government 1 6

.In

GOVERNM ENT J , C i OQ ' " Z

 / S lO r a g e n , P a r t 1 O o ' x .

NORTHEAST POWER FAILU RE— NOVEMBE R 9 ,1 0 ,1 9 6 5 ^

H E A R I N G S

Z V BEFORE THE

SPE CIA L SUBCOMMITTEE TO INVEST IGA TE 

POWER FAI LURES h-..

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

INTERSTATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE 

HOUSE OF REP RESENT ATIV ES

EIGH TY -NINTH CONG RESS

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 1966
COMMITTEE ON INTERSTAT E AND FOREIGN COMMERCE

OR EN HARRIS , A rk an sa s, C h a ir m a n 1

HARLE Y O. ST AG GE RS , W es t V irgi ni a 2 W IL LIA M L. SP RIN GER , Illino is 

W ALTE R RO GE RS , Tex as J . ART HUR YO UN GE R, C al if or ni a

SA MUE L N. FR IE D E L , M ar yla nd SA MUE L L. DE VIN E, Oh io

TO RBERT H. MACDONALD. M as sa ch use tts AN CHER NEL SE N. M in ne so ta

JO H N JA RM AN , Ok laho ma

LEO W. O’BR IE N , Ne w York

JO HN E. MO SS, C al if orn ia

JO HN D. DIN GEL L, Michiga n

PAUL G. RO GE RS , Flo ri da

HO RA CE R. KO RN EGAY , N ort h C ar ol in a

L IO N EL VAN D EER LI N, C al if or ni a

J. J. PIC K LE , Tex as

FR E D B. ROON EY, Pen ns yl van ia

JO H N M. MU RP HY , New Yo rk

DA VI D E. SA TTERFIE LD III , Virgi ni a

DANIE L J . RON AN, Il lin oi s

J. OL IVA HU OT , New H am ps hi re

JA M ES A. MACKA Y, Ge orgia

JO H N J. GI LL IG AN, Ohio

CH ARL ES P. FA RN SL EY , Ken tu ck y

JO H N BELL W IL LI AM S, M ississ ippi

BR OC K ADAM S, W as hi ng to n 3

HAST IN GS K E IT H , M as sa ch us et ts 

W IL LA RD S. CU RT IN , Pen nsy lv an ia 

GL EN N CU NN INGH AM , Neb ra sk a 

JA M ES T. BR OY HI LL , N ort h Car ol in a 

JA M ES HA RV EY , M ichiga n 

ALB ER T W. WA TSON , Sou th Car ol in a 

TI M L EE CA RT ER , K en tu ck y

W. E. Wil li a m so n, C le rk

Ken n eth J. P ain te r, A s s is ta n t C le rk

P r o fe ssio n a l S ta ff

Andrew Ste ve nson J am es M. Men ge r, J r.

K ur t Borchardt Wil liam J. Dixon

Special S ubcommittee T o I nvestigate P ower F ailures

W ALT ER RO GE RS , Te xa s, Cha irman

FR E D B. ROON EY, P ennsy lv ania JA M ES T. BR OY HI LL , N ort h Car ol in a

JO H N M. MUR PH Y, New York JA M ES HA RV EY , Michiga n

J ohn K erw in , S pecia l C ou ns el

1

 R es igne d as ch ai rm an of com m itte e Ja n . 12 ,1 96 6.

3

 E le ct ed ch ai rm an of co m m itte e Ja n. 13, 196 6.

3

 A pp oi nt ed mem ber of co m m itte e Mar. 8, 1966.
C O N T E N T S

_ Hearings held— Page

* December 15, 1965___________________________________________ 1

February 24, 1966____________________________________________ 59

February 25, 1966____________________________________________ 101

Announcement of investigation of electric power failure a nd app ointment of

special subcom mittee____________________________________________ 1

** Sta tem ent of—

Bagge, Carl E., Commissioner, Federal Power Commission_________ 3

Black, David S., Vice Chairman, Federal Power Commission_______ 3

Brown, F. Stew art, chief Bureau of power, Federal Power Commission ___________________________________________________ 3

Dryden, Franklin B., Acting Director, Office of Emergency Plan ning ._ 86

Gendron, Capt. Edward W., U.S. Navy, staff assistant, Defense Research and Engineering, Department of Defense_______________ 59

Lewis, Arnold, Chief of Construction, Prod uction and Power Resources Office______________________________________________ 86

Loevinger, Hon. Lee, Commissioner, Federal Communicatio ns Commission___________________________________________________ 112

McConnell, Joh n W., Assistant Directo r of Civil Defense (Plans and

Operations), De partm ent of the Army ________________________ 76

O’Connor, Lawrence J., Commissioner, Federal Power Com mission ._ 3

Rogers, Thomas F., Deputy Director of Defense Research and Engineering, De partm ent of Defense______________________________ 59

Ross, Charles R., Commissioner, Federal Power Commission_______ 3

Swidler, Hon. Jose ph C., Chairman, Federal Power Commission____ 3

Thomas, David, Deputy Adm inistrator, Federal Aviation Agency__ 101

Additional material sub mitted for the record by—

Federal Aviation Agency: Map of the United States indicating airports

having continuous power facilities____________________________ 110

Federal Comm unications Commission: “Effect on C ommunications by

Northeas t Power Failure, November 9-10, 1965,” report prepared 

by National Industry Advisory Com mittee____________________ 112

zn

INVESTIGATION OF NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE

* WED NE SD AY , DE CE MBE R 15, 196 5

H ouse of Representatives, Special Subcommittee

To I nvestigate E lectric P ower F ailure of the

•*» Committee on I nterstate and F oreign Commerce,

Washing ton, D.G.

The subcommittee met at 10 a.m., purs uant to call, in room 2123, 

Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Walter Rogers (chairm an of the 

subcommittee) presiding.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. The Special Subcommittee To Investigate 

Electric Power Failure will come to order for the consideration of 

pending business.

We are opening our investigation into the power failure which last 

November blacked out the Northeastern sector of the United States. 

We are hearing today from the Federal Power Commission. This 

is a special subcommittee of the House Committe on Inte rstate and 

Foreign Commerce which Chairman Oren Ha rris appointed last 

November pursuant to the authorization contained in House Resolution 35. This resolution was adopted last February 10, providing 

for this committee to make investigations and studies into the adequacy 

of electric energy resources fo r defense and the needs of an expanding 

economy, and into the adequacy, the promotion, the regulation, and 

the safety of facilities for the generation, transmission, and distribution of electric energy.

Chairman Harris appointed this five-man committee and designated me as the chairman for the purpose of determining the cause

1 of the power failure and to undertake to find a remedy to prevent

such a recurrence in the future. I thin k it would be appropriate 

if, without objection, we include at this point the announcement in 

this regard which was made by Chairman Oren Harris. This also in-

* eludes the request of the Speaker of the Plouse that this special subcommittee be established.

(The announcement follows:)

Ann ou nc em en t of I nvest iga tion of Electric P ower F ai lu re , 

November 16, 1965

Congressman Oren Harris (D., Ark.), Chairman, House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, announced today tha t on request of the Speaker of 

the House, the Hon. John W. McCormack, he is establishing a Special Subcommittee of the Commerce Committee to investigate the sudden and unrealistic 

power fa ilure which recently blacked out the Northeastern sector of the United 

States.

He has designated the Hon. Walter Rogers (U.. Texas) to head up the investigation and named to served with him the Hon. Fred B. Rooney (D., Pa.), the

1
2 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Hon. John M. Murphy (D., N.Y.), the Hon. James T. Broyhill, (R., N.C.) and 

the Hon. James Harvey (R., Mich.).

The mystery that shrouds this unheralded, sudden, and drastic event which 

brought darkness and serious difficulties to millions of consumers requires a 

careful and thorough investigation by the committee.

This unexplained failure of electric power over such an extensive area involves 

several private and public utility companies and innumerable generating facilities throughout the area.

I am directing the subcommittee to determine the cause of the power failure 

and just who or what was responsible for the wide scale darkness cast on millions 

of consumers. The committee will thoroughly study and investigate whether 

or not it is the system under a general policy, or carelessness on the par t of any 

company or companies, or if there was jus t insufficient electric power throughout 

the area. If determined to be the latter—why should the entire northea st section 

of the country be so suddenly east into darkness?

The Federal Power Commission appropriately is inquiring into this event 

which brought near catastrophe by a failure which was thought to be impossible. 

No doubt an interim report will be forthcoming. However, a matter of this 

enormity also requires prompt attention by the Congress.

In addition to determining the cause and who, if anyone, is responsible, the 

subcommittee will undertake to find a remedy to prevent such an occurrence in 

the future—a recurrence on even a broader scale throughout the United States 

would indeed be fraught with danger. It may be that additional legislation will 

be necessary.

In view of the necessity of getting such a study underway, and the importance 

of the problem in this technological and highly scientific age, I am calling a 

meeting of the special subcommittee on Monday, November 29, 1965, in Washington, D.C., for the purpose of organizing the investigation and obtaining such 

staff with expertise in this field as necessary for this responsibility.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Let the Chair say further that it is my hope 

tha t we will be able to get into the entire electric picture in this 

country because I think it is definitely of grea t importance not only 

to the health and safety of this Nation and the civilian economy, but 

vitally important to the development of this country.

I thin k this situation in the Northeast pointed this up very vididly.

Chairman Swidler, we are pleased to have you here this morning, 

and I note you have your associates with you whom you may wish also 

to introduce for the record. I assume tha t you will discuss the findings of the Commission pursuan t to the investigation which we know 

tha t you have made at th e direction of the President. I would think, 

however, th at such discussion would not be limited to the Northeast 

failure but also take in some of the other incidents which we have 

had previous to this failure and the one ju st several days ago, or perhaps I should say the two, that occurred down in Texas.

Let me make this further observation, Mr. Chairman. I want to 

compliment you and the Federal Power Commission on the manner 

in which you undertook this investigation in the first instance and 

the excellent report th at you were able to file.

Of course there are many questions left unanswered, but I am sure 

tha t this is due primarily to the fact tha t the information is not 

readily available and there was such a limited time in which you could 

do it. I think it is an excellent report, and I thin k it would be well 

for everyone to acquaint themselves fully with it.

This morning you are scheduled as the first witness representing 

the Federal Power Commission. Perhaps the Chair would recognize 

you now to introduce your colleagues who are with you, Mr. Chairman.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 3

STATEMENT OF HON. JOSEPH C. SWIDLER, CHAIRMAN FEDERAL

POWER COMMISSION; ACCOMPANIED BY DAVID S. BLACK, VICE

CHAIRMAN: CHARLES R. ROSS, COMMISSIONER; LAWRENCE J.

O’CONNOR, COMMISSIONER; CARL E. BAGGE, COMMISSIONER;

AND F. STEWART BROWN, CHIEF, BUREAU OF POWER

Mr. Swidler. Mr. Chairman, Chairman Harris, members of the 

committee. The full Commission is here today. On my left, Vice 

Chairman Black and Commissioner Bagge, and on my right, Commissioner Ross and Commissioner O’Connor.

I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your kind opening statement.

I am glad to respond to your invitation to discuss the power failure 

which occurred in the Northeast on November 9 and 10, 1965. This 

incident, which has left a deep impression on the minds of the American people, has raised a general question of the reliability of power 

service through out the country. It is, of course, the broad national 

perspective in which this committee and the Congress are interested. 

I shall, therefore, attempt to discuss this power failure and other 

recent interruptions of power service in various parts of the country 

as aspects of the overall question of the national interest in encouraging the highest practicable degree of reliability of electric power 

supply, and from your opening statement, Mr. Rogers, this is apparently the way you want me to proceed.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, sir.

Mr. Swidler. I am sure that you all know that on the evening of 

November 9, within hours afte r the blackout first occurred, the Pres ident requested the Federal Power Commission to undertake a complete 

investigation and submit a report to him. The investigation was initiated the same evening and the report to which you have referred was 

submitted to the President on December 6.

Each member of this committee has been supplied with a copy. The 

Commission’s investigation is continuing, with the aid and assistance 

of representatives of all segments of the electric power industry. Undoubtedly the Commission will be issuing further reports from time 

to time as its investigation develops.

Mr. Chairman, I know th at the report is rather bulky. It contains 

a great deal of basic information and I am going to try to avoid repetition. I shall be referring to some of the exhibits in the report and 

it may be th at you would want to put a p art or all of it in the record 

of this proceeding.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I think, Mr. Chairman, tha t appropriate parts 

of it, if not the entire report, will be included in the record at the a pprop riate time.

(The repo rt referred to will be found in the subcommittee files.)

Mr. Swidler. Very good.

Without undue repetition of the facts set out in the report, I shall 

summarize the outstanding features of the Northeast blackout, as a 

background for consideration of the policy implications of the problem 

of electric service reliability.

The Northeast power failure was not the first which has occurred, 

by any means. On the contrary there have been occasional sendee
4 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

outages on every power system from the birth of th e industry. The 

record of the industry is, nevertheless, one of constantly improving 

performance. As th e industry has grown, service has improved, but 

there has also been a constantly increasing reliance upon electric power 

sendee which now has become an indispensable element of almost every 

economic activity.

In 1940, electricity accounted for only 12 percent of our Nation’s 

energy; in 1960 it accounted for 20 percent; and by 1980 it is expected 

to account for 30 percent. The industry is producing over a trillion 

kilowatt hours a year, over 5 times the 1940 production.

Beyond mere numbers is the fact th at because of its convenience and 

versatility, electricity is used for the most vital equipment in our metropolitan centers, the elevators, the subways, the electronic equipment, 

and the illumination, which are essential to metropolitan life. Electricity has also become an adjunct of other fuel supply systems, and 

without it many oil, gas, and coal powered facilities cannot function, 

and most gasoline pumps cannot operate. With out electricity a city 

goes dead.

What distinguished the Northeast power failure was tha t it affected 

the most heavily urbanized region of the country, that it involved a 

cascading of trouble from one area to another until 30 million people 

were affected, and tha t service was interrupted for extended periods, 

as much as 14 hours in some sections of New York City. A feature 

which was particula rly troublesome to the public was that it was not 

associated with any storm or other natural disaster and that the failure 

developed out of the operation of the power systems themselves.

The triggering moment of the North east blackout was 11 seconds 

afte r 5 :16 p.m. e.s.t. on November 9. As I go through these various 

power outages I am going to ask Mr. F. Stewart Brown, Chief of the 

Bureau of Power of the Commission, to indicate locations on the Federal Power Commission’s transmission map, which has been placed 

before you.

