EuroOutage?

[Markus Becker]

6 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

I wonder how long will it take to blame Russians (and Putin personally) for that.

    But, jokes aside, it is terrible situation for locals, especially in places with lots of migrants. Within few hours, this guys would discover CCTVs, security systems and alarms, phoines etc. are not working, police would not arrive and this "lazy white colonisers" are now legitimate prey....

MSM did say a cyber attack could not be ruled out. 

[rmgill]

3 hours ago, sunday said:

That notion of SHTF loved by preppers was in mind, so I began to store some tap water for future cleaning and washing needs. Fortunately we had at hand enough charged batteries to operate devices.

You need to work on your prep. You want to have water stored before the incident. Not as its developing. Alternate sources to filter and purify are highly advised too  

Some kind of ham radio would be advisable. A shortwave and/or a handheld in uhf/vhf and hf if you have the cash. 

[Stuart Galbraith]

8 hours ago, sunday said:

At last, Internet is back.

We got power back at 23:30 local time. It is now 0:47.

I have been without power, internet, cell data, or TV from 12:33 to 23:30. Seeing there was no cell service after the outgage really freaked me, especiall y after rumors of France also suffering from loss of power, which is a very concerning prospect. That notion of SHTF loved by preppers was in mind, so I began to store some tap water for future cleaning and washing needs. Fortunately we had at hand enough charged batteries to operate devices.

Other places got their power restored sooner. Main source of information has been traditional battery powered radio receivers. I still have not checked news on the web.

According to our dear Prime Minister, the cause of the outgage was a sudden disappearance of 15GW of generation during 5 seconds at 13:33 local time. I think the possible causes are not purely electrical, as that is really unplausible, but some kind of software bug in some control system used in several generating plants, a bad configuration of automatic controllers, or some hostile action by hackers, with or without nation state support.

@Markus Becker has tried to contact me several times, many thanks!

Did they try the back of the Sofa? I lose all kinds of arcane shit down the back of there.

Glad you are ok.

[Stuart Galbraith]

4 hours ago, rmgill said:

You need to work on your prep. You want to have water stored before the incident. Not as its developing. Alternate sources to filter and purify are highly advised too  

Some kind of ham radio would be advisable. A shortwave and/or a handheld in uhf/vhf and hf if you have the cash. 

A prepper thread would not be an out of place idea in this strange times..

[sunday]

4 hours ago, rmgill said:

You need to work on your prep. You want to have water stored before the incident. Not as its developing. Alternate sources to filter and purify are highly advised too  

Some kind of ham radio would be advisable. A shortwave and/or a handheld in uhf/vhf and hf if you have the cash. 

We had water pressure until the end of the episode, but there were rumors of some neighborhoods high in Barcelona's hills beginning to lose tap water pressure. The drinking water system here is regional, not municipal, and serves about 4 million people, so it is big enough to have some redundance.

I already have a set of filters for obtaining drinking water, and some purifying tablets.

Ham radio here is not so common, and I did miss a shortwave receiver.

Prepping in an apartment of a city block is quite difficult compared to a family house or an estate dwelling, I know. But not many estates available around here for that purpose.

[sunday]

5 hours ago, Markus Becker said:

MSM did say a cyber attack could not be ruled out. 

This is an interesting chart. Evolution of the Spanish generation mix yesterday. Y axis is power in MW, X axis is time of the day in hours. Y-positive is generation, storage pumping, and imports, Y-negative are exports from the system to Andorra, Morocco, Portugal, and France.

Note the sudden drop of generation at about 12:33. Yellow line is the power demand.

Nuclear (purple) was cut automatically when power stations found themselves without demand for their generation.

Seems the big drop in generation was in PV solar (light orange). As the PV solar generating units are quite small and distributed, looks like there was something iffy with their controllers, as a sudden Sun darkening was not happening.

Edited to add: Now I think there is not temporal resolution in the chart enough to tell if the reduction on PV solar generation was a cause or an effect of the outgage. The PV generating units could have found themselves without consumers, too.

 

Edited April 29, 2025 by sunday

[Der Zeitgeist]

6 minutes ago, sunday said:

looks like there was something iffy with their controllers,

Something similar happens in Marc Ellsberg's novel Blackout.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackout_(Elsberg_novel)

[sunday]

I have found a cordless worklight, of the likes of those being sold by Milwaukee, Bosch, Makita, etc, is quite useful when one has a number of batteries for the respective power tools, and keeps them charged - quite necessary for Li-ion batteries to have a long working life.

