I friend of mine called me about a 2 minute TV news clip she saw on Monday, Dec. 6th on the evening news. She said it was on one of the three network stations, CBS, NBC, or ABC (station unknown).

The person being interviewed (identity unkwown) made a statement saying that the electric utilities industry was only 60% complete with its Y2K remediation, and that the rest will finish between now and June 2000. The reporter doing the interview did not ask any questions about this extreme statement.

DID ANYONE SEE THIS TV NEWS CLIP? I did not see it, and I could not find any articles in the newspaper to confirm this information. I am trying to follow up on this statement, so if anyone here saw this, please let me know.

Thanks, Gail

-- Anonymous, December 08, 1999

Answers

I did not see this, but I was informed three weeks ago by the person who set up Joel Willemssen's (of the US GAO) recent lecture in Rockford, IL, that the FCC is extending the telecommunications industry Y2k compliance due date to June 30, 2000, because the telecommunications companies are currently having extensive problems with data from non-compliant systems corrupting the compliant systems.

Telecommunications industry is, of course, critical to the electric power industry. Feel free to email me if anyone has further questions.

-- Anonymous, December 08, 1999

Didn't see it Gail - the figures sound wildly out of whack, though. Perhaps it was an interview from earlier this year or late last year. Hopefully someone else saw it and will be able to provide a reference / report.

-- Anonymous, December 08, 1999

Saw this post while stealing some time trying to catch up on all I've missed reading recently. The 60% complete, working-into-2000 statement sounds completely logical to me, perhaps even optimistic -- IF the person was talking about FULL remediation of all systems, not just "mission critical" ones. Pretty easy to forget that the industry readiness announcements were only for certain critical systems, huh?

-- Anonymous, December 08, 1999