[bratticus]

A foretaste of the feast to come...

Blackout unlocks psychiatric ward
Illawarra Mercury (Fairfax Media) / June 15, 2011

Nurses say they struggled to prevent mentally ill patients from escaping during a power failure that crippled Shellharbour Hospital.

The mental health unit’s electronic door system stopped working after a backup generator failed to automatically respond to a blackout on Sunday, May 1.

Computers and monitors went blank, hallways and rooms went dark and patients were given sandwiches for dinner because the outage prevented the heating of pre-prepared frozen food.

The incident was revealed in a NSW Nurses’ Association publication circulated this month. ...

... "As a result the place was chaotic, it went mad. ...

Imagine building a world where it's just expected that electrical power will never stop coming when the reality is instead:

[Newfie]

That is an obvious code requirement, that the doors "fail open." For obvious reasons, you don't want to capture people in the event of an emergency.

My son is a prison guard, I'll have to ask him how their jail doors operate. That could be interesting.

[vision-master]

Your picture is totaly bogus. Linear time progresson is false.

[Newfie]

VM,

What the hell are you going on about?

[vision-master]

Oh, I forgot, this thread is about Institutions with Electrical Door Locks. Outside (fire) doors open, inside cells remained locked down.

[FloridaGirl]

My brother flew into New York City just as the big blackout occurred. He had to sleep in the hotel lobby because the electronic locks on the doors didn't work.

Consider too all of the commercial buildings with windows that don't open or have no windows at all. Our society has become totally dependent on a reliable supply of cheap electricity.

[Fiddlerdave]

I was in a restaurant bathroom when the power failed.

I could not flush the automatic toilet.

I could not turn on the water from the sink with a hand sensor.

I could not get paper towels from the automatic towel dispenser.

Not a big deal, but a further warning just how ever-more quickly things will get very bad as infrastructure like electrical power degrades. Or people lose the ability to afford it.

[dolanbaker]

If/when the electrical supply becomes untrustworthy, all of these devices will be rapidly replaced by manual ones or "fixed" to operate without electricity.

[bratticus]

Your picture is totaly bogus. Linear time progresson is false.

My picture? It's your picture as much as it's my picture. We drew it in universal oneness and view it from our relative realities.

You should get a web browser with a spelling checker built-in too.

Meanwhile another hospital blackout.

St. Joseph still probing outage
By Liam Migdail-Smith / Reading Eagle / June 19, 2011

... At that point, the on-site generator should have turned on, Jupina said, but the surge from the lightning also fried a computer chip that detects when the main power line isn't working and automatically turns the generator on.

If the power hadn't gone out, the hospital would have found out about the damaged chip when it tested the generator Monday morning, Jupina said. ...

... "This should be a lesson learned for everyone that no matter how prepared you feel you are, potentially catastrophic things can happen and you have to be ready for them," Jupina said. "We are exploring every avenue and bringing in every resource that can help us address the situation."

You be tellin' em, Jupina!

[bratticus]

We've all gotten so used to the idea that you throw out all your food once the power is cut to your refrigerator we don't even think it's weird.

Not to mention all the salaries that are hooked to electricity too.

Modesto Century Center shops lose power
By Marijke Rowland / Modesto Bee / June 18, 2011

... Raley's was able to stay open during the power failure by using a back-up generator, though shoppers reported that only emergency lights and a couple cash registers were working. Store employees were also preventing people from buying perishables such as milk and frozen items as the loss of power wore on.

A Raley's manager said power was restored to the supermarket between 1 and 2 p.m. Saturday, but would not comment further on how much of the inventory had been affected by the lack of power.

Blockbuster also was able to remain open during the power failure, but most other stores had to shut down, including Starbucks, Jamba Juice, China Gourmet and Pizza Hut.

"It cost us a lot of money," said Pizza Hut manager Chonburi Ean. ...

[Pops]

Modesto Century Center shops lose power

We used to shop at that strip center before we moved to Missouri, it was a client of mine for a time.

