http://wtop.com/41/2925313/Electricity-slowly-coming-back
http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/more-strong-storms-for-dc-balt/67376
Photo courtesy of Photos.com
and....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/30/death-toll-storms-heat-us
http://www.pcworld.com/article/258627/amazon_cloud_hit_by_real_clouds_knocking_out_popular_sites_like_netflix_instagram.html
Digital cloud services aren't immune to the impact of real clouds, and that meant some bad news this weekend for the folks at Amazon and sites that rely in its web services.
An Amazon cloud service update following the recent storms affecting power in the eastern United States.The outages serve as a good reminder that real clouds and what they bring with them can still take out the digital cloud, which isn't immune from failures and random acts of nature. The storms Friday night caused widespread power outages from Indiana to New Jersey and packed winds that reached 70 mph, toppling three tractor trailers on an Ohio interstate and blowing over trees that killed two people in Virginia.
A tree toppled by severe storms sits atop a car in Washington's Dupont Circle neighborhood on Saturday, June 30, 2012 in Washington, D.C. (AP Photo/Jessica Gresko)
WASHINGTON - About a million customers are still without power Sunday morning, after Friday night's storms ravaged the area during the middle of an oppressive heat wave.
The governments of Maryland, Virginia and D.C. have declared a state of emergency. President Barack Obama called the governors of Maryland and Virginia offering federal assistance.
At least 13 people have been killed in the storm, with at least five of those deaths in the D.C. area.
Sunday is supposed to be hot and humid with temperatures getting near 100 degrees, with another chance of showers or thunderstorms in the afternoon.
Powerless
A Pepco spokesman says power could be out for up to a week for some customers.
"We want our customers to have realistic expectations, as unfortunate as they are," says Pepco spokesman Clay Anderson. "We definitely know it's hot out there for customers and our crews as well."
Spokesmen from BGE and Dominion Power both say this will be a multi-day event.
The utility companies are still assessing the damage, and if it crews will have to shut down additional live lines that were downed by the storm.
A global restoration time is expected sometime Sunday from most of the utility companies.
Pepco says that extra crews are scheduled to arrive Monday from as far away as Oklahoma, Florida, Georgia and Missouri. They're also reaching out to crews in the northeast and Canada.
BGE has brought in out-of-state crews from as far away as Florida, Mississippi, Michigan, Michigan, Massachusetts, Tennessee and Pennsylvania. The utility say restoration efforts are expected to last deep into the week.
You Can't Hear Me Now
Many Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile customers say they are having issues with phone service.
AT&T technicians are "mobilized and currently working to resolve the issues," according to a company release.
"Due to damaging storms that have knocked out power across the Midwest and Northeast regions of the country, some AT&T customers in impacted areas in Virginia and Washington D.C. may be experiencing issues with wireless service," the company says.
Verizon has restored service to 911, though many landline phones remain offline. A spokesman says they are working to fix the problem as fast as they can.
Cable TV and internet service in the area is also experiencing problems.
Closings
The Office of Personnel Management hasn't not announced anything about the status of the Federal Government for Monday. WTOP will keep you updated.
State of Emergency
The governor of Maryland called it "a historic storm," and Virginia and D.C. have declared a state of emergency.
"This is the largest non-hurricane power outage in Virginia history," Gov. Bob McDonnell says. "Virginians need to be on guard and to be working together ... and to find out where the shelters are."
"The severity of the storm damage necessitates the declaration of a public emergency to enable District government to respond to emerging issues as expeditiously as possible," said D.C. City Administrator Allen Y. Lew.
At least five people in the D.C. region are dead after being hit by falling trees. One woman was in her car when the tree hit, and another was sleeping in her bed when a tree crashed into her bedroom. A third was killed while sitting in a car in Northwest early Saturday morning when a downed line set his car on fire.
* * *
http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/more-strong-storms-for-dc-balt/67376
Photo courtesy of Photos.com
Following Friday's deadly super derecho, another round of nasty thunderstorms will threaten parts of the Midwest and mid-Atlantic this afternoon and evening.
Friday's super derecho, a widespread and long-lived violent thunderstorm complex, left a trail of destruction and power outages from northern Indiana to the southern mid-Atlantic coast.
Many of the same areas which were affected on Friday will have to endure yet another round of gusty thunderstorms later today.
and....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/30/death-toll-storms-heat-us
Death toll rises as storms lash eastern US amid scorching heat
More than 3m people in eastern US without power, and states of emergency declared in Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia
Email
Storms, which caused power lines to be wiped out, were accompanied by temperatures of 100F in Washington. Photograph: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP
The death toll arising from vicious storms that lashed the eastern US climbed to double digits Saturday as millions of people were left without power in sweltering conditions.