At the triggering moment the first of five 230-kilovolt lines, which 

extend to cities in Ontario from the Beck hydroelectric complex of 

the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario on the Niagara 

River, was opened by the action of a relay designed as backup protection ; that is to say, the line was electrically disconnected. The loss 

of this line caused the remaining four lines to open in rapid succession, 

all within less than 2.7 seconds.

The Beck hydroelectric complex was also interconnected across the 

Niagara River into the United States. The main plant of Ontario 

Hydro at Niagara, the Sir Adam Beck P lan t No. 2, which was then 

generating about 1,280 megawatts, or 1,280,000 kilowatts, continued to 

function. Of this amount, some 1,060 megawatts had been flowing 

northeast in the direction of Toronto over the lines which tripp ed out. 

In addition, there was a flow of power from the United States over 

the same lines in the order of approximately 470 megawatts. When 

these lines failed, the power reversal was therefore on the order of 

1,500 megawatts.

The Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario functions as a 

pa rt of an interconnected group of companies which are known as 

the CANUSE interconnection after the initials of the group name,
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 5

Canada-United States Eastern Interconnection. This group is in turn 

interconnected with the PJM pool (serving Pennsylvania, New Jersey, 

Maryland, and the District of Columbia) and with a larger interconnected group of companies known as the Interconnected Systems 

Group which now covers almost all the remainder of the United States 

east of the Rockies. The power failure wTas confined to the C ANUSE 

area and indeed covered most of it. The affected companies are shown 

on exhibit No. I- E of the December 6 report.

The power reversal of 1,500 megawatts created an enormous surge 

of power into the United States, which exceeded the capability of the 

transmission systems in various sections of the CANUSE area. As 

a result, the automatic circuit breakers operated to disconnect the lines, 

and the systems at the center of the CAN USE area broke up into four 

parts electrically isolated from each other and from systems to the 

south.

In addition, systems at the periphery of CANUSE, the Michigan 

systems together with the western portion of the Ontario system, and 

the systems in Maine and a part of New Hampshire, were separated 

from the interconnected group and continued to function.

This breakup of the CANUSE grid into four affected areas hap ­

pened within 4 seconds of the initial tripout in Canada. The first area 

was the Ontario system which was isolated from New York although 

a portion of it remained interconnected with the Michian companies. 

The Ontario system itself was divided into three parts. The second 

area was a portion of upstate New York near the hydroelectric plant 

of the Power Authority of the State of New York (PA SNY) at 

Massena on the St. Lawrence River, which was able throughout the 

crisis to continue service to adjacent loads, principally industrial.

Third was the area of western New York near Niagara and the Pennsylvania border, which blacked out as a result of the shutdown of generators by automatic protective devices reacting to the power surge. 

The remaining area included most of New England, downstate New 

York and most of the Hudson and Mohawk Valleys. In this last 

area, which we may call the eastern region, the impact of the power 

surge remained in doubt for several minutes.

The eastern region as a whole had been importing power from 

Niag ara prio r to the disturbance. After the initia l breakup of the 

CANU SE systems it found itself with a deficit in generation in re lation to its load. In addition to the loss of the power it had been importing at the outset of the disturbance this region had imposed upon 

it the loads in upstate New York where generators had tripp ed out. 

The generators in this area which were providing spinning reserve— 

that is, they were on the line but not generating at full capacity— 

attempted to respond to carry the added load but they were unable to 

increase their ou tput quickly enough and as a result frequency dropped 

and the generators were cut off one by one to prevent damage to the 

units. Some sections in New England were able to isolate themselves 

in time to avoid shutdown. These pockets of generation, which were 

principally in Connecticut, carried not inconsiderable loads, aggregating about 500 megawatts, and this capacity proved extremely useful 

late r in helping to restore service in the rest of the eastern region area.

The story is told in much greater detail in the December 6 report.
6 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

I have condensed it here in order to perm it focusing on the implications with which I am sure this committee is prim arily concerned.

As 1 have said, two of the troublesome features of the power failure 

are the manner in which it was triggered and the cascading of the 

failure from one area to another. The relay tha t tripped the line from 

Beck to Toronto which was the first to go out, was set in 1963 at a level 

tha t was compatible with loads th at were then being carried but which 

have since been increased. However, the relay operated not because 

the line was overloaded in the sense t ha t it could not safely carry a 

large r load, but rath er because the relay had been set to sense possible 

short circuits at considerable distances, serving in this respect as 

backup protection for other relays along the line. Thus, the very 

effort to provide an extra measure of protection for one type of hazard 

in itself led to another when the line was later loaded beyond the 

capacity level for which the relay had been set.

As to the chain of consequences which occurred within seconds and 

minutes as a result of the power reversal, one can only say t ha t none 

of the CANUSE systems affected was designed to withstand a power 

surge of this magnitude. It had never been envisioned that all five 

of the lines to Toronto might trip out while the Beck generators continued to function. If any of the engineers of the companies contemplated such an incident, it is not reflected in any of the system stability studies which were carried on by the parties.

As I believe you know, new stability studies are being carried on 

now under the sponsorship of the Federal Power Commission. The 

criteria of these studies are being established with the advice of a 

panel of technical experts called together by the Federal Power 

Commission.

I should now like to mention the problems which confronted the 

key operating personnel of the companies in southern New York and 

New England in the critical moments—some 4 to 12 minutes— 

between the onset of the disturbance at 5:16 p.m. and the collapse of 

service. In each system or power pool there is a dispatching or control room with operators on duty day and night. The control room 

of a large system is a very impressive facility.

There is a picture of one control room at page 16 in this report.

An important part of any large power system is the elaborate network of communication equipment the principal purpose of which is 

to make available, in the control room, instant knowledge of what is 

happening on the system. There are numerous panels, gages, meters, 

dials, and lights, in addition to a battery of telephones.

The decision as to what action to take in an emergency is in the 

hands of the chief system operator on duty at the time. Protective 

equipment may disconnect lines or shut down generators in a way 

which the system operator cannot influence, but he has some options 

and choices and, as we shall see, they can be crucial.

When it became apparent that the so-called eastern region (southern New York and New England ) was suffereing a serious deficit in 

generation, there were at least three choices presented to the system 

operators. One was to disconnect their own systems from the shortage area and thus isolate themselves from the trouble, provided they 

had enough generation to carry their own loads. This would, of
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 7

course, have increased the immediate problem of the other systems 

by reducing the size of the pool remaining available to make up the 

power deficit. Mutual assistance in times of trouble is of course one 

of the p rimary reasons why power systems interconnect and the operators in interconnected systems are trained in the tradition of helping 

each other, a tradition which has helped pull their systems through 

many an emergency in the past. They were understandably reluctant 

to pull the disconnecting switches.

* A second option was that of shedding load, tha t is to say, to cut 

off power service to some of tlieir own distribution operations. This 

is a fairly easy choice to make where it is possible to disconnect large 

industrial plants whose requirements may make the difference between 

load balance and shortage, loads such as the great aluminum complexes 

in the Tennessee Valley and in the Northwest.

There are few such large power-using industries in the eastern 

region, and none in New York City. Load shedding of the magnitude which would have been effective would have meant, in New York 

City, for example, turnin g off the power at least temporarily for many 

thousands of customers in order to keep the remainder of the system 

in operation. Thus, it was not an easy decision either.

The third alternative was to attem pt to hold both the interties and 

the local loads in the hope that the generators on the line would in ­

crease their output quickly enough to bring the system into balance and 

prevent any service disruption, or in the hope tha t the trouble wherever it might have been (and the system operators were not aware at 

the time of the nature of the trouble) would soon correct itself.

It is evident from the studies made by the Commission that despite 

the panoply of dials and lights some of the system operators were 

working in the dark. Some systems acted quickly enough to save 

some or all their service areas, but others first waited too long, and 

then attempted both load shedding and disconnection. In several 

control rooms operating personnel could not believe what their meters 

indicated.

Thus, at Boston one operator was tryin g to adjust the frequency

• meter, which had correctly changed scale, when his system blacked 

out. To ill ust rate: the meter may read from, say, 59 to 61 cycles when 

operating on one scale and the same dial would indicate from perhaps 

55 to 65 cycles when a red ligh t went on, so that the operator had to

» know which scale i t was on. The operator couldn’t believe that it

had moved to the larg er scale, and while he was checking his meters, 

his system collapsed.

In New York, and in most of the rest of the Northeast, effective 

action was not taken in time to prevent a service breakdown.

I do not mean by anything that I have said to imply any criticism 

of the system operators. They faced a very difficult task under trying 

conditions. It is now apparent th at the information available to them 

and their preparation for it was not adequate to enable them to make 

quick and informed decisions. The Commission’s December 6 report, 

(pp. 16-17) sums up the situation generally in what it says about one 

system :

Whethe r because of lack of cla rity in the control room ins trumentation or for 

other reasons, the system o perator did not make an immediate, clear-cut decision 

in this emergency. Availability of clear indications of system frequency togethe r
8 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

with standing instructions setting a minimum frequency at which the operator 

should open ties which were draining power from his system or shed some of 

his system’s loads might have prevented the collapse of the Consolidated Edison 

system.

Had the blackout been momentary, as are most service failures, or 

had service been restored in major metropolitan areas in a few minutes 

or perhaps even within an hour, I doubt tha t the impact on the public 

imagination would have been nearly so great. It was the delay in 

restoring service, and the consequent extension of the blackout to several or many hours, and in New York throughout the night, tha t has 

caused so much concern and alarm. Workers isolated in the dark in 

offices many floors above the street, the breakdown of public transportation which kept workers from their families, the more than onehalf million people stranded in the New York subways, the men and 

women who were immured for hours in elevators stalled in their 

shafts—for all of them it was an unforgettable experience which the 

rest of the Nation shared vicariously. It therefore becomes important 

to consider the problems of restoration of service afte r a power failure.

Again New York City serves as the best illustration, because here 

the problems of restoration were the greatest. I believe it illustrates 

practically every problem with which a power system can be confronted in an emergency of this kind. In the first place, it is very big 

and size alone presents a problem. The service area of Consolidated 

Edison is divided into 42 separate districts (called “networks” by the 

company).

Each district is served from a single substation, and some of the substations serve several districts. The entire system could not be energized simultaneously even if 42 crews were available. Where substations service several districts, they can only be p ut on one at a time 

as generation is tailored to the startin g load.

One of the biggest problems Consolidated Edison had to face was 

in the star tup of its steamplants. In order to sta rt a steamplant 

electricity is needed to run the pumps for the boiler feed-water, the coal 

pulverizing equipment, and other auxiliaries. This requires either 

outside power or an auxiliary power supply at the station. Consolidated Edison had no auxiliary power supply equipment. It had never 

assumed or planned for simultaneous loss of its generating stations 

and disconnection from the CANUSE and PJM systems.

It was therefore impossible to star t some of the steamplants, except 

in a series extending from the Greenwood substation which was supplied from the PJM pool and from the Arthu r K ill Pla nt on Staten 

Island (which stayed in operation throughout the night and, incidentally, kept Staten Island and a portion of Brooklyn in service) 

and later to start at the other end of the system when power was 

brought in from the north over interconnections.

I might add also tha t the restoration problems were complicated 

because three major generation units, including the company’s larg ­

est, were seriously damaged by the shutdown. A special problem 

arose for Consolidated Edison as the operator of the world’s largest 

network of underground transmission lines because such lines have 

relatively slow’ startup characteristics.

Finally, unlike the CANUSE system in general which has some 25 

percent hydro capacity, Consolidated Edison has no hydroplants. It
NORT HEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 9

has been granted a license for a pumped storage plan t on the Hudson 

River, but th e p lant has not yet been constructed. Hydro capacity is 

very nearly self-starting at all times and usually needs no auxiliary 

power to restart. Also, it picks up load very quickly and thus is much 

more valuable as spinning reserve than large steam units which can 

come on the line only in stages. In the latter, more steam becomes 

available only as additional fuel is drawn in.

Considering the foregoing problems, coupled with the additional 

difficulties in transporting crews and materials through a city whose 

life had been disrupted, one can envision th e enormous magnitude of 

the restoration challenge. The other systems involved were able to 

restore service in periods varying from a few minutes to a few hours 

depending on the various factors I have mentioned relating to system 

startup problems. Kor Consolidated Edison it took longer.

One of the causes for the cascading of the power failure was the 

problem of system instability.

Mr. Chairman, if this committee is going to conduct investigations 

in depth of the power reliability problem, you will be hearing a great 

deal about system stability. This is a very complex and technical 

concept, and I might also say a very dull one to nonengineers, and I 

am n ot equipped to explain it with precision, but I thin k I can give 

you a layman’s understanding of what the engineers mean. At any 

rate, I shall venture where the engineers fear to tread.

As you know, power service in this country is almost universally 

by alternating current, at a frequency of 60 cycles per second. When 

we speak of alternating current we are talking about the pulsing of 

the current back and forth. The series of pulsations transmits energy 

at the speed of light, 186,000 miles per second. A frequency of 60 

cycles per second means tha t there are 60 plus and minus pulses per 

second or 3,600 complete cycles per minute. These pulses are created 

at the generating station by the revolutions of the generator’s magnetic poles. The magic number for generator revolutions is, therefore, 3,600 per minute. It is possible to have slower speeds by rearrangement of the poles but the generators must pulse together.

When all the interconnected generators are operating in this coordinated way they are said to be operating in synchronism or in 

parallel and the system is said to be stable. If loads are suddenly 

increased or decreased the speed of generators will change momentarily until they adju st to the new loading. Where the load variations 

are small in relationship to the size of the interconnected system the 

effect upon frequency is so small as to be negligible. In an interconnected system, the generators will respond to load surges and in 

effect attem pt to assist in restoring stability anywhere on the system 

within the limits of capacity and of intervening interconnections.

When these surges are of unusually large magnitude in relation 

to the strength of the system, a great strain may be placed on the network to keep the frequency of generators in various areas of the interconnected network in synchronism and thus keep the system in a 

stable operating condition. When the load change is well beyond 

tlie generating capacity of the interconnected system, considering 

spinning reserve capacity and transmission line limitations, the drop 

in frequency will be so marked as to threaten the generating units
10 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

with serious damage and in such cases automatic equipment will take 

them off the line.