I have one of these, bought a few years ago for general working around the apartment, it could be hanged, attached magnetically to the fridge, etc.:

Edited April 29, 2025 by sunday

[Markus Becker]

35 minutes ago, sunday said:

This is an interesting chart. Evolution of the Spanish generation mix yesterday. Y axis is power in MW, X axis is time of the day in hours. Y-positive is generation, storage pumping, and imports, Y-negative are exports from the system to Andorra, Morocco, Portugal, and France.

Note the sudden drop of generation at about 12:33. Yellow line is the power demand.

Nuclear (purple) was cut automatically when power stations found themselves without demand for their generation.

Seems the big drop in generation was in PV solar (light orange). As the PV solar generating units are quite small and distributed, looks like there was something iffy with their controllers, as a sudden Sun darkening was not happening.

Edited to add: Now I think there is not temporal resolution in the chart enough to tell if the reduction on PV solar generation was a cause or an effect of the outgage. The PV generating units could have found themselves without consumers, too.

 

@Roman Alymov

I was telling what the MSM initially reported in a bit of a tongue in cheek manner. 

The more educated guesses suspected the green energies right away and now the unofficial consensus is that there was a big surplus of solar that could not be dumped into France(due to a power line defect). 

A cyber attack has been ruled out by the governments. 

Edited April 29, 2025 by Markus Becker

[seahawk]

30 minutes ago, sunday said:

We had water pressure until the end of the episode, but there were rumors of some neighborhoods high in Barcelona's hills beginning to lose tap water pressure. The drinking water system here is regional, not municipal, and serves about 4 million people, so it is big enough to have some redundance.

I already have a set of filters for obtaining drinking water, and some purifying tablets.

Ham radio here is not so common, and I did miss a shortwave receiver.

Prepping in an apartment of a city block is quite difficult compared to a family house or an estate dwelling, I know. But not many estates available around here for that purpose.

USB solar charger, water containers, water filter. (we have installed an option to draw from a downpipe)

[sunday]

12 minutes ago, Markus Becker said:

The more educated guesses suspected the green energies right away and now the unofficial consensus is that there was a big surplus of solar that could not be dumped into France(due to a power line defect). 

There could be some of that, as the current legislative framework makes quite difficult for investments in power transport and distribution to yield a profit.

Plus the greenies/NIMBYers opposing construction of new power lines.

Still the energy produced by PV solar generation was very large. I doubt even France could have consumed that.

[Stuart Galbraith]

Awkward...

[sunday]

I think the last similar European blackout was in November 6th, 2006, albeit with a likely different cause. This is the final report on the event.

[TrustMe]

You should have a 3 day supply of food and water, medical kit and water purifying tablets just in case, I do.  I don't class myself as a prepper but everyone should be prepared.

Nice to see your ok Sunday.

 

[sunday]

27 minutes ago, TrustMe said:

You should have a 3 day supply of food and water, medical kit and water purifying tablets just in case, I do.  I don't class myself as a prepper but everyone should be prepared.

Nice to see your ok Sunday.

 

We buy groceries weekly, so there is some buffer already. Plus there is a number of cans and jars bought in 2020 before that mass kidnapping event.

Thank you, also.

Edited April 29, 2025 by sunday

[Markus Becker]

Red Eléctrica rules out a cyberattack, and everything points to overconfidence in solar energy.

The lack of technologies that provide stability, such as nuclear, combined cycle, and hydroelectric, left photovoltaics leading the system. A dependency that collapsed

https://www.elconfidencial.com/economia/2025-04-29/el-sistema-electrico-espanol-salto-por-los-aires-por-un-exceso-de-confianza-en-la-energia-solar_4118613/

 

[sunday]

4 minutes ago, Markus Becker said:

Red Eléctrica rules out a cyberattack, and everything points to overconfidence in solar energy.

The lack of technologies that provide stability, such as nuclear, combined cycle, and hydroelectric, left photovoltaics leading the system. A dependency that collapsed

https://www.elconfidencial.com/economia/2025-04-29/el-sistema-electrico-espanol-salto-por-los-aires-por-un-exceso-de-confianza-en-la-energia-solar_4118613/

That makes sense, but more investigation on the incident is needed.