With temperatures expected to reach triple figures in Washington DC and surrounding areas on Saturday, about 3.4 million people remained without electricity – and access to air-conditioning – after power lines were wiped out by strong winds and falling branches.
States of emergency were declared in Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia, as forecasters predicted more thunderstorms and continued heat throughout Saturday.
So far, weather conditions have been blamed for 10 deaths – six in Virginia, two in New Jersey one in Ohio and another in Maryland. In parts of Washington, residents needing assistance were urged to phone non-emergency numbers or travel directly to fire or police stations after 911 response centres were left without electricity.
Authorities also urged some homeowners to start conserving water amid concern over the effect of outages on sewage stations.
Blackouts were reported from Indiana to New Jersey on Saturday, with the bulk of the service interruptions concentrated on the capital.
On Friday, temperatures in DC reached 104F – topping a record of 101 set in 1934. Although marginally cooler on Saturday, many were still left sweating as the mercury ticked up into triple digits.
More than 20 elderly residents at an apartment home in Indianapolis were evacuated when the facility lost power due to a downed tree.
Most were taken to a Red Cross facility to spend the night, while others who depend on oxygen assistance were given other accommodation, the fire department said.
Winds of up to 70mph also led to travel chaos as the storm battered an area spanning a number of states. On Interstate 75, near Findlay, Ohio, three tractor trailers overturned leading to lengthy tailbacks.
The nine deaths so far reported in relation to the storm were all thought to be the result of falling trees.
Amongst those killed was a 90-year-old woman who died when a tree slammed into her home as she slept.
Others had a lucky escape amid flying debris and swinging electricity cables.
A park police officer was injured by an uprooted tree in the northern Virginia county, and an 18-year-old man was struck by a power line. He was in stable condition after receiving CPR, authorities said.
West Virginia governor Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were left without electricity.
At least four utility poles fell on a road in Columbus, Ohio, making it too dangerous for people in four cars to get out, police said. One person was taken to a hospital.
Early Saturday, Pepco was reporting 406,000 outages in the District of Columbia and Montgomery and Prince George's counties, Maryland.
"We have more than half our system down," said Pepco spokeswoman Myra Oppel. "This is definitely going to be a multi-day outage."
For many, the main concern was how to keep cool without home air-conditioners
Those who could afford it flocked to hotels to escape their hot, powerless homes. Others planned to spend the day at places like shopping malls in an effort to get out of the midday sun.
Jose Amaya, 41, of Germantown, Maryland, was one of millions without power on Saturday.
He said his wife and two daughters planned to go the mall to stay cool, and joked that the outage was going to cost him because they would be shopping. His wife, who works for a hotel chain, also planned to get the family a room to stay.
Robert Clements, 28, said he showered by flashlight on Friday night after power went out at his home in Fairfax, Virginia. Officers at the apartment complex where he lives said power wouldn't be back on for at least two days.
Clements' fiance, 27-year-old Ann Marie Tropiano, said she tried to go to the pool, but it was closed because there was no electricity so the pumps weren't working. She figured the electricity would eventually come back on, but she awoke to find her thermostat reading 81F and slowly climbing. Closing the blinds and curtains didn't help.
"It feels like an oven," she said. "It is hot."
and....
http://www.pcworld.com/article/258627/amazon_cloud_hit_by_real_clouds_knocking_out_popular_sites_like_netflix_instagram.html
Amazon Cloud Hit By Real Clouds, Knocking Out Popular Sites Like Netflix, Instagram
Digital cloud services aren't immune to the impact of real clouds, and that meant some bad news this weekend for the folks at Amazon and sites that rely in its web services.
Severe storms that wiped out power to more than 2 million people across the eastern United States Friday night also took down Netflix, Pinterest, Instagram and other sites due to an outage of Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud in northern Virginia.
According to Amazon Web Services, at 8:21 p.m. PDT it was "investigating connectivity issues for a number of instances" in the East region. By early Saturday morning, Amazon said it was "continuing to work to recover."
Netflix, Pinterest were back up, but as of early Saturday Instagram was still down.
It's unfortunate timing for Amazon, considering that recently Google announced Compute Engine, its Virtual Machine offering that will directly compete with Amazon and Microsoft, which both offer Infrastructure as a Service.
An Amazon cloud service update following the recent storms affecting power in the eastern United States.The outages serve as a good reminder that real clouds and what they bring with them can still take out the digital cloud, which isn't immune from failures and random acts of nature. The storms Friday night caused widespread power outages from Indiana to New Jersey and packed winds that reached 70 mph, toppling three tractor trailers on an Ohio interstate and blowing over trees that killed two people in Virginia.