The public awareness of the problem of system outage has been 

heightened by two other outages of substantial proportions which have 

occurred since November 9. The first took place in an area centering 

in El Paso, Tex., on December 2. The city of El Paso was without 

service as were portions of Mexico across the international boundary.

The El Paso system has responsibility for part of the service across 

the international line. The outage spread to Las Cruces, Alamogordo, 

and Deming, N. Mex.; to Van Horn, Tex.; and to other points including the White Sands Missile Test Center. The outage of the 

entire plan t was caused by the failure of an alternate regulator to 

control the pressure at which natural gas used for boiler fuel entered 

the boilers of the Newman station of the El Paso Electric Co. There 

are two such regulators which are intended to be used interchangeably. 

Eit her one is adequate.

When one regulator was taken out of service, the fuel supply was 

switched to the alternate regulator which had not been used or cleaned 

for months. This alternate regulator proved to be clogged with accumulated deposits of oily liquids from the natural gasline.

The El Paso Electric Co. had designed its system so that it could lose 

the output of its largest generating unit with only a limited loss of 

service to its consumers based on a manual load shedding program. 

Unfo rtunately, both of its largest units were tied into the single 

clogged regula tor which caused a drop in capacity beyond the ability 

of the system to take.

When the entire Newman plan t w’ent out, two other units were 

tripped out manually to prevent damage due to overloading and the 

tieline to New Mexico Public Service Co. opened, because of system 

instability. Service was completely restored in little more than 2 

hours, in pa rt through the assistance of interconnections with other 

systems. Here we have an illustration of the reverse of the problem 

in New York City and in this Northeast power failure in general, 

since the El Paso system disturbance was initiated by a fault in the 

fuel supply to the generating plant, rath er than in the transmission 

system.

December 6, the day tha t I presented to the President the report 

on the Northeast power failure, another power failure took place, this 

one on the system of the Gulf States U tilities Co. It was caused by a 

short circuit in the supervisory remote controls, which served to open 

the circuit breakers, thereby disconnecting a transmission line in 

Texas near the Louisiana boundary and isolating the Sabine generating station from p art of its load.

Automatic equipment properly reduced generation around the 

particu lar isolated plant, and part of the load which was dropped was 

picked up by the Nelson generating station in Louisiana through the 

remaining transmission system. Some Texas load was shed when the 

system frequency dropped below 56 cycles per second, but service was 

completely restored within 26 minutes, by connecting the darkened 

portion of the Gulf States system to the system of Houston Lighting 

& Power Co.

One recent outage, which took place almost a year ago, on Janu ary 

28, 1965, has many points in common with the Northeast blackout.
NORTHEA ST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 11

I t covered mo st o f Io wa and par ts of five o ther S tates in th e Midwest. 

I t affected a la rg er are a th an the N or thea st o uta ge b ut o nly ap pr ox ima tely 2 millio n people. Service was c omp lete ly res tor ed wi thin 2 ^ 

hours. Th e Midw est outag e was trig ge red by a loose con nection in 

a prote cti ve rel ay circuit at th e Ar my Co rps of En gi ne ers’ F o rt 

Ra nd all po we rplan t, in South Da kota. Th e rel ay con nection accid ental ly sepa rated du ring ma intenance an d as a resu lt the F o rt 

Ra nd all ge ne ratin g sta tio n bus was isolated, dr op ping six ge ne rator s 

(f or a to ta l of 240 me gawa tts of gene ratio n) off the line. Th is loss 

of ge ne ratin g capacit y threw an abnorm al load on othe r sources of 

supply, an d caused the same g enera l type o f freque ncy v ariatio ns a nd 

flow re versa ls that occ urred in th e Northe ast .

I t may be a na tu ra l question to ask in ligh t of these system di sturban ces wh eth er power pools make good sense or w hether it would 

be be tte r to reve rt to isolated pl an ts or systems. Th e ans wer, I believe, is th at a power pool plan ne d an d opera ted on a un itar y basis 

provide s be tte r an d mo re rel iab le serv ice th an separate systems an d 

th at it ma kes possible f ar low er cost.

Po we r pools have been develop ed in th is coun try , an d throug ho ut 

the wo rld , fo r the sou ndest reasons of service imp rovement as well as 

cost red uction. Th ey are vi ta l to low-cost energ y supp ly an d are 

equ ally vital, in my jud gm ent, to the qu ality of service which th is 

coun try needs and demand s. Isolated ele ctric systems are un thinka ble 

in a mo der n in du stria l economy. A suspension bridg e in the Nor th ­

west colla pse d some y ears ago because of a problem of harm onic v ib ra ­

tio n, which is a form o f i nstability. We d id not stop b uilding b ridges . 

We lea rned fro m th at experie nce an d now we bu ild b etter bridge s.

Th e lesson of the N or thea st power failu re is that we must str en gthe n 

ou r pow er gr ids so th at they ca n hold together and co ntinue service in 

any fore seeable emergency.

In the Com mis sion’s repo rt to the Pr es id en t we pointed ou t th at 

th e Can use system is no t a true power pool because it ha s no t been 

plan ne d as a un it an d is no t fully integrated . On the co ntrary, it 

consists of ma ny en tities (and one sma ll pool with in the interc onnectio n) which hav e plan ne d and bu ilt t hei r systems ind ependentl y an d 

have no t y et even establishe d a cen tra l s taff f or co ord ina tio n of system 

plan ning .

As we expla in in the repo rt, th e Canus e inte rco nnection is i n a t ra n ­

sition al sta ge fro m iso lated system s to an integr ated p ower pool. We 

po int out several inc ide nts o f lo ad surg es in ot he r p ar ts of th e country 

of the same general orde r of mag nitud e as th at which occurred at 

Niaga ra. Th ey w ere accommod ated w ith in th e pow er pools an d in te rcon nected network s with n o widesprea d serv ice bre akd ow ns an d wi th 

voltage variatio ns so small as h ar dl y to cause a flic ker of l igh ts.

On Novem ber 9 a sud den an d hea vy dema nd was placed on the 

Consolidated Ed iso n system by its inte rco nnections w ith consequences 

which it could no t ha nd le and which res ult ed in the bre akdown of 

service. On othe r occasions, however, when it h as h ad trou ble wi thin 

its own system, its interco nnection s h ave enable d it to co ntinue service 

with ou t a pause.

Ev en to da y t he in tercon nec tions a re essential to conti nu ity of service 

while ge ne rator s are b ein g repaire d. Im ag ine, if you can, the pl ig ht
12 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

of a major metropolitan center which was not heavily interconnected 

if it should have generator troubles beyond its capacity to handle. 

Restoring service over overhead transmission lines is a relatively 

simple matter, requiring minutes or days at the most, as compared 

with repa iring major items of generating equipment, a task which 

may take many months.

Power pooling also greatly increases flexibility in the location of 

generating stations. For one example, power networks permit generatin g plants to be located at a distance from heavily populated areas 

and thus to minimize the growing air pollution problem of our metropolitan areas. Also, with the enhanced ability to use large plan ts and 

to locate them with relative flexibility, power pools enable utilities to 

take advantage of the economies of scale in the construction and operation of steamplants and in the purchase and transportation of fuel for 

these plants. This is especially true for nuclear powerplants where 

smaller systems otherwise could not utilize this new source of power 

because of the relatively high cost of constructing and operating small 

nuclear plants as contrasted with large ones.

I hope I have made clear, Mr. Chairman, the distinction between 

equipment outage and service outage. Equipment outages are to be 

expected occasionally in the operation of any mechanical equipment 

under severe service conditions. A service outage results not because 

equipment has failed or an operator has committed an error, at least 

not necessarily, but because in overall system design insufficient account has been taken of the possibility of such failures and errors.

I do not mean to say service outages cannot be reduced—I think 

they can and should be—but only that in system planning it is customary to make severe assumptions as to foreseeable equipment outages and to plan on enough reserve capability to continue service despite such outages. The basic theory of a power pool is tha t by spreading the risks among a large number of units and by providing a number of transmission lines to each load area, the usefulness of these 

reserves can be enhanced and their costs reduced to a minimum.

Before I discuss the question of wh at this Nation has a rig ht to expect from the electric power industry, perhaps I should say a word 

about the natu re of the industry itself. It is an industry of enormous 

size and complexity. So far as I am aware, the National Power Survey, which the Commission published last year in two volumes, was 

the first effort at a comprehensive description of the natu re of the 

industry and how it functions. The industry consists of 3,600 separate 

units divided into 4 ownership segments: Federal systems, which sell 

only at wholesale or to large industries; cooperative systems, which 

are generating an increasing share of their aggregate requirements 

but which still purchase the major share of their wholesale needs from 

Federal agencies and private companies; municipal and other public 

systems, some 2,000 in number, which also generate only a part of their 

aggregate requirements and buy the rest from Federal and private 

systems; and, finally, some 400 or 500 private or investor-owned systems which account for some 75 or 80 percent of the totals for the industry, whether measured in terms of revenue, capacity, investment, 

or number of customers. The 100 largest private systems account for 

almost 90 percent of the generation of the private segment of the industry, and even this is a very large number.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILU RE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 13

The Nation’s pluralistic power supply system has served the country well. The competition by example between the segments of an 

inherently monopolistic industry on the whole has been a healthy 

stimulus for bette r performance by all. Nevertheless this Nation’s 

uniquely diverse and segmented system of power supply raises special 

problems in attaining the high degree of coordination needed in order 

to achieve the most reliable service at the lowest cost consistent with 

such service.

» In effect there are in this country’s complex of power supply prob ­

lems some 3,600 separate centers of decision. Each entity makes its 

own decisions as to whether, when, and how to install capacity or to 

interconnect with its neighbors subject, of course, to adequacy of legal

- authority and the ability to raise money.

Interconnection policy varies widely from company to company 

and from area to area. Some of the companies are very large and in 

themselves constitute substantial power pools. Some individual companies operate systems as large as the entire electric systems of several 

industrialized countries. Some companies are partn ers in highly developed power pools which plan system additions on a unitary basis 

with a view to the best possible service and lowest cost for all members 

of the pool. In other cases there is a dearth of joint planning. Characteristically, in such cases interconnections are light and are used primarily for emergencies or for the occasional exchange of economy 

energy.

With this enormous institutional complication and a staggering 

number of entities there is a wide range in management effectiveness. 

Some entities are technologically alert and highly effective; others 

are less advanced. I believe tha t the power pools tend to elevate 

management standards on the technological level because each profits 

from the resources and experience of the others.

On the other hand, in a power pool (or even, perhaps especially, 

in a group of loosely interconnected systems) each system is married 

to the others and a system weakness in one may work injur y to all.

The one clear lesson of the blackout is tha t there is a profound 

« national interest in this Nation’s system of electric power supply.

I believe it is a credit to the initiative, technological mastery and public spirit of the managements of these 3,600 systems th at we can say 

tha t in this country we have on the whole what is probably the most

- advanced and most reliable power system in the world.

The question is not whether they are providing good service. I 

believe they are providing 99.99-plus percent service, and tha t power 

system managements are universally concerned with improving tha t 

service from day to day and year to year. The question is whether 

in this country, which lias made itself dependent to such a high degree upon continuity of power supply, the present standards are 

sufficiently high, and whether there is anything which the Congress 

can usefully do without impairing management initiative to assure an 

even higher degree of dependability and reliability of service.

The role of the Federal Government comes into sharper focus when 

we realize tha t the overriding technological facts of the industry 

mean tha t each company depends not only on itself but on its 

brothers over whom it may not have any control.

66 -5 77 — 66------ 2
14 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

In this context I think it is apparent tha t State lines have little 

bearing on the question of the national interest. The exended power 

outage in New York City happened to originate from an out-ofState source, but it would present the same hazard to the national 

interest if the interconnections were all within the State of New 

York.

As an aid to the committee in considering the possibility of contrib utin g to the improvement of power supply in this country by 

legislative means, it may be helpful to summarize the present 

reach of the Federal Power Act.

Title I of the act provides only for the licensing of all major hydroelectric plants, except those built by the Federal Government. Titles 

II and II I apply generally to the nonpublic sectors of the industry 

engaged in interstate commerce, other than those engaged exclusively 

in retail distribution operations, and provides for extensive economic 

regulation of the private sector of the industry both with respect to 

rates and systems of accounts.

There is, however, no licensing system, and no approval is required 

for generating or transmission facilities. Congress has made no 

express gran t of authority with respect to reliability of service, and 

the Commission has never undertaken to assert, jurisdiction in this 

field.

With respect to the development of power pools, the Commission's 

authority on its own initiative is limited to the encouragement of 

voluntary pooling among the companies for the purpose of assuring 

an abundant and economical supply of electric energy. This authority the Commission in the last few years has attempted to implement through its national power survey program in cooperation with 

the various segments of the. industry.

It is apparent tha t if the Congress should desire th at the Federal 

Power Commission be an effective instrum ent in helping to improve 

the quality and the reliability of service throughout the country, 

additional legislation will be necessary. I might add tha t to undertake any effective program the Commission would need additional 

funds and staff.

The Commission is discussing among its members various legislative possibilities in the light of the interest of the President and of 

the Commerce Committees of both Houses. It is giving to this subject the careful scrutiny which its importance deserves, and does not 

yet have any specific legislative proposal to put before you.

Inasmuch, Mr. Chairman, as this is probably my last opportunity 

as Chairman of the Commission to present my own views on possible 

legislation to this committee, I shall do so a t this time. With greatest deference to the committee, I would suggest tha t legislation to 

meet the problems in this field be drafted around the following considerations :

(1) There is a great and paramount national interest in continuity 

and reliability of bulk power supply. I contrast this with the distribution of power in the distribution systems. All of the interrup ­

tions that I have discussed involve bulk power system disturbances.

(2) Virtually the entire industry is interconnected across State 

lines and the question of reliability of bulk power supply is beyond
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 15

the reach of State agencies. In any case, there is a national interest 

in the reliab ility of service in centers of population, industry, and 

defense installations, irrespective of whether the power is transmitted 

across State lines.

(3) The electric power industry, including all of the four segments, constitutes a g reat reservoir of management talent, initiative, 

and competence. Any legislation should leave ujjbon the shoulders of 

management the prim ary responsibility M reliability of power

„ supply. .

(4) There would appear to be scope, without undermining the responsibility of utility managements, to opnfer upon the Federal 

Power Commission a role in prescribing minimum standards for sys-

„ tern design and operation and for intersystem coordination, and for

assuring adherence to such standards. Such a role I believe could 

be established in a way which would stimulate and encourage management and elevate the goals of the industry.

