1977 New York City blackout (& others)

[Jim Eshelman]

On July 13, 1977, New York City underwent a 25-hour loss of electricity. Unlike other citywide blackouts before and after, this one was accompanied by extensive fires (arson) in Brooklyn and wider looting and vandalism.

At 8:37 PM, lighting struck the Buchanan power substation, tripping breakers which (due to prior poor maintenance) didn't automatically close as intended. A second lightning strike took out two main power transmission lines, cutting off power from the Indian Point nuclear plant. Consequently, other lines became overloaded. A third lightning strike took out two more transmission lines, one of which did not automatically return to service. Cascading events ultimately led to a shutdown of the entire Consolidated Edison power system at 9:36 PM (as Saturn was setting). Although power restoration procedures began about an hour later, they were not completed for about 24 hours.

There are some interesting charts here... and a bizarre persistence of Jupiter, from which there might be something to learn. (I can't find record that there was rain, though this was all caused by lightning, so probably...?) I don't think it shows the surrounding events at all, though it shows electrical and lightning.

LATER: I don't think there was rain. Articles on the sweltering heat don't mention the rain as complication or relief. The Mets played the Cubs at Shea Stadium. Thunder and lightning were both "very severe," but nobody writing about this speaks of rain, that I can find. Ah, I found a video of young Barbara Walters reporting on it at the time, and there is no rain in the many pictures of "one of the hottest, steamiest nights in New York history."

Year: Capsolar
Uranus on Dsc (2°52')
Pluto on Dsc (4°51')
-- Uranus-Pluto conj. (1°59' in mundo)
Moon on Dsc (8°20')
Jupiter on Asc (8°58' stationary)
-- Moon-Sun sq. (0°04' in mundo)
-- Moon-Jupiter op. (0°38' in mundo)
-- Sun-Jupiter sq. (0°44' in mundo)
-- Moon-Pluto conj. (3°29' in mundo)

Bridge
t. Uranus conj. Capsolar Dsc (1°04')
CanQ Moon-Pluto op. (0°51')
t. Jupiter sq. Cansolar MC (1°01')

Quarter: Arisolar
Jupiter on Asc (0°58')
Saturn on IC (3°45')
Mercury on EP (1°09')
Uranus on EP (2°31')
-- Mercury-Uranus op. (1°45' in mundo)
Pluto on Dsc (9°41')
-- Uranus-Pluto conj. (1°45' in mundo)

Month: Caplunar
Jupiter sq. Asc (0°18')

Week: Arilunar (Dormant.) Moon-Mercury sq. (0°27' in mundo).

Day: Capsolar Transits
t. Uranus conj. s. Dsc (1°04')
t. Mercury sq. s. Dsc (0°09')
-- Mercury-Uranus sq. 0°55')
t. Sun conj. s. IC (1°02')

Day: Cansolar Quotidian & Transits
p. Moon-Pluto op. (0°51')
p. MC sq. t. Jupiter (1°11')
p. Asc sq. t. Mars (1°53')
---------------------------------
t. Jupiter sq. s. MC (1°01')
t. Venus conj. s. Dsc (1°38')


SUMMARY
Year: Uranus (Moon Jupiter Pluto). Moon-Sun-Jupiter Moon-Pluto Uranus-Pluto.
Bridge: Uranus (Cap). Jupiter Pluto (Can).
-- Quarter: Mercury Jupiter (Saturn Uranus Pluto). Mercury-Uranus Uranus-Pluto.
Month: Jupiter.
-- Week: (Dormant.) Moon-Mercury.
Day (Capsolar transits): Sun Mercury Uranus. Mercury-Uranus.
Day (Cansolar): Mars Jupiter Moon-Pluto (CanQ). Venus Jupiter (transits).

[Jim Eshelman]

Electrical power was disrupted across a large expanse including most of New England, New Jersey, and New York, as well as Ontario, leaving 30 million people without electricity for 13 hours. This occurred November 9,1965, 5:16 PM EST on a power line between Niagara and Queenston, ON. A surge originated in Lewiston, NY, which I will use as the event location; there were cascading effects. New York City was dark by 5:27 PM. One effect of this is that New York based TV and radio went off the air.

