How Will You Keep The Lights On (When Everyone Else’s Go Off)?

On July 13, 2019, a faulty cable at a Con Ed substation led to a blackout that plunged 72,000 customers in midtown Manhattan into darkness for nearly six hours.

Nearly 16 years before, on August 14, 2003, three parallel, heavily loaded high-voltage electrical transmission lines in Ohio sagged and touched nearby overgrown tree limbs, causing substantial voltage fluctuations. The resulting electrical power interruption impacted 45 million people across parts of eight states in the Northeast and Midwest United States, as well as 10 million people in Ontario, Canada. The blackout lasted one to five days depending upon the area and servicing utility. At the time it was second largest blackout in history.

These events remind us how vulnerable our businesses can be to electrical grid disruptions caused by everything from squirrels and human error to hurricanes, floods, tornadoes or acts of terrorism.

Every IT manager understands the need for a reliable power supply to ensure business continuity, but few know which strategies will help minimize or completely avoid the effects of a regional electrical grid disruption. And you don’t have to set up a secondary data center thousands of miles away to protect your business-critical resources.

As a Master Business Continuity Professional (MBCP) and principal consultant with Sirius’ Incident Preparedness DR/BC practice, I have been dedicated to IT disaster recovery and business continuity since 1990. And I have intimate, first-hand experience helping companies anticipate, prepare for and respond to natural and man-made disruptions that bring many businesses to their knees.

In my new white paper, Viability of Alternate IT and Business Sites Within the Same Electrical Grid: A Blackout Hazard Mitigation Primer, I look at the causes and effects of the 2003 Northeastern and Midwest blackout, and outline strategies for minimizing or altogether avoiding business disruptions due to regional outages.

Download this informative white paper now to get a better understanding of the dangers of regional power failures and how you can prepare for them. For more information, speak with your Sirius representative or contact us to speak with one of our DR/BC consultants.