(5) The long-term interest of the Un ited States is in strengthening 

of the power networks and in the full coordination of the emerging 

pools for bulk power supply. Congress should consider ways to 

facilitate the formation and operation of fully coordinated power 

pools, and to encourage participation by all segments of the industry.

(6) The national interest in reliability of bulk power supply does 

not depend on the nature of the entity which happens to own the 

facilities. Therefore, any legislation designed to assure reliability 

of bulk power supply should cover all entities in the various segments of the industry which are involved in such supply.

This does not necessarily mean th at these entities would all be subject to economic regulation. I would assume t hat the scope of legislation with respect to bulk power supply would be drafted with 

reliability of service as the controlling criterion.

I am deeply appreciative of this opportunity to a ppear before you. 

I am accompanied here by members of the staff who are more familiar 

with the technical aspects of the power outage problem than I am. 

Members of the Commission, any of us will be glad to answer any

• questions which you may wish to address to us.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for a very 

straightforw ard and a very concise statement, considering the items 

involved and the very complexity of them.

Before we proceed with the questioning, do any of the other members of the Commission have any statements they would like to 

make ?

Mr. O'Connor. Yes, Mr. Chairman.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Commissioner O’Connor.

Mr. O’Connor. I would like to say, that while I generally concur 

with the statements tha t Chairman Swidler made, I take exception 

to recommendations (2) and (4). At this time I haven’t had enough 

familiarity with the reports, which are still in the process of assembling the data, to determine whether I would feel tha t legislation of 

the order proposed in items (2) and (4) would be in the best interest 

of the country.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Commissioner O’Connor.

Do any of the other members care to make a statement at this time ?
16 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE'— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

If not, we will proceed with, the questions and the Chair would 

point out that we have present with us th is morning the distinguished 

chairman of the full Committee on Intersta te and Foreign Commerce, 

an ex officio member of all subzcommittees. The Chair recognizes him 

first for questioning. Mr. Harris.

Mr. Harris. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman Swidler, I want to join in complimenting you and the 

Commission for your very fine statements on this highly technical 

and complicated problem. *

Mr. Swidler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. H arris. I assume this is a statement which the entire Commission subscribes to until you get to the last two pages, the six numbered paragraphs ? w Mr. Swidler. Tha t is righ t, sir.

Mr. H arris. And to fu rthe r clarify the statement of Mr. O’Connor 

a moment ago, did 1 understand that your statement on page 28, at 

the bottom of the page, and the succeeding pages was intended to be 

your own views ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Harris. And not the views of the Commission in a formal 

recommendation ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir. This is a statement of my own views and 

not necessarily the way the other members of the Commission would 

phrase their own position.

Mr. Harris. That is the way I had interpreted it because you 

did say th at in view of your situation, which I can very well understand, you said tha t you would, “present my own views on possible 

legislation.”

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Harris. Personally, I am glad to have your views for the 

record of this committee and for its futu re consideration.

In view of the statement, let me a t this time also compliment you 

on the outstanding service t hat you have performed and the leadership tha t you have provided as Chairm an of the Federal Power 

Commission durin g these years tha t you have labored as a member *

of tha t most important Commission of our Federal Government.

Mr. Swidler. Thank you very much.

Mr. Harris. I know it has been a challenging experience for you.

It is so with all members of this great Commission, and I know it «»

is not only complicated but highly controversial in respect to many 

of the issues th at come before you. Without indicating t ha t I would 

share the same views on everything tha t was accomplished and decided there, and I am sure you do not even as Chairman and the 

others as members of the Commission, because, like it is in so many 

other cases under our system, compromise often is necessary in order 

to perform service, I should like to say I am sure that there are many 

who feel as I do; they regret to see you leave the Commission, in 

view of your long experience in this field, and what you have accomplished with your service there and the familiarity with the problems that you have.

Of course we assure you tha t you carry with you our best wishes 

in your future endeavors.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 17

Mr. Swidler. I want to say not only for myself but, I am sure, for 

the entire Commission, th at we are very grateful for your appraisal 

of the work that we have done.

Mr. Harris. This points up, I think, in a vivid way probably 

more so than I have observed in a long time, the complete dependence 

of the American people on the electric power industry. I thin k it 

should point up in the minds of everybody the necessity of resolving 

some of the highly controversial phases of the industry tha t have 

been quite apparent throughout my service in the Congress of the 

United States.

I do not know of any industry where there has been greater competitive realization not only from a personal viewpoint and actual 

experience of individuals, but from a policy matter insofar as this 

country is concerned. It is entirely possible we are about to reach 

the point that, regardless of the bitterness tha t has gone on, the 

infighting on policy matters between certain parties in the industry 

itself, the American people are going to be more interested in the 

service performed as such than they are with some feud that is 

going on between certain individuals. I think we have done a commendable thing over the years in bringing service to the people in 

this country even within this scope of competitive controversy that 

has gone on so long.

I don’t know whether it is best to have a national grid system 

or not. I assume you feel very strongly tha t a national grid system 

is necessary and we have long since reached tha t stage where we 

should have it.

Am I correctly construing your views?

Mr. Swidler. Mr. Chairman, when you speak of a national grid 

system, you are using a term which is variously understood. I for 

one have not recommended and do not now recommend th at the Federal Government, for example, build an overriding system of tra nsmission lines which would tie in the various sections of the country. 

That is the sense in which the term “national grid” is sometimes used.

Mr. H arris. I did not so intend in my question.

Mr. Swidler. Yes. I just wanted to be sure tha t my answer was 

clear. I do strongly believe in the benefits of interconnection and 

power pooling. In order to intertie across regional lines, I think 

first it is necessary that the individual systems be strengthened so 

tha t in effect the pools grow from within and then interconnect with 

each other.

I think t hat there should be, and there has indeed been through the 

years, a growth and development of these power pools. They have 

become more numerous. They have become larger. They have 

become more closely integrated.

But it is a development tha t has taken place like Topsy. There 

are enormous variations from company to company, from region to 

region, from one interconnected group of companies to another. 

Some of the interconnections are on a highly integrated basis so that 

within each pool the companies have virtually the same standards 

as though all of the members of the pool were under common ownership—as though it were all one company. In others the interconnections have not been carried out with the same effort to achieve 

that concept of unitary operation and un itary design.
18 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

I think that these pools should be fostered to the extent tha t they 

are economically justified; and that this is not a matter of a priori 

decision tha t a pool is always the right thing or tha t any interconnection which may be proposed should be built, but rath er a matter 

of analyzing the power supply problem in each area with a view 

to strengthening the systems, improving reliability of service, and 

reducing the cost of service. I thin k tha t this will lead to a great 

development of power pools and to tying many of the pools together.

Mr. Harris. Hasn’t the Federal Power Commission proposed, en- „

couraged, urged, and recommended interconnected systems for the 

last many years, even long before you or any of you came to the 

Commission ?

Mr. Swidlf.r. The Federal Power Commission has been operating 

under a statute which gives the authority to encourage voluntary 

interconnections, and until 4 years ago that authority was employed 

only to make studies of the desirability of particular interconnecting lines and not really system studies.

In the last 4 years we have tried to operate on a broader basis and 

encourage all of the elements of the industry to work together in 

building and strengthening their power pools.

Mr. Harris. If I remember correctly, even back in the early days 

of the Commission, or certainly soon thereafter, within a relatively 

short time there came the general policy of encouragement which 

has been rather consistent through these years, though there has 

been naturally some shifting of thinking in the Commission from 

time to time, but, basically I think tha t has been the general trend.

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Harris. Isn ’t tha t based on the fact tha t by interconnecting 

power pools you can get a much higher load factor that can be 

utilized in all of the power areas or power productive facilities?

Mr. Swidlf.r. It is based on that as one of the principal factors, 

but there are manv benefits to power pooling and all of them have 

to be evaluated. I mentioned some others. By power pooling it is 

possible to use more efficient units in an industry where costs go 

down with scale. It is possible to have greater flexibility in the •

timing and staggering of these units. It is possible to locate the 

units where you have greater advantages in fuel supply or in 

water supply for steam purposes, and it is also possible greatly to 

reduce the possibilities of outage by the spreading of the risk among 

the parties in a whole network, provided it is built with a view to 

enabling each p art of the pool to contribute to the solution of emergencies in other parts, so that, while improvement in load factor 

was perhaps the first of the advantages to be recognized, now the 

industry sees many, many advantages, and power pooling—the word 

is used r ath er loosely—power interconnections, I should say, are far 

advanced. There are few companies operating today in complete 

isolation.

Mr. Harris. You presented then the other side of the coin when 

you said that, “each system is married to the others and a system 

weakness in one may work injury to all” ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Harris. It seems to me th at there is the crux of this inquiry 

and study.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 19

Mr. Swidler. That is a part.

Mr. Harris. It seems to me that this presents a problem with which 

this committee along with your Commission and those in the industry 

have to come to grips and try to find out what should be done because 

obviously i f you are going to have innumerable weak systems along 

■with the others without some way of overcoming it, I would question 

the trend of interconnecting all of these systems together.

As a matter of fact, I thought from what I had been told th at when 

one part of a system becomes overloaded, that system then can automatically, with whatever devices or equipment there is on it, go out 

without knocking out every other system that is interconnected with 

it. If that can’t be done, we are going to subject ourselves to a system 

tha t is going to be questionable, No. 1. No. 2, it is going to produce 

fear in the minds of people, having people living under stress and 

strain throughout, and then even more important, we are going to be 

subjected to sabotage in a case of emergency where this country gets 

involved.

I think those are the problems tha t are going to have to be dealt 

with, together with whatever arrangement we have with Canada, as 

an example, with different lines going across there, if one could knock 

one of them out, knock them all out, and then knock those five out 

because they are across the boundaries of the country into another 

country, and then knock out a system th at is serving—what was it? 

Seventy million people?

Mr. Swidler. 30 million, sir.

Mr. Harris. 30 million people. Tha t is a lot of people at that.

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Harris. So it seems to me that these questions, as the Chairman 

said a moment ago, are very important and we are going to have to 

look beyond the problems th at you presented here and the work t hat 

your Commission did in tryi ng to smoke this m atter out and find out 

where the trouble was. That is another thing I could not understand. 

I thought that just by looking at boards and so forth, when it happens, 

you immediately locate where the trouble is. I know in some utilities 

tha t is true. I have seen then. Here we went for days and days before we could ever find out where the trouble developed.

Mr. Rogers said you couldn’t see the board—I guess tha t is right— 

when all the power went out and the lights -went off. I guess they 

forgot the ir flashlights.

Mr. Swidler. Some did have to use temporary light.

Mr. Harris. It raised many questions, and I do have many things 

in my mind in more detail, but I am sure the other members of the 

committee want to ask you about some of these. I just wanted to 

point up some of the things I had in my mind about it and from -what 

little I know about it, it is very involved with highly technical problems, and I am sure the committee does w ant to go into it in depth.

The American people are entitled to a development of this problem 

and it is going to take some time to do it, in my judgment. I want 

to thank you and the other members of the Commission for your 

devoted attention to the problem and your efforts. I know the committee will appreciate all th e assistance th at the Commission is going 

to give in this study.
20 NORT HEAS T POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 

North Carolina, Mr. Broyhill.

Mr. Broyhill. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I am very interested in your report this morning 

and was also interested in reading the report tha t you submitted to 

the President on December 6. It is interesting reading and it certainly helped me in coming up with a better understanding of some of 

the reasons behind the power failure. One thing tha t impressed me 

this morning, in your statement, was that, among others, you stated 

tha t the operating personnel did not have the proper procedures or 

instructions to deal with a problem of this magnitude, and also th at 

there was not sufficient planning, I thin k you said, for simultaneous 

loss of generating stations as well as at any time that there is disconnection from other systems.

This seems to be a rather serious—I don’t want to call it a charge, 

but at least a statement tha t these various systems or companies or 

whoever was providing the transmission of the power did not have 

these procedures in effect.

I wonder if the Commission is doing anything at this time to see 

tha t proper procedures are p ut into effect and are written and carried 

out.

Do you have any authority to do this and if you do not, what are 

you doing?

Mr. Swidler. Mr. Broyhill, if I may comment first on the problem 

of these companies, this was of course the largest blackout in history, 

and I think none of the companies w’ould claim to have been prepared 

for it. I thin k tha t it has added a new dimension to their thinking 

and to their preparations for the future, and I am sure that every 

company in the Canuse interconnection is reviewing its own trainin g 

procedures and its own operating instructions to reassure itself tha t 

this could not happen again. It sometimes takes a shock like this to 

awaken people. So far as our own activities are concerned, we are 

working with all of the companies in the area and we have brought 

together representatives of these companies and a panel of experts 

who are developing new and more stringent criteria for these stability 

evaluations, and those will be, and I believe they are now being, carried 

on with the use of the computer facilities of one of the major equipment manufacturers. So far as a repetition of this precise pattern 

is concerned, I think t hat the wheels are in motion which would prevent that, but this not to say tha t trouble could not come in some 

other unexpected way.

We are working with the companies in the area, with, of course, 

what little manpower and what little authority we have, but we are 

getting a great deal of voluntary cooperation.

The question is whether this situation, where "we are doing the best 

we can under our limitations, working without authority, and without an ample staff, and working in only one area, is an adequate longterm solution, to a national problem. I have suggested, Mr. Broyhill, 

my own view th at it is not, and that the Commission could properly 

be given authority to prescribe some minimum standards and to assure 

adherence to those standards.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILU RE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 21

I don’t think that this would interfere with the assumption of 

management responsibility. On the contrary, it seems to me that 

we ought to examine their stability studies. We have never seen 

them before, Mr. Broyhill. They are not required to be filed with us 

and they weren’t filed with us. We should know what assumptions 

they are making in their stability studies and we should have the 

resources to evaluate such assumptions.

We should be able to establish, as I say, minimum criteria. We 

should know what they are doing. I don’t want to try to spell out the 

details. What I am trying to convey to you is th at pursuant to the 

President’s request we have conducted this investigation and are 

making recommendations, and under such authority as we have we are 

doing whatever we can, but to my mind, in the nature of things, this 

cannot be enough with present limitations of legislation, manpower, 

and money.

Mr. Broyhill. You do say that the companies are voluntarily cooperating 100 percent?