It's a funny thing about Modesto, it is completely benign as far as natural disaster goes, incongruously, that makes it a completely unprepared and vulnerable place because the population has no concept of self sufficiency whatsoever.

Of course it is a desert with only about 12" of rain a year and many of the wells are polluted with ag runoff but there is no rough weather to speak of, it's zone 9 so it rarely gets below freezing, earthquakes aren't too strong because it's miles from bedrock, it's only 36 feet in elevation but 30 miles from saltwater (so far).

It is smack in the middle of the richest ag counties in the country (world) where when I was a kid you could walk a couple of miles and find most any food imaginable. Today the populace would stand stock still and starve if the feeding tubes were disconnected.

A scary place for a doomer like me.

[Niagara]

I was in a restaurant bathroom when the power failed.

I could not flush the automatic toilet.

I could not turn on the water from the sink with a hand sensor.

I could not get paper towels from the automatic towel dispenser.

C'mon, you're making this stuff up. The devices you mentioned are all battery powered, they aren't connected to the mains.

[vision-master]

Of course they are connected to the mains viva low votage transformers.

[Newfie]

Perhaps some are and some are not? Maybe?

[babystrangeloop]

Your picture is totaly bogus. Linear time progresson is false.

Meanwhile hospital blackouts become commonplace as wild weather (AGW?) batters aging, unmaintained infrastructure (peak oil's main impact is economic.)

Peterborough Hospital has power cut during Rowan Atkinson stay
BBC / August 6, 2011

The new £289m hospital which treated comedian Rowan Atkinson after his car accident suffered a major power failure while he was a patient.

Atkinson was taken to Peterborough Hospital after he crashed his McLaren F1 supercar into a tree on Thursday night. He was discharged on Friday.

Power went out at the hospital at about 2215 BST on Thursday and a back-up generator failed to operate properly.

The hospital said it could not say why the back-up generator failed.

The emergency department blacked out as were the operating theatres, along with the maternity and critical care units.

Power was restored at 0230 BST on Friday. ...

Patients spend 14 hours without electricity in Madinah hospital
Arab News / August 7, 2011

MADINAH: Patients at the King Fahd Hospital in Madinah suffered a power cut that lasted 14 hours starting from 8 a.m. recently.

Several operations scheduled for the day were canceled. All elevators, air-conditioners and other equipment stopped working. After four hours the air-conditioners started working partially. ...

Ponca City left in the dark after Monday's storms
BY TIFFANY GIBSON / August 9, 2011

... Ponca City Medical Center went to its backup generator after the outage, spokesman Eric Lybarger said. He said there was never an interruption of service, but parts of the hospital went without air conditioning for a while.

Nurses used fans to keep patients cool and had a backup supply of water. The hospital's emergency department has a separate air conditioning unit and wasn't affected by the storm, Lybarger said. ...

56,000 hit as power is cut
Johnston Publishing Ltd. / August 10, 2011

A HIGH-voltage fault led to a power blackout affecting 56,000 properties yesterday afternoon.

Homes and businesses west of Bradford and Halifax – including Calderdale Royal Hospital – had their electricity supply cut from about 1pm. ...

Power cut leaves Gloucester surgeon in the dark
This Is Gloucestershire / August 20, 2011

A surgeon was left operating by torchlight after a power failure at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital earlier this year, it has emerged.

The cut-out took place during routine testing of electricity supplies at the Great Western Road hospital in Gloucester on March 13.

Back-up generators failed to kick in, plunging operating theatres and wards into darkness.

Equipment used to suck fluid from the lungs of patients in intensive care also failed, forcing nurses to carry out the task manually until the power was restored.

Ambulances were put on standby to transfer patients but were not needed because of the power being restored.

The incident has only come to light after confidential minutes of meetings of the Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust board were released. ...

Vital VOICE A&E Luminaries 2011
thevitalvoice.com / August 2011

My more exuberant work is a tongue in cheek nod to tabloids and sensationalism.