[RETAC21]

Ah, what a time to be alive... the timeline:

Grid (in)stability

And the apparent cause:

 

I found an alternative explanation on solar dumping more energy that the grid could take and/or export causing automatic trips that cascaded out. Once the nuclear PP scrammed, there were not further safeguards.

A few fortunate few had a proper diesel generators and could keep on going while Walking Dead was being re-enacted by everyone running to the closes bar to empty all the beer bottles as fast as they could.

On a more serious matter, dead toll seems to be around 10-20 people and counting

[rmgill]

11 hours ago, sunday said:

We had water pressure until the end of the episode, but there were rumors of some neighborhoods high in Barcelona's hills beginning to lose tap water pressure. The drinking water system here is regional, not municipal, and serves about 4 million people, so it is big enough to have some redundance.

Don't count on that. You could be away from home when you have an event and by the time you get there the water is low in the towers OR it's contaminated. 

 

11 hours ago, sunday said:

I already have a set of filters for obtaining drinking water, and some purifying tablets.

How many days worth? 
 

11 hours ago, sunday said:

Ham radio here is not so common, and I did miss a shortwave receiver.

Prepping in an apartment of a city block is quite difficult compared to a family house or an estate dwelling, I know. But not many estates available around here for that purpose.

You basically have to set aside a closet for gear. 

These are my go to. 
 

[rmgill]

 

[sunday]

25 minutes ago, rmgill said:

 

There are some very valid points there, especially the possible causes of PV solar getting disconnected from the grid due to instabilities and resonances, but there are also more interconnections with the French transport network. See https://www.ree.es/sites/default/files/downloadable/maptra2005.pdf

Edited April 29, 2025 by sunday

[sunday]

46 minutes ago, rmgill said:

Don't count on that. You could be away from home when you have an event and by the time you get there the water is low in the towers OR it's contaminated. 

Thanks. However I am at home >90% of the time, and I do not live alone. Moreover, this region is quite hilly and we live in the lower reaches.

46 minutes ago, rmgill said:

How many days worth?

That could be improved, yes. I think there are only 20 tablets. Drinking water outages are very, very rare, however.

46 minutes ago, rmgill said:

You basically have to set aside a closet for gear. 

These are my go to. 
 

Thanks again for the advice. We usually have at home about 3 or 4 demijohns of about 8 quarts each, with still water, plus about up to 20qt of sparkling water, that are enough for a week of hydrating.

[rmgill]

43 minutes ago, sunday said:

That could be improved, yes. I think there are only 20 tablets. Drinking water outages are very, very rare, however.

Get some Chlorine Dioxide 2 part reagents. 

https://waterpurificationdrops.com/chlorine-dioxide/bulk-chlorine-dioxide-treating-water-for-safe-drinking-guide/

43 minutes ago, sunday said:

Thanks again for the advice. We usually have at home about 3 or 4 demijohns of about 8 quarts each, with still water, plus about up to 20qt of sparkling water, that are enough for a week of hydrating.

My fear is that there will be some sort of accident or attack that will contaminate water supplies itself. So having some already stored is advisable. 

[Markus Becker]

14 hours ago, RETAC21 said:

Ah, what a time to be alive... the timeline:

Grid (in)stability

And the apparent cause:

 

I found an alternative explanation on solar dumping more energy that the grid could take and/or export causing automatic trips that cascaded out. Once the nuclear PP scrammed, there were not further safeguards.

A few fortunate few had a proper diesel generators and could keep on going while Walking Dead was being re-enacted by everyone running to the closes bar to empty all the beer bottles as fast as they could.

On a more serious matter, dead toll seems to be around 10-20 people and counting

Red Electric is said to have warned about this for several months! 

[sunday]

1 hour ago, Markus Becker said:

Red Electric is said to have warned about this for several months!

Yes, they filed a report in February, but Red Eléctrica is controlled by the Socialist Government, thus did not act. The lawyer currently presiding over RE, a Socialist politico of name Beatriz Corredor, says she did nothing wrong and she does not think about resigning.

Moreover, about half of the Spanish nuke plants were stopped, with the authorization of RE, because the taxes on electrical generation, that were recently raised by the Socialist Government, make selling electricity unprofitable for them. Stability of the system be screwed.

Another case of bigoted politicians going against physical laws.

For those able to understand spoken Spanish, there is a pretty good video here:

 

Edited April 30, 2025 by sunday