Mr. Swidler. I think in the Canuse area we are receiving complete 

cooperation, and this includes the cooperation of the Ontario HydroElectric Commission which has a member on the panel and also of the 

National Energy Board of Canada, which is roughly the counterpart 

of the Federal Power Commission, and which is also represented by 

an observer at the sessions of this group.

Mr. Broyhill. Getting back to the question th at was developed by 

Chairman Harris, I just want to ask for inform ation this one final 

question and let some others have some time here.

In regard to a national power pool, would you visualize that this 

would develop by Federal planning or planned by the FPC, by 

issuing orders to the various entities, or -would you visualize tha t it 

would develop internally, tha t is, with the managements of each of 

these groups making th eir own decisions with the advice of the Commission?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t have language which perhaps would answer 

your question with precision, but I think that the plans should be 

developed under the scrutiny of the Federal Power Commission. I 

don’t thin k that this Commission should take over the planning 

responsibilities of the industry as a whole. This isn’t to say that we 

shouldn’t be in a position perhaps to jog this company or that one, but 

the grea t reservoirs of technical ability, the great reservoirs of scientific knowledge, of knowledge of system operations, are in these companies and we could not possibly duplicate it. We shouldn’t try. 

Our role should be rather that of an overseeing agency, of setting 

standards and assuring compliance, and of scrutinizing what these 

companies are doing, of setting goals, of trying to bring the parties 

within the industry together, bu t I don’t visualize, Mr. Broyhill, tha t 

we would establish in the Federal Power Commission a design and 

planning organization and say th at we will take on the planning functions for the ind ustry ; no, sir.

Mr. Broyhill. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Rooney.

Mr. Rooney. I too would like to compliment the distinguished 

Chairman of the F PC and the members of the Commission for a very
22 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

exhaust ive an d com plete stu dy of the Northea st pow er failu re. Th e 

week aft er I was appo int ed by the ch air ma n of our com mittee to in ­

vestigate the cause or causes of th is bla ckout I vis ited Eu ro pe an d I 

too k it upon my self in the five countries t h at I vis ite d to discuss with 

the top power officials in those cou ntries th e sim ila r pro ble m—could 

it or could it not occ ur in Europ e.

I would like to ask the d isting uis hed Cha irm an wh eth er or n ot you 

th in k an overa ll integrated gr id system no t only wi thin th e United 

State s, bu t an integr ated system which would includ e the en tire 

no rth an d central par t of this conti nent, th e ove rall in tegr ation of 

all of the countries invo lved , would eli mi nate powe r failu re?

Mr. Swidler. Mr. Rooney, you can get com plete integr ation by natio na liz ati on or pe rhap s some equ iva len t of it, but I th in k you do it 

only at a pric e. Th ere are, as you kno w, na tio na l powe r systems in 

most of th e co untrie s o f th e world, and t he th ou gh t doesn’t shock me in 

pri ncipl e, bu t fro m my own observations, on the whole they are in no 

be tte r sha pe th an we are. On th e co ntrary, I th in k th at ou r system 

of plur alistic pow er supply has ma ny advanta ges. I t has some disadvanta ges, and I th in k that the challenge is to reap th e adv antag es and 

to plan so as to avo id th e disadvanta ges. You hav e now 3,600 sep ara te systems, some with s tro ng mana geme nt, some w ith w eak, in ma ny 

cases feud ing among them selves, and t his is not th e aspe ct of ou r p lu ralistic system which add s stre ng th to th is country. I th in k th at the 

rea l challe nge is to ge t the same or a g re at er deg ree of effectiveness f rom 

ou r pluralist ic powe r economy while avoid ing some of the defe cts.

Th is I th ink is th e first chall eng e. I w ou ldn’t thi nk th at you w ould 

want to con sider a more radical ap proa ch un til you have trie d a system of br ingi ng all of the bu lk powe r su pp ly agencies of t he coun try 

into good wo rking rel ati ons with each othe r th ro ug h some kind of 

overseeing arra ng em en t.

Mr. Rooney. Mr. Ch air man, are you fa m ilia r wi th th e Un ion fo r 

the Co ordin ation of the Pr od uc tio n an d Transm ission of El ec tri city 

in Europ e ?

Mr. S widler. Un ion ?

Mr. R ooney. F or the Produ cti on and Tran sm ission of E lectric ity in 

Eu rope.

Mr. S widler. I s this one of the agencies------

Mr. Rooney. U C PT E .

Mr. Swidler. Yes.

Mr. R ooney. On th e Eu ro pe an Co ntinent eigh t countries are in ­

volved in this netw ork with th re e othe r c ountries assisting as asso ciate 

mem bers and th e co untries involved here are Au stria , Be lgium , F ranc e, 

Ital y, Lu xemb ourg, Ne the rla nds, Sw itz erlan d, and W est Germany.

I have visited, as I s aid before , five o f th e cou ntries a nd of the five 

cou ntries th at I visited the y said because of th ei r power pool in E ur op e 

this could no t possibly happen in an y one o f those five countries th at 

I visited alon g w ith th e rest o f t he E ur op ea n Co nti nent, that th is ty pe 

of power bla ckout could not, occur in Eu ro pe , and here we a re in the 

Un ite d State s where we have all of the fac ilitie s, all o f th e m oney, and 

it has occurred here.

W hy has it occ urred here an d why can it no t occur over there? 

Do n’t you th in k th ei r system is f ar sup erior w ith thei r intercon nec tions 

th an the one we hav e in the Un ite d States ?
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 1965 23

Mr. Swidler. I think that the uncoordinated and unsupervised decisionmaking by 3,600 separate enterprises is a great source of weakness 

in this country; yes, sir.

Mr. Rooney. Do you not think it is a grea t source of weakness in 

Europe where you have 11 countries involved with a certain amount of 

economic, social, and political problems, and yet they pool all their 

resources as far as their electricity and power supply ?

Why can’t it be done here in the United States, in the North American Continent ?

Mr. Swidler. I thin k this is a problem for this committee and I 

have suggested in general terms some measures which look in that 

direction, Mr. Rooney.

Mr. Rooney. No further questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Harvey ?

Mr. Ross. Mr. Chairman, I would just like to add a comment.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, Mr. Ross.

Mr. Ross. I am not prepared to say at this time tha t this could not 

have happened in Eu rope and a t least at this preliminary stage I am 

not prepared to say that our industry is that badly off.

Mr. Rooney. Let me say th is : Since 1946 and the inception of the 

UC PTE grid system in Europe it has never occurred, a blackout of 

this magnitude.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Harvey ?

Mr. Harvey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman Swidler, I would like to refer to your report to the P resident, if you don’t mind, because I have had a chance to sit down and 

read tha t over and there are a few points there I would like to ask you 

questions about.

First of all, let me say I think in the very short time t hat the Commission had tha t it is a very excellent report and you should be congratulated because I am sure it must have entailed just tremendous 

effort on the part of the Commission to put, together this very comprehensive report in th at short a period of time.

Mr. Swidler. Thank you.

Mr. Harvey. But it did raise several questions in my mind. I 

would refer you first to page 3 of the report and right at the opening 

a very basic statement is made with reference to Ontario HydroElectric’s Back Plan t and the Niagara plant of the Power Auth ority 

of the State of New York. In that first paragraph you say:

Combined, these developments con stitute the largest concentration of genera ting capacity in one lo cality in North America.

My question is, Isn ’t th is large concentration o f generating capacity 

referred to here vulnerable to enemy attack? Couldn’t a small 

amount of sabotage in this same area, for example, cripple the same 

affected area that suffered this?

Mr. Swidler. I am not an expert on th e military aspects, although 

it is obvious, Mr. Harvey, tha t one of the things we must all keep 

in mind is the defense consequences of what we do or do not do.

Mr. Harvey. I think we are conscious of tha t here in this investigation, too.

Mr. Swidler. I am sure you are.

Mr. H arvey. I feel certain of that.
24 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE'— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir. So far as the vulnerability is concerned, 

this complex is spread out over an area. It is not a pinpoint. Now, 

it is true tha t there are some kinds of defense emergencies in which 

you could visualize a loss of perhaps all tha t capacity. I think tha t 

this indicates one of the things perhaps that needs to be considered in 

system planning. Without interconnections you don’t solve the problem; you are in worse shape locally if the plant goes out.

To go back to so many little plants dotted all over, that this would 

not constitute a problem would, I think, be a reversal of what is going 

on everywhere in the world.

It is hardly thinkable. You don’t improve your posture by eliminating the interconnections.

Mr. Harvey. No, I am not talking about th at. I thin k you would 

agree with me that this massive concentration here of generating 

capacity is vulnerable. There is no question about it.

Mr. Swidler. I think you have to have a network, Mr. Harvey, 

that can face even tha t kind of contingency and be strong enough 

to withstand the consequences.

Mr. Harvey. Now I would like to skip over to page 6.

Mr. O’Connor. Mr. Harvey, may I interject one point?

Mr. Swidler. Yes.

Mr. O’Connor. It seems to me that the mass of concentration is 

at th at point because the natural place for it to be is at Niagara Falls. 

You reduce your total generation and reduce your economics materially, but that massive generation takes advantage of a natural resource at that point, which isn’t put there by man.

Mr. Harvey. No, I am well aware of the geographic reason for locating it there, but I don’t think th at changes one bit its vulnerability 

as far as sabotage or as far as our defense considerations are concerned. That is why I question the statement in the report. That 

this was the largest location I believe of power, in North America.

I want to skip to page 6, if I may, Chairman Swidler. In the second para graph on page 6 you describe there how after the one line went 

out tha t the other four lines going north to Ontario could not carry 

the load, and as I read th at I couldn’t help but ask myself the question 

why couldn’t the remaining four lines carry the increased load, as it 

seems to me tha t some human here had failed to anticipate other 

emergencies, because certainly a tornado, an airplane crash, sabotage, 

a mechanical failure, a bolt of lightning, all sorts of things could have 

happened to knock out one of these transmission lines, and the very 

simple fact tha t this one line went out immediately triggered all the 

other lines going out. It just seems to me tha t somebody here failed 

to anticipate these, so I couldn’t help but ask the question why couldn’t 

the other four lines carry the load.

Mr. Swidler. They all had a similar relay system. The lines had 

a capacity perhaps double the amount at which they went out if they 

had been operated up to the limits of the capacity of the copper or 

the aluminum and the insulators and so forth. The problem was not 

in the capacity of the line, but in the trip pin g of a relay in accordance 

with its setting. That relay setting was made not to protect this line 

from being overloaded at that point, b ut with reference to short circuits that might occur to the north and as a backup for circuit breakers on the line further up.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 25

Mr. Harvey. But the load has been increased considerably since the 

relay setting has been made. I don’t know how long.

Mr. Swidler. Yes, I understood it had and I think that the Ontario 

Hydro-Eleotric Commission recognizes tha t those relay settings should 

be reviewed.

Mr. Harvey. My point is this: In my opinion they were not prepared to meet this emergency caused by this reason, but i t seems to me 

they were equally unprepared to meet an emergency caused by a bolt 

of lightning, a tornado, a plane crash, or any other thing tha t would 

have knocked out one of those lines, it seems to me there are many other 

emergency situations that could have happened tha t could have 

brought about exactly the same chain of events tha t occurred here 

that they were unprepared to meet.

Mr. Swidler. I see your logic, but, of course, they were focusing on 

an emergency which might be caused by a short circuit fa rther north. 

It is tru e t ha t they took other risks in order to avoid that one, which 

they th ough t was the most serious.

Mr. H arvey. Now I would like to skip to page 7 and maybe you can 

explain to me. I am a lawyer, not an engineer, but for the life 

of me I can’t understand this language here. The first full paragraph 

on page 7 star ts:

The backup relay which triggered the blackout was set in 1963 to operate at 

pproximately 375 mw. The load-carrying capacity of each of the lines is considerably above 375 mw, but i t was necessary to set each backup relay to operate 

at a power level well below the capacity of the line because its function was 

to detect faults beyond the next switching point from the Beck Plant on the 

Ontario Hydro system.

I don’t have any idea what th at means. What are these faults they 

are ta lking about ?

Mr. Swidler. I am a lawyer, too. I was about to tell you th at I had 

completely exhausted my own expertise in trying to explain system 

stability, so tha t perhaps you would like a technical explanation from 

Mr. Brown. I have tried to give you a layman’s explanation. Because of voltage drop or some other technical consideration the backup 

relay at Beck had to be set a t a lower level in order to detect a fault 

on the line at some distance. Would you like to have Mr. Brown 

attempt to give you the technical reasons for that? This is the best 

I can do.

Mr. H arvey. All right. If he can do it very simply. I don’t want 

to take too much time.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Will you identify yourself, Mr. Brown?

Mr. Brown. F. Stewart Brown, Chief, Bureau of Power.

Perhaps I can just begin by saying th at these lines are protected by 

breakers, oil circuit breakers. They are actuated by relays.

Mr. Harvey. A circuit breaker is just like we have in our house? 

If we get too much load on there it is going to cut the line out, is that 

right, so we don’t get any power ?

Mr. Brown. Tha t is correct. It cuts out the line from its energy 

source so t hat the power th at is going through the lines is cut off. If 

you don’t do this you will undoubtedly run the risk of burning out 

your equipment, so it is essential that cut-outs be provided everywhere 

in the system.

Mr. Harvey. Why were these set so low—375 megawatts? What 

are these faults they were trying to detect, and so forth?
26 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Brown. The faults are short -circuits, short-circuits either from 

a phase—one of the phases of the three-phase transmission line—to 

ground or a fault from phase to phase. Eit her one of these is a serious condition.

Mr. H arvey. Then I find that inconsistent with this next statement 

here on page 8. Do you have the report in front of you there ?

Turn the page over. On page 8 the first sentence says th is :

Ontario Hydro officials have informed us tha t the personnel operating the 

Ontario Hydro system were not aware that the relay was set to operate at the 

375 megawatt level.

Well, why didn’t the operators know that the settings were this 

figure ? Tha t is my question right there. My next question is : Would 

they have continued to increase the load being carried without regard 

to the cutout level of 375 megawatts until the disaster occurred from 

tha t cutout ?

It seems to me this is a very sloppy practice, and I couldn’t think 

tha t somebody failed to say it in the report. It should be said.

Mr. Brown. I can tell you now, Mr. Harvey, that of course the 

practice has been changed. The relays have been reset. My latest 

information is th at they are now set for a lesser length of protection 

along the line, specifically, 125 percent of the line length from the 

Beck Plant versus nearly 200 percent of line length which they were 

protecting originally, so tha t the reach of the relays as they are now 

operating is less, but they will not trip at a load of 356 or 375 megawatts. These relays are now set, I believe, at 500 megawatts or higher.

