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Power Outages facts

While investigating facts about Power Outages Near Me and Power Outages In My Area, I found out little known, but curios details like:

An octopus named Otto caused an aquarium power outage by climbing to the edge of his tank and shooting a jet of water at a bright light that was annoying him. He's also been seen juggling hermit crabs, throwing rocks at the glass and re-arranging his tank surroundings.

how to find power outages in your area?

During WWII, the British launched nearly 100,000 weather balloons trailing long metal wires toward occupied Europe, causing power outages when they shorted out power lines and causing at least one German power station to burn down.

What causes short power outages?

In my opinion, it is useful to put together a list of the most interesting details from trusted sources that I've come across answering what areas have power outages. Here are 45 of the best facts about Power Outages By Zip Code and Power Outages Victoria I managed to collect.

what causes power outages?

  1. In 1999, 40 million people suddenly lost power in the Philippines, igniting fears of a possible military coup, only to find out that the cooling pipes of one power grid had sucked up 50 dump truck’s worth of jellyfish which caused the outage.

  2. About Otto, an octopus that was able to climb onto the rim of his tank, squirt a jet of water to a bright light shining into his aquarium and cause a power outage. Staff believe that Otto had been annoyed by the lamp

  3. Chick-fil-A once broke their tradition and opened on a Sunday when an Atlanta mayor called the company and asked that an airport location remain open after thousands of passengers were left stranded due to a power outage.

  4. When a power outage struck southern California in the 1990s, Los Angeles residents reportedly called 911 to express alarm about strange clouds hovering overhead; they were seeing the Milky Way for the first time

  5. A polio victim was kept alive in a metal tube for nearly 60 years only to die when a power outage shut her iron lung down.

  6. Looting of DJ equipment during a 1977 power outage in New York played a large role in the success of Hip Hop

  7. In Los Angeles in 1994, after an eathquake-induced power outage, calls came into emergency centers about a "giant silvery cloud." It was the Milky Way.

  8. In 1982 a Los Angeles man named Larry Walters used a lawn chair and weather balloons to ascend to 15,000ft above ground. On the way up, he lost both his glasses and his bb gun, which he planned to use to shoot balloons to descend. He caused a 20min power outage, and was fined $1500.

  9. During a brief power-outage at Nirvana in Munich, Krist Novoselic joked “We’re on the way out. Grunge is dead. Nirvana’s over." It would be Nirvana's last concert before Cobain's death.

power outages facts
What is the most frequent cause of power outages in the u.s?

Power Outages data charts

For your convenience take a look at Power Outages figures with stats and charts presented as graphic.

power outages fact data chart about Florida Power Outages During Irma, County by County, 9/9-9/1
Florida Power Outages During Irma, County by County, 9/9-9/11

power outages fact data chart about Measuring Venezuela's power outage in real time
Measuring Venezuela's power outage in real time

Why power outages in california current?

You can easily fact check why power outages in ca by examining the linked well-known sources.

When the Northridge Earthquake caused a massive power outage in L.A. in 1994, panicked residents called 911 to express alarm about a strange ethereal light overhead; they were seeing the Milky Way Galaxy for the first time.

South Park has failed to meet a production deadline only once through the show's history. It was due to a power outage. - source

The city of Fairbanks, Alaska holds the world's largest rechargeable battery, which powers the whole city during outages. - source

10-20 percent of USA power outages are caused by squirrels

A massive ice storm in Quebec in 1998 helped scientists to understand “epigenetic inheritance”: stress on pregnant moms during the prolonged power outage led to changes in infants’ DNA that is linked to illnesses later in life. The research program was named Project Ice Storm. - source

When are the power outages?

On 7th June 2016 a monkey climbed onto the roof of Gitaro power station (Kenya), fell onto a transformer and caused national-wide outage which lasted a few hours. The primate survived.

How to check power outages in your area?

It is estimated that nearly 25% of power outages in the United States are caused by squirrels. One such instance in 1987 caused Nasdaq to go offline for 82 minutes and lose 20 million trades in the New York Stock Exchange.

