AVB
Jesus of Cool, I'm bad, I'm nationwide
On Nov. 9, 1965, the great Northeast blackout occurred as several states and parts of Canada were hit by a series of power failures lasting up to 13 1/2 hours. My father and 4 other people were stuck in an elevator for almost 7 hours in the RCA building finally getiing out about 12:30 AM.
The cause of the failure originated at the Niagara generating station Sir Adam Beck Station No. 2 in Queenston, Ontario. As was common on a cold November evening, power for heating, lighting and cooking was pushing the system to its peak capacity. At 5:16 p.m. Eastern Time a small surge of power coming from Lewiston, New York's Robert Moses generating plant tripped a misset relay (designed to prevent the line from being overloaded), disabling a main power line heading into Southern Ontario at far below the line's rated capacity. Within seconds the other lines heading north out of the plant were overloaded by the extra power flowing into them and their relays also tripped, isolating Adam Beck from all of Southern Ontario. The excess power from Beck then headed into the interconnected lines heading south into New York State, overloading them as well and isolating the power generated in the Niagara region from the rest of the interconnected grid. The generators, with no outlet for their power, were automatically shut down to prevent damage. Within five minutes the power distribution system in the northeast was in chaos as the effects of overloads and loss of generating capacity cascaded through the network, breaking it up into "islands". Plant after plant experienced load imbalances and automatically shut down. The affected power areas were the Ontario Hydro System, St Lawrence-Oswego, Western New York and Eastern New York-New England. Maine, with only limited electrical connection southwards, was not affected.
The cause of the failure originated at the Niagara generating station Sir Adam Beck Station No. 2 in Queenston, Ontario. As was common on a cold November evening, power for heating, lighting and cooking was pushing the system to its peak capacity. At 5:16 p.m. Eastern Time a small surge of power coming from Lewiston, New York's Robert Moses generating plant tripped a misset relay (designed to prevent the line from being overloaded), disabling a main power line heading into Southern Ontario at far below the line's rated capacity. Within seconds the other lines heading north out of the plant were overloaded by the extra power flowing into them and their relays also tripped, isolating Adam Beck from all of Southern Ontario. The excess power from Beck then headed into the interconnected lines heading south into New York State, overloading them as well and isolating the power generated in the Niagara region from the rest of the interconnected grid. The generators, with no outlet for their power, were automatically shut down to prevent damage. Within five minutes the power distribution system in the northeast was in chaos as the effects of overloads and loss of generating capacity cascaded through the network, breaking it up into "islands". Plant after plant experienced load imbalances and automatically shut down. The affected power areas were the Ontario Hydro System, St Lawrence-Oswego, Western New York and Eastern New York-New England. Maine, with only limited electrical connection southwards, was not affected.