Mr. Harvey. Now I would ju st like to skip if I may. I just have 

another question, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Go rig ht ahead.

Mr. Harvey. Chairman Swidler, I will skip to page 9 and maybe 

either you or Mr. Brown can answer. I am not sure. Here again 

we see there in the second column about the middle of the page th at—

The generators at the Beck Plant were not designed with relays to trip them 

out under these circumstances. While at PASNY’s St. Lawrence plant the break 

of the transmission lines to the loads in Canada had been considered to be a 

reasonable contingency and provision was made for its occurrence, at Niagara 

the contingency of the five lines to the north being lost simultaneously was 

unanticipated.

It seems to me tha t is a ridiculous conclusion. I couldn’t buy tha t 

for one minute. As I mentioned, all these other things tha t could have 

happened here, it seems to me that it could just as well have been 

anticipated that these five lines would have been lost. There is one 

thin g I didn’t understand about th at. Here in the paragra ph above, 

at St. Lawrence we speak of an automatic device which is our governing device, so to speak, on these generators which they have at the 

St. Lawrence Plant, but which they don’t have at the Beck Plant, 

apparently.

Mr. Swidler. They did have it at the Beck Plant, Mr. Harvey, but 

it was a slower operating device and the problem was th at the lines 

kicked out and this power surge came within a time period which was 

shorter than the time for which the relays a t the Beck P lan t were set, 

so tha t the Beck Pla nt continued to operate although it could not 

transmit any power to the north and tiie power had to come south 

and create this surge.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 27

Mr. Harvey. There are obviously safety devices that could have 

prevented it, are there not?

Mr. Ross. Mr. H arvey, I believe the story on tha t is th at the automatic trip-out tha t was installed at St. Lawrence was installed after 

a fault or an occurrence that happened 4 or 5 years ago and as a result 

of that experience they wired it so th at a portion of generation would 

trip out when they lost those lines.

This was a different type of protective device. It was designed 

particularly as a result of the very experience which they did not have 

at the plant at Beck.

Mr. Harvey. Are these governing devices installed only after a bad 

experience? Are they totally uncommon in the industry? That is 

my question. It seemed to me this would not have happened had 

these devices been present. That is what I gath er from the report.

Mr. Swidler. Th at is right, Mr. Harvey, and I think this is the 

major point tha t I tried to make in my testimony, which was that we 

needed gre ater uniformity of criteria and we needed an overall view 

of the possible impact of one system upon another. As long as each 

company runs its own show, the other members of the pool, although 

they have a stake in what happens, are not in position to control it 

and have no real voice in it.

We are now together reviewing these criteria to be sure that they 

are making assumptions postulating the worst credible conditions 

which could occur and doing it together and each looking at the systems of the others and putting the whole network on the computing 

boards of this equipment manufacturer. This was not done before, 

Mr. Harvey. This is the lesson of the blackout. It was not done 

before.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Would the gentleman yield to the Chairman ?

Mr. H arvey. Yes.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Chairman, who sets these criteria for 

these circuit breakers and relays in Canada where your repo rt reflects 

this trouble began?

Mr. Swidler. In a loose interconnection such as this I believe each 

company for itself, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is this a Canadian private company ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. This is the system that is owned by the Province of Ontario. It is the Ontario H ydro-Electric Power Commission.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do they have any provisions having the effect 

of statutory law as to the relays, the circuit breakers, and the safety 

devices tha t would be required?

Mr. Swidler. The Ontario Hydro-Electric Commission is one of the 

great operating public utilities of the world. It is a very large concern with a grea t history of contribution to the development of 

Ontario. I think tha t what happened here is testimony to the need 

for joint planning rather than, in my judgment, a matter for individual criticism.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I wasn’t criticizing them. I was just wondering by what authority they did or did not provide certain safety 

devices. Does the law of Canada require them as a matter of law 

to provide certain relays or circuit breakers?

Mr. Swidler. I believe th at th eir closest counterpart in this country 

would be the TVA, and they have broad operating authority and
28 NORT HEAS T POWER FAILURE'— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

broad managerial flexibility, and I am sure that the nature of the equipment th at they use is a m atter for management decision.

Air. R ogers of Texas. But the source of the trouble, as we find it in 

this report, would not be in whole or in part under the jurisdiction 

of the Federal Power Commission, would it, Mr. Swidler?

Mr. Swidler. No, it would not be under our jurisdiction at all. I 

must add, however, tha t we are receiving the most cordial and unlimited cooperation.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Harvey.

Mr. Harvey. I just have one other question.

Mr. O’Connor. Mr. Chairman, I would like to clarify something 

by asking Mr. Brown a question. Mr. Harvey said that a stroke of 

lightning or sabotage on one of these lines would accomplish the same 

thing. It is my understanding that with a stroke of lightning or a 

sudden fault like that, generation would have been taken off a portion 

of this line and it wouldn’t have had to go to the others. Am 1 wrong 

about that?

Mr. Brown. I think there is no system at the Beck Plan t for cutting 

out generation simultaneously with the loss of a line.

Mr. Ross. Isn’t it true with a lightning stroke on that line, the 

breaker would have opened and reclosed in terms of something less 

than a second so tha t you would not have had a cascading effect from 

one line over to another based purely on a lightning stroke?

Mr. Brown. Yes. The system is equipped with rapid reclosing of 

breakers. If a lightning stroke occurs which causes temporary grounding, a breaker will open almost instantaneously—say—in about 4 

cycles. There are 60 cycles to a second, so tha t is a very fast opening; 

usually the breakers will reclose in a total time of about 20 cycles, or 

about a thir d of a second. This is so rapid that you do not lose 

synchronism of your generating equipment with other units on the 

line, so as Commissioner Ross indicated, for a lightning stroke which 

does not damage equipment and inject a permanent short, a rapid reclosing probably would be successful.

Mr. Harvey. May I ask a question, Mr. Brown, about the other 

causes I just mentioned; sabotage, for example, on one line, or the 

jet crash into th at one line, or some other factor th at would be longer 

than the instance you are talking about?

Mr. Brown. I think the answer to that is that it would then be what 

we might call a permanent short, one that could not be cleared during 

a recycling or a quick reclosing.

Mr. H arvey. And they did n ot anticipate that, I gather.

Mr. Brown. It would have been similar to this.

Mr. Ross. Air. Harvey, I thin k this is an important point: No. 1, 

there was a relay in existence on the two lines tha t connect the United 

States and Canada. Unfortunately, the relay was not set up to protect against this surge of power. No. 2, the aim of system design, as I 

understand it, is to try to isolate a fault as soon as possible in as small 

an area as you can, so it will not affect other areas. In fact, this is 

what the system did try to do. It isolated the PJAI interconnection 

going south into Pennsylvania. The two single-circuit, 345-kilovolt 

lines that connect basically to New York City did open. In other 

words, this is exactly w hat the system was designed to do, and this is
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 29

what actually happened. The power surge tha t we had from Canada 

was not the primary reason for the outage in New York City. During 

this period of instability the 345-kilovolt lines and these other interconnections separated, disconnected, as you will. Then what hap ­

pened was, unfortunately, tha t the spinning reserve available to the 

area in north-central New York was not sufficient to carry the load, but 

the system instability actually was separated as the planners more or 

less assumed.

My point is tha t this impact from Canada was not the primary 

reason for the outage.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Will the gentleman yield ?

Mr. Harvey. Yes.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Ross, what do you mean by spinning

reserves ?

Mr. Ross. As Chairman Swidler pointed out, you had a deficit of 

generation to supply the load in north-central New York State. The 

systems were tryi ng to hang together. The New England Electric 

system and the Con E d system were tryin g to supply this deficit. Had 

they had more spinning reserve, more reserve th at could come on the 

line immediately, the whole thing might have been averted.

Mr. Swidler. Spin ning reserve, Mr. Chairman, if I may amplify 

that explanation, is unused capacity in a generator tha t is already on 

the line and revolving, but not carrying all the load it is capable of. 

Sometimes it may not be carrying any load. The interesting thing, 

which was pointed ou t in the report to the President, is that the eastern region had enough spinning reserve to make up their deficit. They 

lacked, I think, about 1,100 megawatts of capacity and they had 1,200 

megawatts or more o f spinning reserve, but the trouble was th at this 

reserve could not respond quickly enough. Had it been hydro, or even 

had a large part of it been hydro, there probably would never have 

been this cascading of failure.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Why couldn’t it respond quickly enough ?

Mr. Swidler. Because in steamplants you have to feed in more fuel. 

You have to put in more steam. In hydro plants your gates open 

and your power o utpu t almost instantly expands to any desired level. 

In a steamplant it is more gradual. A very large p art of the spinning 

reserve on Consolidated Edison’s own system was in itself one big 

uni t; it had either 250 or 300 megawatts of spinning reserve in that 

unit. At the time that the system went down this unit had speeded up 

only to the point where it was carrying an additional 100 megawatts 

of load, so there alone about 150 megawatts or more of spinning reserve 

went totally unused.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Swidler, if you would let me interrupt 

you at tha t particu lar point, actually we shouldn’t call it a spinning 

reserve because it was not available a t the time it was needed, is tha t 

right ? I mean it was possible to get it, but it wasn’t available on a split 

second.

Mr. Swidler. One of the great lessons here is tha t there must be 

greater sophistication in evaluating spinning reserves. You can’t call 

everything spinning reserve and figure tha t you are safe when your 

spinning reserves match the amount of the possible deficit unless you 

know tha t the timin g fac tor will enable you to put it on the line when

66-577—66-----3
30 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

the deficit occurs. Some hydro there would have saved the day, but 

New York City did not have it.

Mr. Harvey. Mr. Chairman, I only have one other thought and I 

would like to refer, Chairm an Swidler, to page 16 where it shows 

exhibit—I think that is I-Q -----

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Harvey. Which is the 65th Stree t control center of the Consolidated Edison p lant, and shows the operations room there. After 

the upstate generators had been knocked out, there wasn’t enough 

power, as 1 gather, in the metropolitan areas to suffice.

The one method of saving some of the area would have been, as they 

say in the report here, to cut off some of the service, and your report 

there points out th at it was the job of one man to pay attention to the 

dials, as in exhibit T-Q here, and decide what to do. I couldn’t help 

but think this would seem to be the perfect spot for the application of 

computers to make this decision.

Is that uncommon in the industry? Has thought been given to 

that ?

Mr. S widler. There has been a lot of thought given to it and some 

of these decisions are computerized, but there is a lot of debate and 

a good deal to be said on both sides because if you pick a point of 

separation you may be separating systems and creating a cascading 

problem which could be avoided if you just knew enough to hold together a little longer. I am not qualified to answer the question in any 

greater detail.

Mr. H arvey. We don’t want to be critical of those who had to make 

the decisions because hindsight is a wondeful thing. Nevertheless, 

doesn’t the report show that humans under the tests tha t were imposed here did not make the proper decision ? Let’s say they did not 

make the decision which would have reserved power. The computer 

would have made those decisions.

Air. Swidler. I have no doubt that there will now be an intensive 

scrutiny of their implementation of t hat control. There will be, and 

I know that there is being made, a review of the instructions to dispatchers, and I have no doubt they will also consider the degree to 

which computerization would be helpful.

Mr. H arvey. Thank you very much, Chairman Swidler and members of the Commission. I would like to say once again I thin k this 

a tremendous report considering the very brief time in which you had 

to put it together.

Mr. Swidler. Than k you.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The Chair will now recognize Mr. Staggers 

of West Virginia to make a statement. Mr. Staggers.

Mr. Staggers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to commend Mr. Ha rris for having made this hearing 

possible and also our chairman of the subcommittee, Mr. Rogers, for 

chairing the hearing. I would like to congratulate you, Mr. Swidler, 

for your competent and understandable report and for the courage 

tha t you have exhibited in your suggestions here.

I would like to say that I personally, and I am sure the committee 

does, wish you well in private life. I think with the knowledge and 

the courage th at you have exemplified here today th at you have helped
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 31

the com mittee con sidera bly . I was inter ested in th e sta tem ents of 

Ch ief En gine er Brown here of some of the steps th at have prob ably 

been tak en to co rre ct some o f the se th ing s.

I am very mu ch int ere ste d also in the sta temen t of Mr. O’Connor 

in his dis agree me nt with you, an d I am sure th at the com mittee late r 

would like to he ar h is views, t o know wha t the y m ig ht be.

I th in k the who le hearing, so fa r as I have listen ed to it, po ints up 

the need fo r th is com mittee or fo r Congress to tak e a deeper an d 

a closer look at the pro blem to det erm ine wh eth er leg islation should 

be com ing out of the Congress a nd, if so, wh at kind of legislation.

Ag ain, I wa nt t o co ng ratulate you and wish you well.

Mr. Swidler. Th an k you very much, Mr. Staggers.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Tha nk you, Mr. Staggers.

Mr. Ross. Mr. Ch air man.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Mr. Ross.

Mr. Ross. As it has been ind ica ted th is morn ing , the Com mission 

presen tly has u nd erw ay ce rta in studie s an d I am sure th at we wou ld 

ap prec iate an op po rtu ni ty to re tu rn as these stu die s pro gre ss to give 

you ou r in fo rm ation an d ou r own th ou gh ts on this whole sub ject 

matter.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Yes. Comm issio ner Ross, the subcom mittee 

will hope to ge t those at th e ap pr op riat e tim e an d I th ink th at at this 

moment the subcom mittee sh ou ld recess u ntil 2 p.m. th is a fte rnoo n, at 

which tim e we will conti nue the questio ns and deter mi ne wh eth er or 

no t it will be necessary to mee t tom orrow , so the subcom mittee will 

stan d in recess un til 2 p.m.

(W hereu pon, at 12:10 p.m., the comm ittee was recessed, to be reconven ed at 2 p.m. th e same day.)

AFTER RECESS

(T he subcom mittee reconv ene d a t 2 p.m., H on. W al te r R oge rs, ch ai rma n of th e subcom mittee, presiding .)

Mr. Rogers of Texa s. Th e special sub com mittee will come to order 

fo r fu rther pro ceedings.

Mr. Sw idler, there are qu ite a nu mber of questions, of course, th at 

I hav e in min d, b ut I th in k t hat really th e first one th at I oug ht to sta rt 

off w ith is this. I do n’t kno w wh eth er you are pr ep ar ed to answer it 

or w hethe r y ou could g et p repa red to a nswe r it. W ith relation to the 

blackout in th is countr y, how m uch o f Ca na da was blacked out ?