A city in Florida issued an advisory in 2018 blaming a power outage on "extreme zombie activity." City officials quickly apologized, assuring residents that "Lake Worth does not have any zombie activity currently."

During a power outage in New York City in 2012, a team of people which included Squarespace CEO Anthony Casalena formed a bucket brigade to carry diesel fuel up 17 flights of stairs to power a generator keeping a data center online.

A real-life version of BBC2’s mascot, a kangaroo called Hullabaloo, went berserk in the studio after getting stuck in an elevator due to a power outage on the planned opening night.

Power outages infographics

Beautiful visual representation of Power Outages numbers and stats to get perspecive of the whole story.

power outages fact infographic about Approximate path of two tornadoes seen by reported power out

Approximate path of two tornadoes seen by reported power outages


When do power outages happen?

Those blue reflectors on the street are there for the fire department to find fire hydrants in emergency cases (total blackouts, power outages, etc.)

When a massive power outage struck southern California in the 1990s, Los Angeles residents reportedly called 911 to express alarm about strange clouds hovering overhead; they were seeing the Milky Way for the first time.

In Germany, the average consumer's annual power outages is less than 12 minutes.

During a power outage you can still get electricity from a landline phone jack and use it to charge your smartphone, however its a felony

About an octopus named Otto that caused a power outage by shooting water at a bright light that was annoying him. He’s also been seen juggling hermit crabs, throwing rocks at the glass, and rearranging items in his tank.

How long do power outages last?

The developers of the Metro series of games had to work in below freezing temperatures, deal with frequent power outages and smuggle PCs and developer kits into Ukraine to avoid corrupt customs officials.

The national weather service warning in advance of hurricane Katrina was quite strong including predicting destruction of most buildings and weeks long power outages

If there is a nuclear blast in our atmosphere, it could cause an immediate and devastating power outage to nearly all of America

That, exactly seven years ago, the electricity went missing for over 400 million people in India. That's the largest power outage ever.

In 1998, a massive power outage struck Los Angeles and residents called 911 to report seeing "strange clouds" which were actually stars.

The entire province of Quebec suffered a power outage in 1989 due to a solar flare.

In 2016 a monkey caused a 4-hour power outage across Kenya after it tripped while crossing Gitaru Power Station and fell on the transformer of a hydroelectric dam. The incident cut off power to over 4.7 million homes and businesses throughout the country.

During a brief power-outage at Nirvana in Munich, Krist Novoselic joked “We’re on the way out. Grunge is dead. Nirvana’s over." It would be Nirvana's last concert before Cobain's death.

The world's oldest working light bulb is 110 years old, was only turned off for 1 week, and during power outages.

Some fire exit signs are made from tritium viles as it is self illuminating and so they don’t need electricity in the event of a power outage, and can be seen in the dark indefinitely until the tritium decays. Also its radioactive.

In 1999, Enron Energy Traders rerouted over 2900 megawatts of energy to the unincorporated community of Silver Peak, Nevada. This caused a massive power outage in California, and the company made a profit of $7 million from the outage. They were fined $25,000.

During the California wildfires of 2017, power outages caused garage doors to become inoperable, causing residents to became trapped in their homes. In response, California passed a law requiring new garage door openers to have built-in battery backups. The law went into effect on July 1st.

Squirrels climb power transformers and capacitors looking for food, causing short circuits that shut down equipment. They have brought down the NASDAQ stock market twice, and are responsible for numerous power outages at the University of Alabama.

Foil balloons became such a nuisance that California enacted a Balloon Law in 1990 to regulate the sales and use of helium-filled foil balloons. This was due to power outages caused when they snag on power lines, costing the state's businesses millions of dollars annually.

This is our collection of basic interesting facts about Power Outages. The fact lists are intended for research in school, for college students or just to feed your brain with new realities. Possible use cases are in quizzes, differences, riddles, homework facts legend, cover facts, and many more. Whatever your case, learn the truth of the matter why is Power Outages so important!

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