Third World South Australia: State Blacked Out

[Rev.Cambeul]

Living in South Australia for the last twenty or so years, I've seen the infrastructure slowly begin to collapse. Privatisation of government utilities has meant that the electricity, gas, water, roads and prisons are beginning to collapse. Even the phone networks failed yesterday ....

But I'm not going to get into all of that here. Just letting you all know that I haven't abandoned anyone. The entire state of South Australia (the size of Texas) was blacked out yesterday due to severe storms. And there have been other localised blackouts before and I expect later as well.

As for me, my electrical equipment is protected with safety switches and 575j surge arrestors - and I often unplug things during electrical storms. Thanks to Festum Album, I have enough candles to last a week, and I'm resourceful enough with general batteries. The rainwater tank is full, the cupboards have enough tinned food to last me, and Nigger (my dog) has plenty of food. If the power goes down again and the phone networks remain working, then I've got my smart phone and I can recharge that using my car if need be. I just tend to be conservative with mobile phone usage.

If it comes to it, I can sit in the dark with a candle playing some of our Creator audio books on my battery op CD player/radio/cassette ... That's actually what I did last night.

So, everything is fine here. The third world state of blackouts is a nuisance, but that's all it is. I'll eventually get back on and answer any questions I may have missed.

RaHoWa!

@Cailen.

[Br.IanVonTurpie]

Glad I wasn't around for that! People stuck inside the airport. Electrical towers that folded. Looks like some homes got smashed up!

http://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/whats-going-on-with-south-australias-power/news-story/885602b3ff99c3500dbde27fbe54b5ab

The blackout appears to be related to severe "almost cyclonic force winds" and 80,000 lightning strikes that battered the state about 3.48pm.

The damage triggered an automatic cut at the interconnector, which as the name suggests, links South Australia and Victoria. It allows the states to share electricity, and acts like a large surge protector, which automatically cuts off supply if there is a fault in the system to protect the entire system from being damaged.

SOUTH AUSTRALIA RELIES ON VICTORIA FOR POWER

South Australia gets its electricity from wind, solar and gas but no longer has coal power.

[Rev.Cambeul]

Yeah, a new house near mine only finished being built last year was demolished this morning. I expect it had something to do with the storms. Probably cheaper for the insurance to pay for a new house than to try and repair.

Superstorm set to unleash across Australia tonight
http://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/storm-warning-sydney-melbourne-brisbane-hobart-adelaide-to-be-battered/news-story/464829aed96e95286f1fdd16d315d0ce

SA was left in total blackout for hours yesterday evening — causing travel chaos, hospital terror and reported looting of homes. Back-up generators at an Adelaide hospital failed during the outage, forcing 17 patients to be transferred to another hospital, many breathing with the help of manual respirators as they were moved.

The Premier said powerful wind gusts and thunderstorms smashed 22 electricity transmission stations near Port Augusta at 3.48pm yesterday, and the toppled towers were followed by a lightning strike, which triggered a safety shutdown.

"This is a catastrophic natural event which has destroyed our infrastructure," he said in a press conference this afternoon. "These are events the Director of the Bureau of Meteorology has never seen in his whole career.

"There is no infrastructure that can be developed that can protected you against catastrophic events that take out three pieces of infrastructure."
BoM regional director John Nairn said the state was hit by an extremely vigorous front connected to a very powerful low, with strong wind gusts bringing down trees and towers.

He said Adelaide was now entering a lull but it would be short-lived before the system reintensifies throughout the afternoon and evening.
"We've only seen half the rain we've expected to see so far," he said. "We're expecting quite significant falls tonight."

Period of Emergency declared: A "period of emergency" has been declared after a meeting of State Cabinet this evening. Deputy Premier John Rau issued the following statement.

"Following a meeting of Cabinet this evening, a period of Emergency has been proclaimed under the Essential Services Act 1981 due to the severe weather event. Under these provisions, the Attorney-General has directed the Australian Energy Market Operator to maintain control of the South Australian Energy Market. His Excellency the Governor assented to the regulations which ensures the production, distribution and supply of electricity are declared to be essential services. The declaration lasts for seven days unless revoked beforehand. This comes as another severe weather front hits the State."