According to the website Data Center Knowledge, the affected Amazon data center in Ashburn, Va., lost power for about 30 minutes, but the fallout from the outage affecting customers is longer lasting as Amazon has to recover virtual machine instances.
And while major data centers like this one have backup generators in case of a power problem, for whatever reason Amazon wasn't able to use it.
This is the second time this month that this particular data center lost power during a utility outage. On June 15, it suffered failures including one involving a generator cooling fan.
and....
http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/deadly-super-derecho-strikes-m/67383
A tree toppled by severe storms sits atop a car in Washington's Dupont Circle neighborhood on Saturday, June 30, 2012 in Washington, D.C. (AP Photo/Jessica Gresko)
A super derecho left a trail of destruction across the Midwest and mid-Atlantic on Friday, cutting power to millions and killing seven people.
More than 450 damaging wind reports were received by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center (SPC) as the super derecho took roughly 12 hours to race from northern Indiana to the southern mid-Atlantic coast.
A derecho is defined as a widespread and long-lived wind storm produced by a band of rapidly moving showers or thunderstorms. The most severe derechos are given the adjective "super."
Winds gusted to 91 mph at the Fort Wayne International Airport, Ind., Friday afternoon. As the super derecho maintained its violent nature, an 81 mph gust was then measured at Tuckerton, on the southern New Jersey coast, early Saturday morning.
The majority of the damaging wind reports pertained to downed trees, which led to Friday's seven deaths.
One of the multiple trees that crashed into homes in Springfield, Va., killed a 90-year-old woman as she was sleeping in her bed, according to the Associated Press.
A few hours earlier, a falling tree outside of North Middletown, Ky., (located east-northeast of Lexington) killed a man who was attempting to clear some tree limbs off a road.
Two people died by a pine tree fell onto a tent at Parvin State Park, N.J.
Damage on Friday was not confined to downed trees. Power poles were also snapped, while some structures suffered damage. At least four semi-trucks were blown over by the winds on I-75 between Findlay and Bluffton, Ohio.
Friday's super derecho was triggered by a ripple in the jet stream and fueled by the intense heat that caused Washington, D.C., to set a June record high and Columbia, S.C., to break its all-time record on Friday.
Derechos typically strike the lower Midwest states once every year, according to the SPC. The occurrence of derechos, however, are quite rare across the mid-Atlantic, south of Philadelphia. On average, this region endures a derecho once every four years.
One of the most recent significant super derechos to slam the United States occurred on May 8, 2009. This super derecho traveled more than a thousand miles in 24 hours from southeastern Kansas to the southern spine of the Appalachian Mountains.
Destruction from the May 2009 derecho totaled millions of dollars with numerous injuries and several deaths reported.
One main difference between the May 2009 derecho and Friday's is the number of tornadoes spawned. Forty-five tornadoes were sighted in May 2009, while there was only one unconfirmed report of a tornado on the ground in Newcomerstown, Ohio, Friday afternoon.
While winds reached 91 mph in Friday's super derecho in Fort Wayne, winds in the strongest derechos can top 100 mph. The derecho that tore through Wisconsin and Lower Michigan on May 31, 1998, produced a 128 mph wind gust in eastern Wisconsin.
http://washington.cbslocal.com/2012/06/30/eastern-u-s-storms-leave-5-dead-2-million-without-power/
WASHINGTON (AP) - Violent evening storms following a day of triple-digit temperatures wiped out power to more than 2 million people across the eastern United States and have killed at least five people.
Widespread power outages were reported from Indiana to New Jersey, with the bulk of the service interruptions concentrated on Washington, D.C., and the surrounding areas. Earlier Friday, the nation’s capital reached 104 degrees — topping a record of 101 set in 1934.
More than 20 elderly residents at an apartment home in Indianapolis were displaced when the facility lost power due to a downed tree. Most were bused to a Red Cross facility to spend the night, and others who depend on oxygen assistance were given other accommodations, the fire department said.
The storms, sometimes packing 70 mph winds, toppled three tractor trailers on Interstate 75 near Findlay, Ohio.
Fallen trees were blamed on both deaths in Springfield, Va.
Besides a 90-year-old woman who died, who authorities didn’t identify pending notification of kin, a man driving his car was pronounced dead at the scene. Authorities identified him as Khiet Nguyen, 27, of Burke, Va. Anne Arundel County, Md., police said in a news release Saturday that 25-year-old Kevin Obrien was killed when a tree fell onto his car late Friday. In New Jersey, two young cousins were killed when a tree fell on their tent at a park.
In addition, a park police officer was injured by an uprooted tree in the northern Virginia county, and an 18-year-old man was struck by a power line, Jennings said. He was in stable condition after receiving CPR, she said.
No comments:
Post a Comment