ERNS database goes down due to Y2K problem The main U.S. EPA database for reporting chemical spills, the Emergency Response and Notification Systems, was quietly unplugged at the end of 1999 because it was not Y2K-compliant. The ERNS Web page carried no information on this, nor apparently was any public announcement made. EPA staffers told the Center for Y2K and Society that they are working on a new system, tentatively known as "ERNS 2000", that they hope will be ready in mid-January. Until a new system is up, EPA regional offices and emergency responders will have to rely on the reporting system maintained at the National Response Center. First response to chemical spills thus may not be significantly affected by the loss of ERNS, but the 10 EPA Regions will no longer have any ability to modify the data in the accident reports as new information becomes available (e.g., if a spill initially reported as 10 gallons of gasoline turns out to have been 10,000 gallons). [Y2K Center staff]

This was originally posted at GICC by -- Lee Maloney (leemaloney@hotmail.com. An interesting coincidence is I was trying to access the EPA database myself tonight and wondered what was wrong...

original stoy is at this link:

http://www.y2kcenter.org/resources/glitches/index.html

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), January 07, 2000

Answers

Yikes! chilling article.

Not y2k, they were gonna unplug it to turn it into a planter anyway. So wonder what other federal depts are sitting on stories like this one?

-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), January 07, 2000.

How convenient...

What's potentially dangerous about this situation, if I understand it correctly, is that in depth reports about the FULL extent of spill damage may not be reported. Is that right?

How many times, when it pertains to industrial accidents, is the "devil found in the details"? Almost all the time. It usually takes a good period of time before the scope of the accident is fully understood....and now the public has no source to ascertain this needed information? Someone tell me I'm misunderstanding this situation?

-- TM (mercier7@pdnt.com), January 07, 2000.