Using November 9,1965, 5:16 PM EST, Lewiston, NY.

Year: Capsolar
Saturn on Asc (0°30')
Uranus on Dsc (3°45')
Moon-Uranus sq. (1°47')

Bridge
t. Uranus sq. Capsolar MC (-0°19')
t. Pluto sq. Capsolar MC (+0°22')

Quarter: Libsolar (Dormant.) Moon-Sun sq. (0°54'), Moon-Mars sq. (0°05' in mundo), Moon-Venus sq. (2°39'),
Quarter: Cansolar (Dormant.) Moon-Uranus op. (1°15' in mundo).

Quarter: Arisolar
Mercury on Asc (0°15')
Moon on Dsc (1°19')
Pluto on Dsc (2°50')
-- Moon-Pluto conj. (1°31' in mundo)
-- Moon-Mercury op. (1°34' in mundo)
-- Mercury-Pluto op. (2°05' in mundo)
Sun on Asc (4°51')
Venus on Asc (6°09')
-- Sun-Venus conj. (0°35')
-- Sun-Pluto op. (2°01'in mundo)
-- Moon-Sun op. (3°32' in mundo)

Month: Caplunar (Dormant.)

Week: Arilunar
Sun on Asc (0°53')
Neptune on Asc (4°22')

Day: Capsolar Quotidian & Transits
p. Asc sq. t. Uranus (1°45')
----------------------------------
t. Uranus sq. s. MC (-0°19')
t. Pluto sq. s. MC (+0°22')

Day: Cansolar Quotidian & Transits
p. MC op. t. Uranus (0°23'), t. Pluto (1°04')
p. MC sq. s. Jupiter (0°26')


SUMMARY

[Jim Eshelman]

A widespread power outage, across much of the Midwest and Northeast (eight states), occurred August 14, 2003, "just after 4:10 PM EDT." Power was back some places within 7 hours, and other places within 2 days, overall depriving 55 million people of power. A software bug (in an Ohio control room) triggered an alarm that set off cascading events leading to the blackout.

Since I don't have a real location for this event, or even an exact location of its cause, I should check it for Washington - a huge block of the U.S. was affected directly.

Year: Capsolar
Pluto on EP (0°16')
Moon sq. MC (0°07')
-- Moon-Pluto op. (1°00')
Venus on Asc (2°35')
Mars on Asc (4°29')

Bridge
t. Pluto sq. Capsolar MC (0°37')
t. Pluto op. Capsolar Moon (0°30')
t. Uranus sq. Capsolar Asc (1°52')
t. Neptune sq. Cansolar Asc (0°24')

Quarter: Cansolar
Neptune sq. Asc (0°22')
Jupiter on MC (1°43')
Moon-Pluto sq. (0°07' in mundo)

Month: Caplunar
Sun on Asc (0°24')
Neptune sq. MC (1°55')
Venus on Asc (3°07')
-- Venus-Neptune op. (2°51' in mundo)
Jupiter on Asc (8°14')

Day: Capsolar Quotidian & Transits
p. EP op. s. Mercury (0°15')
----------------------------------
t. Pluto sq. s. MC (0°37'), op. s. Moon (0°30')
t. Uranus sq. s. Asc (1°52')
t. Mercury conj. s. MC (1°06')

Day: Cansolar Quotidian & Transits
p. MC conj. t. Mercury (0°09'), sq. t. Pluto (1°52'), sq. s. Pluto (1°28')
p. Asc sq. s. Uranus (1°50')
---------------------------------
t. Venus conj. s. MC (0°39')
t. Sun conj. s. MC (1°43')
t. Neptune sq. s. Asc (0°24')


SUMMARY

[Jim Eshelman]

