Blackout Hits Ontario and Seven US States
This article was originally published in Maclean’s magazine on August 25, 2003. Partner content is not updated.
IT TOOK just nine seconds to turn the clock back a century. A voltage fluctuation in some Ohio transmission lines. Then, at 4:11 p.m. n a muggy August Thursday, a faster-than-you-can-blink reversal in the flow of current, suddenly sucking away a city's worth of power from the eastern half of the continent.