Three items dominated the media this week. The Olympics, the flooding in China and the massive power black-out in India – the latter causing much mayhem and disruption of the everyday normal routine!
But, China has had a bucket-full of rain and tempers were running high due to the lack of preparation for a deluge of such magnitude and the suffer
ing associated with flooded or washed-away homes and a total disruption of transport in some areas. This surely must go down as one of the must disruptive floods China has experienced for a very long time!
We have had no contact with our Chinese counterparts to establish what measure amateur radio played in supportive radio communication, but one thing is sure, they will not wish this sort of flooding to happen again soon. Again, a show of changing weather patterns in various ways.
The power-down situation in India caused major disruption to normal life in many areas, towns and villages. A report from Jim Linton, VK3PC, Chairman of Region 3 Emergency Communication Committee and Jayu Bhide VU2JAU, National Coordinator for Disaster Communication in India, indicated that the blackout affected around 700 million people and could be regarded as the worst black-out in recent times!
Jayu also reported that the North-East grid failed due to a fault in the plant and 20 states were affected by the power failure. Work was in progress to restore the grid but the break lasted for almost 12 hours bringing the economy to a standstill!
"Hams in and around the affected areas were ready for the emergency communication required during power cuts," said Jayu. They provided emergency communications during the outage; all voice repeaters were in order and did not fail despite the heavy duty back-up power needed.
He said, "Hams will still be on their toes until complete power is restored."
Up to 20 of India's 28 states were plunged into darkness as suppliers failed to meet the growing demand caused by air-conditioning units, flat-screen TVs and other gadgets.
Hundreds of trains failed, traffic lights were out, surgical operations cancelled, and underground miners were trapped when their lifts broke down.
At the time of going to press, most if not all the power has been restored but it was a painful reminder on how we rely on power grids and what can happen when the system fails!
Reporting for Hamnet, this is Francois Botha, ZS6BUU.
No comments:
Post a Comment