Out go the Lights
Everyone that has a vague understanding of current affairs and the news media has heard of Ted Koppel. Mr. Koppel hosted ABC Nightline for 25 years and is respected as a newscaster and writer. He has a new book out called “Lights Out” The National Post featured an article by Mr. Koppel recently that should have made headlines across North America, but it didn’t so much as raise an eye brow. Our government leaders are far more focused on trivial things like how they can change weather conditions that have been changing on their own for thousands of years, or raise more funds to assure a re election, or promise to re distribute wealth so everyone is treated equally.
Many prominent leaders have been warning that North America has a bigger problem than climate change, or Islamic terrorists. It is our crumbling Electric grid system that is in grave danger against cyberattacks. North America has powerful enemies that can destroy our electric power system and throw us into the dark for as long as 2 to 3 years. Mr. Koppel says in his article that multiple sources in the intelligence community and the military have stated that Russia and China have already embedded cyber-capabilities within our electrical system that would enable them to take down all or large parts of a grid. North Korea and Iran are presently working toward such a goal. Warnings of this magnitude should not be taken lightly, two former US secretaries of defense, two former US secretaries of central intelligence and two former US national security advisers have all warned that there is an 80 to 90 % chance that the USA will have to deal with a cyber attack. That puts us here in Canada in a similar position. Our governments have done nothing to warn the public nor have they made provisions other than to tell the people that a battery radio would be a good idea.
In 1995 our Inn property was hit with a devastating storm that toppled over 100 mature trees. A storm of this magnitude will also cause power outages for long periods of time. We were without power for over three days. While in Florida a few days ago watching Mr. Koppel being interviewed regarding his latest book, our power went out, then on , then off again and a 4th time off for over an hour. What a sense of despair when you are thrown into total darkness.
If our governments are unable or unwilling to take a responsible course of action to protect us against such a disaster, perhaps we should take things into our own hands and as a community take the necessary precautions available to us. When we had the storm in 95 we had 12 guests and no power for over three days. Hundreds of dollars were melting in our freezers and perishables in our refrigerators were beginning to rot. I immediately installed a generator that would come on automatically in the event of a power down age. As we were on a well and depended on an electric pump, this was a necessity..
Should we as a community of over 200 homes consider a similar course of action? A large generator that would serve our basic needs in the event of a disaster would give everyone a great sense of peace and security as well as save lives. Failing a full coverage of all our homes, a good start would be to install a smaller unit to service our CC.
Ted Koppel sums up his news story by saying this.
“I end as I began. The internet is a potential weapon of mass destruction, accessible to many of our enemies. It is surely time that our vulnerability of power grids to cyber attacks and the absence of a national plan to deal with the consequences become a part of our conversation.”
Paul D. Scott