Avian Flu Diary: South Australia Blackout Due To Severe Storms

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#11,774

A week ago today, in Puerto Rico's Blackout, we saw the power grid go down for several million people for roughly 60 hours. Today, it appears that the entire state of South Australia is without electrical power in the wake of a violent spring storm.

The following are pinned tweets on the South Australian Power Network's twitter feed.

https://twitter.com/SAPowerNetworks

The ABC News live blog - updated about 9am EDT - shows:

44 minutes ago

That's where I'll be leaving the live blog tonight. I hope you've got some power back, or at least aren't running out of candles...

Keep an eye on the BOM website for the latest weather updates - the winds and storm surges tomorrow are forecast to be quite destructive.

So, to recap:

Power is continuing to be restored overnight. Metro areas will be first

People in the state's north are likely to be without power for "considerably longer than the rest of the state"

There are no reports of deaths or serious injury

Adelaide Metro trains are expected to be running from Thursday morning

All schools in the state will be open, but some still without power may have different programs

Although this outage is blamed on severe weather, and power is already being restored to some areas, this is another reminder of just how dependent we are on the grid, and why we need to be prepared for prolonged outages.

It was just a week ago that I posted #NatlPrep: Revisiting The Lloyds Blackout Scenario, which looked at multiple vulnerabilities to our electrical infrastructure, and how we should prepare as individuals to cope if the power goes off for days or longer.

Among them, are having:

A battery operated NWS Emergency Radio to find out what was going on, and to get vital instructions from emergency officials.
A decent first-aid kit, so that you can treat injuries
Enough non-perishable food and water on hand to feed and hydrate your family (including pets) for the duration
A way to provide light (and in cold climates, heat) for your family without electricity. And a way to cook. And to do this safely.
A small supply of cash to use in case credit/debit machines are not working.
An emergency plan, including meeting places, emergency out-of-state contact numbers, a disaster buddy, and in case you must evacuate, a bug-out bag
Spare supply of essential prescription medicines that you or your family may need

As demands on our infrastructure grow, the equipment in the field gets older, and violent weather and other disasters continually test the system, the odds of seeing widespread and prolonged power outages increases.