Some of America's History of Power Loss

  This is some of the US's power outages.  There are more to come.  Be prepared by having a generator installed at your home or business so you are not left in the dark.

• 1977
  • July 13^th – 14^th - New York City blackout resulting in looting and rioting
• 1991
  • July 7^th - Customers from Iowa to Ontario loss power due to a powerful wind storm affecting about 1 million residents and businesses
• 1995
  • October 4^th - Hurricane Opal caused over 2 million customers from the eastern and southern North America to go without power
• 1996
  • August 11^th - Nine western states and parts of Mexico was affected by cascading power loss caused by the Western Intertie buckled under the high summer heat
  • November 19^th – Parts of Washington and Idaho was hit with a severe ice storm causing power outages lasting for up to two weeks.
• 1998
  • January – Over 3.5 million customers in northeastern North America were without power during a major ice storm.
  • May 31^st – A powerful wind storm knocked out power to nearly 2 million residents and businesses across most of Central North America.
• 2000
  • California’s 12 month electricity crisis – power loss due to energy shortages
• 2003
  • July 22^nd – Over 300,000 Memphis, Tennessee metro area customers experienced blackouts due a severe wind storm knocking out power
  • August 14^th – the “Northeast Blackout of 2003” caused over 50 million people to be without power in the wide-area power failure in the northeastern US and central Canada
  • September 19^th – Hurricane Isabel came ashore knocking out power to over 4 million people across nine states and parts of Canada
• 2004
  • September 4^th – Hurricane Frances causes five million people to be without power
• 2005
  • August 29^th – Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama residents lost all electricity due to Hurricane Katrina
  • September 12^th – Los Angeles’ blackout affects millions
  • October 24^th – 3.2 Million residents and businesses lost power during Hurricane Wilma in South Florida and Southwest Florida with hundreds of thousands of people without power for over a week.  Power was not completely restored to full power until November 11^th
  • December 15^th – 700,000 customers on the Atlantic Cost power was lost due to winter weather with extensive ice damage
• 2006
  • July 18^th – Northeast United States as well as the Delaware Valley experienced a blackout for more than 365,000 people
  • November 30^th – The St. Louis area residents and business lost power for 1 to 2 days due to winter storm
  •  December 1^st – Long Island electrical department had a fire which caused half of Long Island residents to go without power
• 2006 North American Heat Wave
  • July 18^th – over 50,000 people was without power for up to a week because of the excessive heat.  The restoration of power was compromised by power lines and transformer catching on fire, melted or failed.
  • July 19^th – In the St. Louis, Missouri area, over 486,000 residents and business were without power and for some people it lasted up to 9 days in a heat wave of temperatures reaching 104° F. 
• 2007
  • January 12^th – 24^th – Winter storms knocked out power to 1 million customers from Atlantic Canada to Texas – 330,000 in Missouri, 200,000 in Michigan, and 120,000 in Oklahoma – by an ice storm
  • June 27^th – 136,700 people in New York were without power due to a power failure.
  • December 8^th – 12^th – Over 1 million homes and businesses lost power from a series of winter storms with ice in Oklahoma to Nebraska
• 2008
  • January 4^th – 1.6 millions northern California customers were without power for day from a winter rainstorm
  • January 29^th – Almost 70,000 people lost power in Dallas county due to strong wind gust
  • February 26^th – the Miami power outage was caused by a failed switch and a fire at the electrical substation outside Miami.  The outage affected 4 million people from Southern Florida to the Northern Florida peninsula.

Information from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_outages