Early reports coming from Bloomberg News indicate no immediate problems with power, phones and oil refining. According to their story filed one hour after the Year 2000 rollover, Alan Davey, general manager of the Whangarei plant operated by New Zealand Refining, said, Were certainly still refining. No problem at all, regarding the availability of electricity and water.

However, theres an odd indication that the refinery is not operating on normal time, according to Bloomberg. The refinery will conduct further tests of its own computers, which we set back an hour, at 1 am New Zealand time, the story read.

Phone lines were reported jammed with callers between New Zealand and Australia. At 7 am EST (1 am NZ) the New Zealand government plans to release its first Y2k report. As of 12:15 am NZ time no Y2k incidents have been reported, although theres been an apparent unrelated failure at a water power plant, reported before midnight, in the country's interior.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Answers

Here's the New Zealand government site for monitoring Y2k disruptions:

http://www.y2k.govt.nz/home/Navigationpage.htm

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

ABC News reported an electrical blackout in New Zealand. Said it was restored "quickly." Cause under investigation. High winds, maybe. 01:32 NZ Time.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Now, don't we all feel a little foolish for the countless hours we spent away from our families discussing this non-event? I know I do.

Signed, Waiting For the Berating from Spouse

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

I hope your comments were tongue and cheek, Mike. Only "fools" rush in. When time permits, uncertainty always mandates examination before action.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Charlie,

Where did you see that ABC report on New Zealand? I didn't see it on their Web site.

Thanks.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Drew,

When ABC came back from a local news break, Peter Jennings mentioned a power loss in passing, saying that it was quickly restored. The was a little more than an hour after rollover, NZ time. On further review, he may have been referencing the power loss at the water plant inland, which was actually reported before the rollover. You know how the news business goes when reporting in progess.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Drew,

Malcolm had this to say on another thread listed here:

Less than 30 minutes after I posted my previous message, the lights went off. The time was 00:41. I went outside and the only lights I could see anywhere were along the top of the dam, and from a few cars driving along the nearby highway. Naturally I went to bed (in the dark) trying to rack my brains thinking about what could have happened. What did we miss. When I arrived at work this morning I expected to hear the worst, but apparently the outage was just confined to our immediate area, and lasted 1 hour. The cause was sabotage on the power line from the dam to our small town. Someone's cruel idea of a joke for the new year.

Malcolm

-- Malcolm Taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), December 31, 1999.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Mike,

Being proactive rather than reactive is ALWAYS a better choice.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999

Indeed, I agree that being proactive is the best course. However, with positive reports flooding in from all over the world about the infrastructure working without incident, i.e. electricity, water, communications transportation and banking, I would characterize our time spent in discussing this event as so much intellectual masturbation. Who did we help? What tangible result did we provide? We were left standing with egg, or otherwise, on our faces. I am as guilty as everyone else.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1999