Hazards of the people, by the people, for the people

By Bob Buddemeier

NEWS UPDATE

After the article below was written, the following information was released by station KPTV 12, Portland (Officials confirm deliberate physical attacks on Oregon and Washington substations (kptv.com), 7 Dec 22.

PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) – Following what authorities are calling a targeted gunfire attack towards power substations in North Carolina over the weekend, a federal memo warned substations in Oregon and Washington recently had “physical attacks on substations using handtools, arson, firearms, and metal chains possibly in response to an online call for attacks on critical infrastructure.”

Twelve hours of darkness.  Temperatures below freezing at night.  Not the time to be without electricity.

From the December 5 Mail-Tribune:

“The Associated Press:

CARTHAGE, N.C. — Two power substations in a North Carolina county were damaged by gunfire in what is being investigated as a criminal act, causing damage that could take days to repair and leaving tens of thousands of people without electricity, authorities said Sunday.”

Power outages are one of our most frequent emergencies.  Among their many causes are natural hazards such as earthquakes, wildfires, and winter storms. In terms of hazard evaluation, it is increasingly clear that human threats need to be considered, whether considered “natural” or not.

Additional reports on the North Carolina sabotage leave little doubt  that the acts were carried out quickly,  with widely available weapons, and by perpetrators who knew enough to target the most valuable and vulnerable components of the power stations.

Could it happen here? Of course it could.  According to CBS News (6 Dec 22), in January a bulletin from the Department of Homeland Security warned that domestic violent extremists “have developed credible, specific plans to attack electricity infrastructure since at least 2020, identifying the electrical grid as a particularly attractive target.”  Oregon has already been the site of lethal conflicts (Portland, Malheur County).  Armed conflict is the most shocking, but cyberwarfare and cyberterrorism pose threats to society’s infrastructure that are at least as great.

Can you survive many days of cold and darkness?  It’s completely possible – with preparation.  Without preparation, it’s difficult at best.

For information:

RVM – Go to MyRVM main menu, click the Emergency Preparedness tab, then scroll down to Emergency Situations and further to Emergency Preparedness Information. Below that is the RVM “Power Outage Information” document.

Residents’ Preparedness Group (RPG) — https://thecomplement.info/2022/10/05/rpg-manual-resident-preparedness-2/    Specifically, see https://thecomplement.info/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Cottage-Elec-1-final-rev.pdf

Note 1:  The documents referenced above address primarily short-term outages.  Loss of electricity for multiple days, or over a large spatial scale, will cause more and greater problems.

Note 2:  In an earlier Complement article, Joni Johnson addressed some aspects of preparing for a power outage: “Emergency Power at Home: Why, What and How.”