Mr. Swidler. A lar ge part of Ont ario w as blacke d out. A p art of 

the system ne ar Det ro it sta yed in servic e. I f y ou look at page 3------

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Yes, si r; I have it here.

Mr. Swidler (con tin uing ). Of th e repo rt, it shows th e are a in 

Ontario, and, as indicated the re, it is a lar ge are a an d the bla ckout 

perio d was w ith in th e ran ge of 15 minute s to 3 hours.

Mr. R ogers of T exa s. Th en acc ordin g to th is scale, wh at happ ened 

in Ca na da was one of th e less er of th e bla ckout situa tio ns in so fa r as 

leng th of tim e is con cerned?

Mr. Swidler. I th in k th at Ca nada ha d few er pro blem of restor atio n of serv ice th an we ha d in some of ou r more concentra ted areas, 

are as where th ere were un de rgroun d systems an d where th ere was 

a d ea rth of hydro power.
32 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes. Tha t is what I am coming to, Mr. Chairman. The areas in most of New York State, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island are shown to have been blacked out from 3 to 8 

hours and a substantial part of New York City was blacked out from 

8 to 13 hours. Is it your statement from your findings tha t the 

Canadian situation was quickly adjusted because they had access to 

more hydropower than did the New York or New Engla nd area?

Mr. Swidler. This was one of the reasons. Each area had its own 

problems of restoring service, but, as I mentioned, the problems in 

New York City were the greatest because they had so many difficulties. They had lost three big units. They had all this underground 

network and there is a real problem in energizing underground tran smission lines.

They had 42 sections that they had to energize separately. They 

had no hydropower. It was a complex of all these things.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. The power that they were using in the first 

instance in New York City was basically hydropower, was it not?

Mr. Swidler. They were importing a substantial amount of hydropower from the Niagara area.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. That was coming from the Niagara area?

Mr. Swidler. Niagara and St. Lawrence.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The separate areas in Canada, were they 

intertied ?

Mr. Swidler. They were intertied originally, but they separated 

into three separate segments of their own. Some of their own transmission lines opened up within Canada. We have treated Ontario 

as a single area for purposes of this report, and of course we don’t have 

the same responsibility there and have not gone into their problems in 

the same detail, but we understand their system broke into three 

separate pieces.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And each one of those separate pieces was to 

a certain degree self-sufficient ?

Mr. Swidler. I think tha t is right.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Why couldn’t tha t be done in th is country ?

Mr. Swidler. I think, Mr. Rogers, the impression tha t we had hoped 

tha t this re port would give and that my testimony would give is that, 

while the blackout was triggered by this incident at Niagara, the 

whole tra in of events need not have happen ed; I can’t tell you why the 

whole train of consequences ensued as it did.

You can imagine slightly different arrangements, somewhat different decisions, that would have led to a wholly different result. It 

was a series of mischances th at resulted in this wide enlargement of 

the area of failure and in the long period of restoration of service. 

I don’t think such a combination of things should happen again.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. I know, but what we are tryi ng to do is find 

out what the situation is so tha t we can absolutely prevent it.

Now, Mr. Chairman, with regard to Canada, would you say tha t the 

ability to restore service in Canada so quickly as compared with the 

time required to restore it in this country was due solely to the availability of hydropower ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir; not solely. That was one of the things. Not 

all of the bad things tha t could have happened did happen. I think I
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 33

mentioned to you that in the CONVEX system about a h alf million 

kilowatts of load continued to function.

If you will look at this map, you will see that in many of these areas 

in the United States the outages were only momentary to 15 minutes, 

and th at there were other areas where our history was the same as that 

in Canada. The outage was only 15 minutes to 3 hours.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Why were those out only 15 minutes?

Mr. Swidler. Well, if they were able to keep some generation with 

which to get started, th at would help. Fo r example, in Rochester they 

had th eir own little hydroplants.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In what ?

Mr. Swidler. Rochester had its own little hydros.

In other areas they didn’t have the same problem of underground. 

They had radial feeders from a few central locations, instead of having 

to sectionalize a whole metropolitan area as was done in New York 

City, so I think you get a grea t many variations, but I understand 

your viewpoint. You are trying to look at it in the large, and I think 

I can say looking at it in the large that in the first place these systems 

ought to be so strong that they would never fail, and in the second 

place they ought to have procedures available so tha t if they did fail, 

they would be put back together in a hurry. I thin k you have to work 

on both.

We need a higher development of failure analysis techniques to be 

sure t ha t everything is tested, that every component is tested in relationship to every oth er; and then we need to plan on the worst. Suppose something does fail—how can you restore service ? It is this double system of safeguards tha t I think needs to be instituted. This is 

not an original approach. This is what the indu stry now attempts, but 

in a way that is not, to my mind, adequately coordinated or adequately 

uniform.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Wh at other factor besides hydro was highly 

controlling in getting the Canadian situation corrected quicker than 

the situation in the United States ?

Mr. Swidler. The fact t hat there wasn’t much underground.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. There was not ?

Mr. Swidler. No underground transmission. That was another 

factor.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Would another facto r be the smaller load 

required in tha t general area?

Mr. Swidler. No, the loads in Ontario are very heavy.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is that in the blacked out area?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, the loads in Ontario are very heavy, b ut there 

wasn’t any single metropolitan center with the load density of New 

York City or Boston.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Are those requirements of heavy load by in ­

dustry in Ontario?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, Ontario has quite a development of high electricity using industry.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The type of industry that load shedding 

would help in getting it restarted ?

Mr. Swidler. I believe so. In the Toronto area I am told they do 

have a lot of such loads.
34 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Swidler, the faulty situation originated, 

according to this report, in Canada.

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As I asked you this morning, the Federal 

Power Commission does not have jurisdiction over that in whole or 

in part?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The FB I would have no jurisdiction over 

tha t operation in whole or in pa rt as f ar as you know, would it ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In other words, it was in a foreign country 

and could have been accomplished by a saboteur as easily as it was 

accomplished by what you feel in your report was an accident ?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t know whether this could have been accomplished by a saboteur or not, but I do know tha t there are many effective examples of international cooperation.

Mr. Rooney mentioned one in Europe, and I don’t thin k the fact 

tha t the pool is an international one is a barrier as long as both countries work together. I thin k we do have a history of close and cordial 

working relationships.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I understand that, and I am certainly not 

reflecting on it. I am merely talkin g about the possibilities.

Now, an individual could have broken that circuit just the same as 

tha t automatic circuit, could he, or she, not?

Mr. Swidler. Well, an individual could have broken the circuit 

breaker either there or in New York City or in Texas.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, but if he h ad broken it there, and the 

same result had occurred, and these other lines had gone out, the 

result in the eastern part of the United States would have been the 

same, wouldn’t it?

Mr. Swidler. It is apparent tha t in a power pool everybody may 

be in the same boat and the kilowatt hours are not respecters of 

boundaries.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Of course that is another thing tha t I am 

coming to.

When you speak of a power pool, are you speaking of complete 

interdependence ?

Mr. Swidler. I use it more loosely than that to cover interconnected 

systems.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Take, for instance, if you had this power pool 

or intertie between operations in this country and operations in Canada, and this country had no jurisdiction over the particular situation or the particular point at which a break like this could have occurred, it would be a very dangerous situation from a defensive stan dpoint under any circumstances; wouldn’t it?

Mr. Swidler. Mr. Rogers, I am not clear why there would be more 

likelihood of sabotage in Canada than here.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Well, the point is not tha t there might be 

more likelihood of sabotage in Canada than there might be here, but 

my point is we would have no authority or no jurisdiction to use any 

defensive measures insofar as safeguarding the particu lar situation or 

the particular area that, would be the focal point from which this sort 

of thing could start.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 35

Mr. Swidler. As I mentioned, I thin k tha t we ought to have a 

double line of defense. We ought to make our systems invulnerable, 

but, on the other hand, I think we ought to plan so tha t in case of 

trouble tha t we can make the best of it and isolate our systems, or do 

whatever else may be necessary, to prtoect ourselves.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Actually that is what occurred in this situa ­

tion except it took about from, say, 3 to 15 hours to get it corrected.

Mr. Swidler. These things were not done quickly enough to prevent 

a breakdown of service.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In other words, these areas were completely 

isolated in whole or in part durin g this period of time, during the 

period of time it required to get them back into electric service that 

would meet the requirements of the people in tha t area?

Mr. Swidler. You are talking about Canada now ?

Mr. Rogers of Texas. No; I am talking about the areas in the 

United States. In other words, if one area had no service for 3 hours 

then it was actually isolated insofar as many, many things in ordinary 

operations of everyday life were concerned. It was completely isolated the same as if it had been surrounded by a m oat; was it not?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. With regard to the interties in Canada, is it 

the Beck Station?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir; Adam Beck.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Tha t is located in Canad a; is it not ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir, on the Canadian side of the Niag ara River.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And completely under their jurisdiction. Are 

there any of those producing that same amount of electricity or generation of power on our side ?

Mr. Swidler. There is a plant on our side. The Moses plant on the 

other side of the river develops our share of the Niagara power. We 

each have a pla nt at Niagara.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is the plan t that is on the other side of the 

river under our jurisdiction, under the jurisdiction of the United 

States, or is it on Canadian soil ?

Mr. Swidler. No, it belongs to the Powe r Authority of the State 

of New York, or PASNY , from the initials.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I understand tha t. Is it policed completely by 

citizens of the United States ?

Mr. Swidler. So fa r as I know it is, yes. By employees of the State 

of New York.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You say so far as you know. Would it be policed otherwise and you not know it ?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t know what their employment policy is. They 

may be permitted to hire someone who isn’t a citizen. I thin k tha t 

the U.S. Government hires some people who aren’t citizens. But the 

people who operat the Moses plant are all employees of the State of 

New York.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, I understand, but what I am th inking 

about is th is : Is the location of the facility itself on foreign soil, which 

is held by us ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir, it is in the United States.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It is on American soil.
36 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir, United States.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And of course would be subject to the jurisdiction of the United States ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir, and i t was built unde r Federal Power Commission license.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, sir.

Is power produced in tha t plan t sold in Canada and transmitted 

through Canada the same as the power that was being transmitted 

from the Beck plant into New York ?

Mr. Swidler. You mean does the New York State Power Authority 

find a market fo r its power in Canada?

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, the Canada, throu gh this plant.

Mr. Swidler. No, sir, I think the markets of the New York State 

Power Authority are in the State of New York and to some extent the 

neighboring States. It sells some of its power in Vermont, I think. 

There are interchange arrangements with Ontario Hydro. I don’t 

think they sell any firm blocks of power to Canada, but there are 

interchanges.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What I mean is th is : Is Canada dependent 

upon power being produced in the United States, or is it self-sufficient 

in its power requirements and power needs ?

Mr. Swidler. I thin k tha t the report discloses th at at the moment,. 

Ontario is in a pinch and is importing power from the United States.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Importing power from the U nited States?

Mr. Swidler. Yes. I think its construction program will make it 

self-sufficient in the near future. It is adding a great deal of capacity, 

but at the moment it is a net importer.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Did you want to ask a question, Mr. Rooney ? 

The Chair yields to Mr. Rooney.

Mr. Rooney. Wh at is the percentage of hydroelectric versus thermal 

in this whole area that has been involved in the blackout ?

Mr. Swidler. Roughly about a quarter hydroelectric and threequarters thermal.

Mr. Rooney. Three-quarters thermal and one-quarter hydroelectric?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rooney. One other question. When the United States exports power to Canada, is this on a reciprocal basis, or are they charged 

for it, and vice versa ?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t know. I presume tha t there are dollar settlements.

In 1964 the net transfers by PASN Y to Ontario Hydro a t Niagara 

were 6 million kilowatt-hours, which is a very small a mou nt; and in 

tha t same period it received from Ontario 3? million kilowatt-hours 

at Niagara and 113 million kilowatt-hours at St. Lawrence, so th at in 

1964 the United States was a net importer. More recently, because of 

difficulties it has had with some of the units in its large Lakeview 

plant near Toronto, Canada has been a net importer.

Mr. Rooney. Why would the thermal power be 75 percent and the 

hydroelectric power be 25 percent with relation to the Niagara Falls 

area?

Doesn’t most of the power produced in that area come frcm the 

falls and why wouldn’t it be much higher than 25 percent ?
NORT HEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 37

Mr. Swidler. It is much higher. I am talking about CAN USE 

area as a whole. It is much higher in the Niag ara area.

Mr. Rooney. And if it were just reversed, if it were 75 percent hydroelectric power and 25 percent thermal power, this situation couldn’t 

have occurred as drastically as it did ; is tha t correct ?

Mr. Swidler. I th ink th at is right, Mr. Rooney.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Chairman, now with regard to the hydropower, that hydropower all comes from the Niagara areas?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. I think most of it does, either from Niagara 

or the St. Lawrence development, but as I mentioned, Rochester has 

some hydro, and I know th at there are hydroplan ts in Massachusetts 

and Connecticut. Niagara Mohawk has some hydro. There are hydroplants distributed throughout the area.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Percentagewise, how much of tha t hydro is 

located in our country as compared to the production in Canada ?

Mr. Ross. I would say tha t the percent of hydro in the Ontario 

Hydro system is much higher than ours because of the Sir Adam Beck 

plant. They have the Massena plant and they have some new development coming along the lines on streams that flow into the Hudson 

Bay and I would project that it would be much higher than our percentage.

Mr. Swidler. Th at’s right. The disproportionate amount of hydro is on the Canadian side.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Chairman, with the situation as it presently stands, this country could be sorely put quickly if the hydro 

power of Niagara should instantaneously fall into hands unfriendly 

to us; could it not?

Mr. Swidler. You mean on both sides of the river?

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Well, just on the Canadian side?

Mr. Swidler. No, I thin k tha t the exchanges are rather modest. 

The numbers tha t I mentioned are very small in relation to the total 

consumption on the American side, and I wouldn’t think tha t the loss 

of tha t interconnection would be fatal, although I think tha t the joint 

pool is stronger because of Canadian participation.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You think tha t this interconnection should 

he continued in the futu re as it has in the past, knowing what we do 

today about this situation ?

Mr. Swidler. I think it should be strengthened, Mr. Rogers.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. When you say strengthened, you mean the 

joint pool as between the United States and Canada? How would 

you strengthen it?

