West Europe's blackout last weekend

the title should have been "launch of liner met with dark looks"

| pando wrote: |> Hello people, |> I'm not sure if many of you heard but there was a blackout in most |> parts of France, parts of Germany and Belgium. I wonder what heppened |> and what was the cause of this? |> If someone have informationons about this event, please share it with |> us. |> Thank you | |

You'd think that if it was a planned cut-off, power would be re-routed through other lines. Presumably this would not be scheduled during a time when power demand was expected to be at a peak.

So, if terrorists were to knock out just one critical transmission line this could make such a sweeping blackout? And such an attack could cut the line (not just trip it with a fault) and leave it out of service for a longer time, extending the blackout until thet get it fixed.

| the title should have been "launch of liner met with dark looks"

Sounds like a Slashdot style title.

Let's schedule "World Electric Appreciation Day" where all power is shut off for 1/2 hour at noon :-)

Minor nit pick, but it was 5M people in France, i.e. about 10% of the population, although this did include some parts of Paris. It was smaller numbers in the other effected countries.