Wikipedia has a timeline with the location of the original events. While the main problem was the plant in Eastlake OH, going off line at 1:31 PM, causing transmission lines to carry an extra load, and those lines shorted out after coming in contact with a tree in Walton OH at 2:02PM, the first cause was at 12:15 PM when an operator at MISO (Midwest Independent Transmission System Operator) took part of the monitoring software offline to fix a problem and forgot to put it back online before he went to lunch. While this may have occurred at the MISO headquarters in Carmel, IN, I think it's just as likely to have occurred at their main monitoring facility in Eagan MN.
The Wikipedia entry has exact times and most of the places where things occurred. Most of the actual blackout causing events occurred between 4:05:57 p.m and 4:10:50 PM, and it was established First Energy in Akron, OH, could have prevented the disaster, but didn't maintain transmission lines properly, ignored alarms, and didn't notify system controllers in other states of the problems when they did notice.

[Jim Eshelman]

Thanks. I'd missed that chart. - Finding an acceptable time isn't hard, but it's damned hard to narrow an event to a specific location. Rather than looking at cause, perhaps it should focus on effect - concentrating, for example, on New York's separation from the New England grid at 4:10:46 PM, for example. At the present, the best I can do to localize it is to consider it a national event defaulting to Washington, DC for lack of specific localization; but I'll play with some of the charts to see what they can tell us.

LATER: I didn't find what I was looking for. I ran all the major charts as astro-maps to see if there was a clear distribution of the right lines that made more sense out of the picture. There wasn't anything that simple. Ohio did manage to have more adverse activity than anywhere else, across multiple charts, so that makes sense. I'm still inclined to treat something that affected a fifth of the country as a national event.

[Jim Eshelman]

Here's another that just occurred:

6:40 PM eastern July 13, 2019 Manhattan, NYC
I've also heard 6:45 PM
The power's out in Manhattan. More than 40,000 households (meaning 160,000 people without power.) The Sun is going down and it's hot.

Someone just wrote me that today is the anniversary of the 1977 blackout, which occurred at 8:37 PM. I wonder if there are similarities.

The blackout (color black = Saturn) occurred exactly as Saturn crossed Eastpoint (0°45'). It's the day of Sun opposite Pluto with Mars barely out of partile phase to Uranus (though other Mars-Uranus appears in the charts below). Moon had recently risen - I'm looking at a lot of gravitational and electromagnetic phenomena this month, a degree or so past Jupiter (except, mundanely, the conjunction was 0°20'). Moon-Jupiter conjoined Rasalhague, the brightest star in Ophiuchus. FWIW, Mirach (Beta Andromedae) was exactly on IC, not a good showing since it is traditionally a cheerful, happy star.

Year: Capsolar {+2}
Sun on EP 1°11'
Uranus on IC 2°05'
Mercury & Saturn more widely foreground
-- Sun-Uranus sq. 0°09' (in RA)
-- Mercury-Saturn conj. 2°46'
-- Mercury conj. non-foreground Pluto 2°22'
-- Sun conj. non-foreground Pluto 2°23'
-- -- Pl = Su/Me 0°00' in mundo
Moon-Sun sq. 2°06' in mundo

Bridge (Dormant.)

Quarter: Arisolar {+2}
Saturn on Asc +1°17'
Pluto on Asc -1°13'
-- Sa/Pl = Asc 0°02'
-- Moon-Saturn sq. 0°38' PVP
-- Moon-Pluto sq. 1°34' PVP
-- Saturn-Pluto conj. 2°31' in mundo
-- Pluto sq. non-foreground Sun 1°53'

Month: Caplunar (Dormant.) Moon-Sun Moon-Mercury Moon-Pluto.

Week: Liblunar {+3}
Pluto on Asc 0°52'
Moon sq. Asc 1°08'
Sun, Mercury, Mars, & Saturn more widely foreground
-- Sun-Saturn op. 0°20'
-- Mercury-Mars conj. 0°50'
-- -- Mars sq. non-foreground Uranus 1°03'
-- -- Mercury sq. non-foreground Uranus 1°52'
-- Sun-Pluto op. 3°34' in mundo

Day: Capsolar Quotidian {+2}
p MC conj. s Uranus 1°07'
p Asc conj. t Mars 1°43'
p EP conj. s Sun 1°55'

Day: Cansolar Quotidian & Transits(Dormant.)