Just to make things interesting, there was a blackout of short duration here in the other LA. A call to the LA Department of Water and Power told me that it was major; the circuits were busy. So I took a short little tool around the area to map the extent of the outage, using the traffic signals as a gauge. The outage's south and west boundaries extended only a few blocks, but the distance of the north and east boundary lines were much farther. I wasn't willing to drive to see just how far, since average Angeleno driving ability is dubious at best, even with the signals working (and I did pass a rear-ending). Good thing I didn't try to make that drive; minutes after I made the decision to go back home, a radio bulletin informed listeners that the outage was widespread and extended as far the San Fernando Valley which is many miles north of here.
Power is obviously back on again. Let's see what happened...
UPDATE: Bear Flaggers affected:
UPDATE: From FoxNews:
LOS ANGELES — A major portion of Los Angeles (search) lost power Monday afternoon and officials said early indications were that a power line was accidentally cut.Considering that my home isn't far from LAX, this a huge area.Outages were reported shortly before 1 p.m. from downtown to the coast and north into the San Fernando Valley (search), an area encompassing hundreds of thousands of residents and thousands of businesses, according to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. [SNIP]
Fire officials said they received reports of people stuck in elevators and traffic was snarled at intersections throughout the city when stop lights went dark. Neighboring cities, including Burbank and Glendale, also were affected.
Bill Quick reminds us that the Sheikh of OC--Adam Gadahn--threatened to blow up LA (and Melbourne, Australia) just yesterday, but the authorities say that terrorism isn't suspected. However, "the Los Angeles Police Department went on 'full tactical alert,' meaning no officers were allowed to leave duty."
It's Bush's fault. Where da feds at?
UPDATE: BFLer Matt Szabo is thinking along the same lines.
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