View Source: EastCoastBlackout

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!!The great blackout of 2003 occurred on August 14 and lasted about 24 hours.

Here's what I wrote at the time:

We were totally affected by the blackout.  Lost power at 4:10pm and lost
network connectivity at the same time.  Waited 45 minutes, then decided
to shut down computers (all systems in our office are on big battery
backups).  Shutdown took about 90 minutes - going through servers,
hitting power buttons in the rack - fun.  Luckily, the markets close at
4, so it wasn't totally damaging for my company.

From our windows, we couldn't see much activity.  There were more people
on the streets than usual, and the lines for the ferries were extremely
long.  However, we didn't see any smoke or other unusual activity -
except for a large number of people walking across the Brooklyn Bridge,
reminiscent of the stories of 9/11.

Elevators were out at 7 when we left, so the three of us who stayed to
do the shutdown walked down 53 flights of stairs - then we found out
they could have sent the elevator to us!

Walked about 2 miles up Manhattan to my friend's Jake's house as the sun
set - tons of people on the street because the subways weren't running.
What cars there were on the street were going nowhere fast.  Lots of
people having impromptu parties out on the street.  Lots of cops outdirecting traffic.  As it got dark, they began lighting flares to mark
intersections, so all you saw as you looked down the avenues were lines
of red dots stretching into the distance.

I meant up with with Jake and R  at Jake's place on 5th Ave. and
1st. street.  We all three decided to make our way to our house in
Greenpoint.  There were a few cabs running, but we couldn't find one to
pick us up so we walked south to the Manhattan Bridge.  It was pretty
much pitch black by this time.  Everyone on the street was fairly
friendly, and the police were very helpful when we asked for directions.
We walked across the bridge to Brooklyn, by which time it was about
10:30pm.  The almost full moon rose a very ominous red color, although
as I say, it didn't feel dangerous to be out.

On the Brooklyn side of the bridge, a group of Orthodox Jews were
dispensing cups of water which were much appreciated by the crowd.
Everyone threw their cups on the ground, so it was like walking through
a plastic snowdrift.

We waited about 30 minutes to try and get a bus north to Greenpoint from
there.  Tremendous confusion all around, of course.  Finally we left the
main bus stop and walked a couple of blocks up Broadway to another stop
based on someone's advice for the best place to catch our bus.  That was
the only really creepy part of the night - once we were a few blocks
from the bus stop, everything was empty and very quiet.

Just as we got to the bus stop, a delivery truck showed up and the
driver offered us a ride!  Another Orthodox Jewish guy (props to the
jews!) who was driving a pastry delivery truck to Greenpoint.  He
finally dropped us off at our house at 11pm.  We celebrated by cracking
a few beers and passing out from exhaustion at midnight.

This morning, we still didn't have power, and our Cingular cell service
was out.  I walked to a pay phone and called in to work to find out that
they had power and needed my help.  R gave me a ride to the Brooklyn
side of the Brooklyn bridge and I hoofed it in to work.  Finally arrived
just before noon.

We're working now to get all our computer systems restored again.  The
NYSE is trading today but we're basically just watching and not doing
any trading ourselves.  Everyone on Wall St. is pretty much taking the
day off and waiting for full power to be restored.


I guess now I can say I survived the great Blackout of 2003.

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