/31/1999 to 1/1/2000 transition (their "spike"). But for higher level "embedded systems" (the broad inclusive definition) that use computers and software interfaces to controllers, there can be a wider window (depending on the specific software functions, etc).

One correction, the rollover testing I had referred to was from 12/30/2000 to 12/31/2000. Some test plans test just the 12/31/2000 date and not the rollover, but this is my preference. The key here is that the risk date is 12/31/2000 since it is the 366th day as Dan pointed out. The rollover to 1/1/2001 is not a high risk date in my opinion. I have a bit diffent opinion of risks than others on this date from what I have read.

My opinion was formed by a test I did on data acquistion equipment - the equipment had a serious functional failure on reaching 12/31/2000, but did not have a functional failure on the 2/28/1999 to 2/29/2000 rollover test. In fact, this equipment was found to fail on the last day of any leap year.

I have seen (and read about) several minor date problems in embedded systems with 2/28/2000 to 2/29/2000 rollover, but not aware of any serious problems on this date in such systems.

Regards,

Regards,

-- Anonymous, September 21, 1999

FactFinder is right that there are some embeddeds which may not develop problems until past the actual rollover. One I read about recently tested out as having a problem in mid-February.

Bonnie is also correct in that the real problems are quite likely to come in areas where they will not be expected. In my reading and conversations with people in the areas I am most concerned about, they strike me as far too complacent. At least in the electricity situation, even if there are more problems than the optimists believe (or less than the pessimists), people are at least cognizant of possible dangers.

I don't consider these worst-case scenarios likely, but they are clearly possible. And unfortunately, possible things sometimes happen.

-- Anonymous, September 21, 1999