LA Airport Blackout... Scary stuff
 

I hadn't seen the news today. Heard about this from my neighbor whose husband is with the FAA in Seattle.

LOS ANGELES - A brief electrical outage apparently caused by a bird on a power line knocked out electricity to the Los Angeles International Airport control tower and disrupted air traffic Monday morning.

Eighty to 100 flights had to hold in the air, circle or stay on the ground at other airports, Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Donn Walker said. Some departures from Los Angeles were also delayed briefly.

All flights remained in contact with the FAA, including through a facility in San Diego County that directs planes until they are about five to eight miles from Los Angles International, Walker said.

A 34.5-kilovolt supply line went out for 10 seconds at 9:38 a.m., city Department of Water and Power spokeswoman Carol Tucker said.

The bird apparently managed to ground the line, which re-energized moments later, the department said in a statement. But despite the immediate restoration of the power supply, the effect on the tower lasted longer.

All radar, radios and telephones ? essentially everything that controllers use to communicate with aircraft and other control facilities ? were hit by the outage, Walker said.

Walker said the airport allowed about 30 flights to land during the hour after the blackout, but about 40 others had to stay in the air.

Most functions came back quickly but some important equipment remained out, including critical switching equipment that allows instantaneous communication between controllers in the Los Angeles tower and the approach control facility in San Diego County, Walker said.

The switching equipment was restored after about three hours. Had it remained out and had there been bad weather, it would have restricted instrument landings.

The airport's ground radar also did not immediately work properly after the blackout.

Next the planes will crash.

Bro chill out, we dont need that shit any more.. Im tired of all that bullshit.!@

I can relate with ya PK... My lil brother is a pilot he just got his instrument rating and now working on his commercial liceanse...

That would be another good classic.

Love that sig :1orglaugh

Bad day for power I guess...The Bellagio in Vegas was without power today as well...


LAS VEGAS - One of the biggest hotel-casinos on the Las Vegas Strip closed Monday and thousands of guests had to check in somewhere else after a main power line failed.

The 3,000-room Bellagio was hit with the partial blackout about 2 a.m. Sunday. Emergency power to the casino came on, providing only a glimmer of light throughout the building.

"I guess I'll have to go to another casino to lose money," Bob Raf, a teacher from Michigan, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

A power line coming into the resort failed, said Alan Feldman, a spokesman for MGM Mirage, which owns the hotel. "We don't know what happened and probably won't for some time," he said Monday.

Feldman said thousands of feet of cable would have to be replaced and the hotel would not reopen until Tuesday morning at the earliest.

The power failure caused surveillance cameras to shut down, but a priceless collection of Monet paintings on display was safe, Feldman said. There were no reports of any injuries or thefts.

He said 800 guest rooms were occupied Sunday night and 1,100 arrivals were scheduled for Monday. Guests were moved to other hotels.

Bob Petersen, a 59-year-old retiree from Washington who was paying $350 a night at the Bellagio, told the Review-Journal he was frustrated.

"Why is there power across the street and there is no power here?" he asked. "I can't understand in this day and age why there wasn't more backup."

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...lagio_blackout

Airplanes have a special safety feature that kicks in when navigation and ATC systems fail. For a mere $500,000 per year, you get a pair of "pilots" that can assume control of the craft in an emergency. What a bargain.

Interesting with the west coast power failures.

It was sure strange driving past Bellagio tonight with absolutely no lights on. It's quite surreal seeing a major LV hotel with no lights.

Hopefully the airport re-activation will be problem free and all passengers will be safe. I'd hate to see anything disasterous happen.

Well, if one fuckin bird (which is not capable of the thought process nessicary to carry out a sabatoage plot) can knock out the power to the entire goddamn airport, than how in the hell do they expect to defend against terrorists that have much bigger bombs and can think? So much for Homeland Security!

it was this morning, and I believe resolved already.


I have been telling people they need to shoot all birds, they cause nothing but trouble with their incessant chirping, shitting on windshields and grounding out power lines

Your an Idiot, Move to the middle east you asshat! It was down for minutes you dick and they were'nt dropping bombs! Fuck I hate people like you who are so anti american...if we are so easy to be attacked why the fuck are we still the strongest nation you ass? Hmmmmm should be real easy right? shut the fuck up and go to sleep dick head.

Why would you ever say something like that?

Maybe you would be on that plane...taking a shit..when it happened? That would be cool huh?


Mike Hawk

http://smashbucks.com/sb.gif

I just think it is absoultely hillarious that after all the money spent on Homeland Security, all the drills, all the training and all the bullshit - a bird with the brains of a pissant can take the whole damn thing out even for a couple of minutes.

I agree with you but how often does this happen? Not often enough. Funny thing is that you can train birds to do thee kinds of things...has anyone ever heard of Falconary?

Danny Dukes > Do you have an ICQ ? Give me a sign on my number.. I want to ask you something.

planes crashing would be a "another good classic"?
you piece of shit

That's an interesting point actually...if you were on a plane that was going down, would you want to be in the shitter and not know or be in the fuselodge screaming with everyone and know you're gonna crash? :1orglaugh Let's hope none of us have to find out.

Scary. I would be praying if I was in the planes.

Shit, that cost them some major money. I wonder how much they lose per hour of not being open? There's probably insurance for that, but still.