Flashback Friday: The Blackout of 2003

Where were you during the Blackout of 2003??

Hahah, I am sure that only the people in the Ontario and the Northeast part of the US will understand what I am talking about!

Can you believe that it will be 7 years tomorrow since the Blackout?? It’s crazy how time flies!

It’s funny because I will always remember exactly where I was, what I was doing and who I was with on that day…

It was a Thursday. It was my 3 year anniversary with my high school boyfriend (at the time). I was picking him up from summer school, and then we were going out for dinner to celebrate.

I arrived at his school at my usual time of 3:45, and waited for him to get his act together and get his ass in the car {you see, this boy always kept me waiting, I probably spent a good year out of the 4 years we were together waiting for him to show up! Let’s not get started on that one…}

So after slacking, he gets in the car around 4:00. We leave to go to his house. I start to notice that there are some street lights out – “no biggie” I think to my self, just treat it like a four way stop. As we got farther and farther downtown the chaos ensued… traffic was backed up, people were walking all over the street, there were accidents left, right and center… and of course still no street lights anywhere!

We flick on the radio… I believe at the time there was nothing. Check the clock – its 4:16ish. After a long, careful drive through the city back to BF house, we quickly released THERE WAS NO POWER ANYWHERE!

By this time all his friends arrive at his house {it was a pretty small town!}, and we are all wondering the same thing… what the hell is going on?

So naturally we did what all 17 year olds would do on a hot summer day with no power… sat in the backyard, BBQ’ed up some steaks {from the quickly defrosting freezer}, drank all the beer in the fridge, and looked up at the stars. You will never understand until you witness it yourself just how clearly you can see the stars in the night sky when there is NO light for hundreds of kilometers! I will always remember that….

Once the radio stations in our area started broadcasting again we quickly realized that this Blackout was HUGE! It was the second most widespread electrical blackout in history! It affected 10 million people in Ontario and 45 million people in eight U.S. states. In some areas power was out for almost 5 days!! We were lucky enough to have our power restored late the next day, but still – going 5 days without power is just crazy!

Shortly thereafter the blame game started – “Blame Canada!” and “It started in the US!” were the arguments presented in the aftermath. And of course the jokes started to fly… some of my favourites:

  • “The blackout was Fox’s new idea for a reality show: A Day in Baghdad.” ~ Elaina Newport
  • “Bush said the East Coast blackout was a wake-up call. He must have been napping a little lately.” ~ Will Durst
  • “The Iraqis must be stunned. We’re gonna rebuild their infrastructure when a tree can knock out our power system?” ~ Lewis Black
Budumbumcha!! hahaha

It actually wasn’t until February 2004, when the US-Canada Power System Outage Task Force released their final report, placing the main cause of the blackout on FirstEnergy Corporation’s failure to trim overgrown trees in part of its Ohio service area…

Hahaha!! Trees!! Seriously!

~~~~~~
So, where were you there during the Blackout of 2003? What did you do? How long were you without power?

If you were lucky enough not to experience the Blackout what other catastrophe have you been involved in that you will always remember? Earthquake? Monsoon? lol

Share Up!!

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