Mr. Swidler. This panel is now working on new stability criteria. 

I thin k we will find that additional links will be necessary, tha t there 

will be a need for heavier interconnections. I think they will need 

to review together all of their relay settings. They may need to improve their communications and instrumentation. They may want to 

computerize some of the ir operations. They certainly will want to have 

a refinement of startup procedures and emergency procedures.

When they have done all that, they will have a pool that is not going 

to get into trouble.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you think then tha t something should be 

worked out to make the same rules and regulations apply on both sides 

of the border ?
38 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Swidler. I think that if we find the Ontario people don’t do 

their share, we might need to exercise persuasion by diplomatic negotiation, but I don’t know any reason, Mr. Rogers, to assume that we will 

not get entire cooperation on the Canadian side.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Now, Mr. Swidler, of course you didn’t know 

of any reason why you could assume th at this blackout would occur, 

because it had been stated by private, public, and political figures 

that this couldn’t happen. To my certain knowledge I have had this 

said to me many time, and it did happen.

Mr. Swidler. But what happened, Mr. Rogers, was not only on the 

Canadian side.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I understand that, but the point I am getting 

at is this, Mr. Chairman. Don’t you thin k that it is high time tha t 

this country take a long look at this situation from the standpoint, 

well, let’s say, of solely defense and not be interdependent or even 

semidependent upon what might happen in a foreign country, whether 

it be Canada or some other foreign country ?

Mr. Swidler. I think maybe you are getting beyond my depth. I 

had always assumed that our friendship with Canada and our reciprocal trust and working relationships with Canada were a foundation 

stone of our national policy.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I certainly wouldn’t reflect on them Mr. 

Chairman, and I am not intending to. What I am talkin g about is 

being realistic about what our needs are and what needs to be done. 

As I understood you this morning, this whole (meration over there is 

under the Power A uthority of the Province of Ontario. As I understand it, th at is a public body, is it not?

Air. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And this operation there on the river is a 

public operation?

Mr. S widler. Yes, sir.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. And of course tha t is completely and wholly 

without the jurisdiction or control of anyone in this country, whether 

it be the Federal Power Commission, or the President of th e United 

States, or anyone else; isn’t it, Mr. Chairman ?

Mr. Swidler. That is true, but, on the other hand, we cooperate in 

many ways and very effectively through joint agencies. The Int ernational Jo int Commission is one example. Mr. Ross sits as a member 

of it. I know in the whole world no better opportunity for close and 

cordial working relationships than between the United States and 

Canada, so that I don’t personally see tha t this is an element of weakness. 1 f it should become so, I am sure that the Congress will-----

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I don’t want to look at it as a question of 

weakness. I want to look on it as a question of being realistic. I can 

remember many, many years the friendly and very helpful coordination between this Government and Cuba, and I don’t think that exists 

today. I thin k the situation with regard to sugar can very well be 

applied to electric energy, and I don’t think this country ought to take 

the chance. I think it is too great.

However, what I am getting at actually is this. In this situation, 

do you feel that, if we continue to operate with Canada as we have in 

the past, a joint commission on power authority or joint commission
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 39

to control the generation and distribution or transmission of power 

from these sources would be in order?

Mr. Swidler. There certainly should be a joint agency, Mr. Rogers, 

I agree with you. I am not sure how formal this needs to be, and I 

think this would take some exploring. There is in Canada an agency 

which, as I mentioned, is more or less a counterpart of the Federal 

Power Commission, the National Energy Board of Canada. Whether 

either or both of us would need legislation in order to coordinate our 

activities I am not sure, but I think th at there should be joint action, 

effective joint action, yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Chairman, with regard to the relay that 

went out, tha t had nothing to do with the operations in this country a t 

all, and the circuit breaker tha t caused the original flipover th at trig ­

gered all the rest of it had nothing to do with anything in this country, 

did it?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir, it did not.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Let us say that th at was a defective relay or a 

defective circuit breaker that caused this trouble or there were some 

other defective relays and circuit breakers which continued this sequences of events.

Mr. Swidler. It was a poor setting for the relays. Actually the 

relay functioned in accordance with its setting.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Were there any defective relays or circuit 

breakers in this country tha t had they been operating correctly would 

have prevented a portion of this blackout?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t know th at I can answer tha t question for sure, 

but for one thing, in restoring service at one station they found tha t 

one circuit breaker wouldn’t work because the compressed air t hat was 

required was exhausted and they had no auxiliary equipment with 

which to restore pressure. I think the matter of housekeeping on 

equipment is not all on one side; th at all of us need to check up on our 

housekeeping.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now, Mr. Chairman, are there any regulations, safety or otherwise, requiring these relays and these circuit 

breakers to be inspected or checked out at certain intervals to be sure 

they are working?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. You mean under your jurisdiction, or on the 

State basis ?

Mr. Swidler. So far as I am aware there is no requirement at all 

and certainly none under our jurisdiction.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. How often are these inspected or looked over 

and tested?

Mr. Swidler. I think tha t varies from company to company, Mr. 

Rogers.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In other words, it is a matter for the company 

to determine ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Has there been any controversy, Mr. Chairman, with regard to the money expended io do this being used as a pa rt 

of the rate base ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. I thin k now everyone recognizes that the 

quality of service and reliability of services comes first. Whether
40 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

th ere has been any cu tti ng of corners in or de r to save money, I do n’t 

know, bu t I th in k th at the pr im ary pro ble m is one of visuali zin g the 

con ting encies ra th er th an an unwillin gness to prep are fo r the m once 

the y are visualized.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yo ur jurisd ictio n does go to ratem ak ing and 

acc ountk eep ing , does i t no t ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. And it does go to licens ing of hy drop rojects 

on stream s o th er tha n F ed eral proje cts ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. You do n ot license those because of the fact 

th at the y are Fe de ral. Has the discussion eve r come up or the issue 

ever come up, Mr. Ch airma n, wi th any of the pr iv at e ut ili tie s concerni ng th e use of sizable sums of money to do research in th is p ar ticu ­

la r area or in ha ving c ert ain sti pu lated tim es at w hic h these different 

safety factors are insp ected an d those charg es no t allo wed as a part 

of th e rate base ?

Mr. S widler. No. Th e F ed eral Pow er Comm issio n, a t least so fa r as 

I am aw are, has nev er disa llow ed or even questio ned ex penditu res fo r 

res ear ch and development o r exp en dit ures fo r p rotec tiv e equipm ent , o r 

com municatio ns equ ipm ent, or other equip me nt th at the com panies 

involve d deem ed nece ssary in or de r to pr otec t relia bility of service.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Th en you feel th at this wou ld be a pr op er 

cha rge to be used as a pa rt of th e rat e base ?

Mr. Swidler. I certa inly do, and th is Com mission in the la st few 

ye ars has been str on gly encoura gin g th e electri c power in du stry to 

devo te more of its money and mo re of its attention to resear ch and 

development.

Ab out 2 or 2 ^ years ago I ha d th e privi leg e of speaking to the 

Ed iso n El ec tri c In st itut e at a con ven tion in De nver an d the the me o f 

my ta lk was t hat thi s indu str y need ed m ore resea rch and th at it sh ould 

gea r its elf fo r a faster pace of tech nolog ical imp rov ement.

Since th at tim e there has been a pickup in the resear ch ac tiv ity of 

the indu str y. I doubt th at it h as y et reac hed the level wh ich is r equir ed 

if it is to tak e ad va ntag e of all the technolo gical op po rtu nitie s which 

are availab le.

Mr. Rogers o f Texas. Mr. C ha irm an , whe n we a re speakin g of electric energy we are actu all y speaking of tw o prim ar y sources, are we not, 

hy dro and steam ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Th ere has been a lot of talk abo ut nu cle ar 

ene rgy . Nu cle ar ene rgy is n ot hing more th an th e use of nu celar m ate ­

rial as a fuel to pro duce steam to tran slat e into electrical ene rgy , so 

actua lly yo ur bas ic sit ua tio n inso far as energ y is concern ed is eit he r 

hy dr o or stea m ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texa s. An d you ha ve vario us metho ds of crea tin g 

th at steam . Is it any spe edi er to do it wi th nu cle ar energ y th an it is 

with, Ave will say, g as, or oil, or coal, or wh ate ver fuel you w an t to bu rn ?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t k now. Th is is som eth ing we h ea r quite a bi t 

abo ut. We m ade a po int o f n oting in ou r re po rt th e fact t hat the two 

nu clear pl an ts in the are a ju st h ap pe ned no t to be in service the n. I t
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 41

would have been an instinctive thing if they had been in service and 

we could have had a little experience as to the pickup potential of the 

nuclear plants, but we didn’t.

Mr. Ross points out tha t it is customary to baseload the nuclear 

plants, in which case if one were on the line it wouldn’t have any excess 

capacity, anyway.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. That is a question. Wasn’t there one nuclear 

plant in operation?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Were there just two? I was thinkin g there 

were three.

Mr. S widler. There were just two in operation and they both hap ­

pened to be down.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Both were down?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. So you have no yardstick at all with regard 

to that ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. I am talking about two paints in the affected 

area.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In the affected area, that is correct, because 

that is the only only place you could get inform ation ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. With regard to the difference between hydro 

and steam, hydro of course picks up faster. There is also a difference 

in the cost of producing that power, is there not, Mr. Chairman?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And hydro is much cheaper than steamproduced power, is it not ?

Mr. Swidler. Well, they tend to balance out in overall cost because 

when a company is try ing to decide what its next increment of capacity will be it will pick the cheapest one that will fit into its system, 

be it hydro or steam. Now, where you have a great block of untapped 

hydro such as existed on the Niagara and the St. Lawrence, there you 

can bring in something that has remained untapped because of its very 

size. You can bring in these great blocks of hydropower which are 

much cheaper than the prevailing cost of steam power, but by and 

large when hydro is added it is because that is the cheapest increment 

and when steam is added it is because tha t happens to be cheaper, 

considering not only the operating cost, but the capital charges.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. With respect to the hydro power tha t was 

imported into New York, how fa r did that have to be carried?

Mr. Swidler. The distance from Niagara to New York City is about 

400 miles.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Was tha t power transp orted or transmitted 

from Niagara to the city of New York?

Mr. Swidler. A good deal of it reached the city of New York, yes, 

sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Was tha t alternating or direct?

Mr. S widler. It is all alternating.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. All alternating and it carried 400 miles into 

New York?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.
42 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Rogers o f Texas. W ha t would be the com par ison of the cost of 

th at power fro m the hy dr op lant to th e prod uctio n of steam power in 

New Yo rk City in the pl an ts th at Con E d ha d there to be opera ted ?

Mr. Swidler. I t hink I w ould wa nt to refresh m yse lf on the figure s. 

I th in k th at Con E d ’s lowest cost of steam generat ion now is in the 

orde r of 6 mi lls or more. I do n’t kno w wha t th is hy drocost is delive red. I would guess som eth ing on the same orde r.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Off th e reco rd.

(D is cu ssio n of f th e re c o rd .)

Air. Swidler. Th ere is a very serious relat ionship between the tr ium ph o f the G em ini 6 and 7 spa ce craft a nd o ur subject. In the aerospace indu stry the problems of com puter iza tio n, an d th e fa ilur e an al ­

ysis technique s have been ca rri ed to a gr ea ter sta ge of dev elo pm ent 

and refinem ent th an the y have elsew here. I th in k th at the electri c 

power indu stry h as a lot to lea rn f rom the aerospace in du stry on how 

to eliminate as mu ch as possible of equip me nt faul ts an d how to 

includ e in its pl an ning all of the devices an d all of the ma nageme nt 

technique s for pr even tin g break down s a nd failures .

Air. Rogers of Texas. Now, Air. Ch airm an , bac k to th e othe r sub ­

ject: How fa r un de r prese nt con dition s can al te rn at in g cu rren t be 

tran sm itt ed und er an econom ic fe asibi lity yardstick?

Mr. S widler. Prob ab ly you know, Air. Rog ers, th at the dis tan ce th at 

you ca n tra ns m it is in lar ge measure a f uncti on o f the size of the block 

and the volta ge at which you tra ns mit. W here there is a larg e bulk 

movem ent as fro m the Pacifi c No rth we st down to south ern Ca lifo rnia, they are bu ild ing a com bin ation of al te rn at in g cu rren t and 

direct cu rre nt tra nsmi ssi on lines which will move pow er in com bin atio n a thou sand miles, rou ghly. These line s are being bu ilt.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Y es ; I un derst and.

Mr. Swidler. The se lines will be 500 kilovolts fo r the alte rn at in g 

cu rren t an d there are some such lines in existence. You can’t affo rd 

to tr an sf er a block of 100,000 kilowatts fo r a thou sand miles, bu t 

pe rhap s you can tran sp or t a millio n kil ow atts fo r a thou sand miles.

Air. Rogers of Texas. I am speak ing of alte rn at in g cu rre nt.

Mr. Swidler. I am speakin g of alte rn at in g cu rre nt.

Mr. Rogers o f T exas. We are tal ki ng ab out a lte rn at in g cu rre nt a nd 

direct.

Mr. Swidler. Th is is a comb ina tio n of alte rn at in g an d dir ect. I 

would say if yo ur block of powe r is bi g eno ugh and if you use hea vy 

eno ugh tra nsmi ssion lines, 500 to 1,000 miles is a possibility where 

there is enough price differen ce betw een the rec eiv ing end and the 

or ig in at in g en d to pay fo r th e transm iss ion .

Mr. R ogers of Texa s. Ho w fa r can you tran sp ort d ire ct e nergy ?

Mr. S wtdler. Dire ct current?

Mr. R ogers of Te xas. Yes.

Mr. Swidler. Pe rh ap s I ou gh t to re fe r th at question to th e engineers, bu t I will say, Ch airm an Roger s, th at t he R uss ian s are pl an ­

ning to ma ke use of hydro sites 2,000 miles away f rom th ei r load centers 

and t hey are pl an ni ng to tran sm it it. Und er m ode rn techno logy you 

can move it as f ar a s you need where th e cost difference is g re at en ough, 

if you have a gr ea t power rive r lik e the Le na or Yen isey in eas tern 

Sib eri a an d gr ea t ma rkets in we stern Siberia , and you can move it, as 

they are th ere, a coup le of tho usan d miles. We d on’t h ap pe n to have
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 43

con dition s lik e those. We are a sm aller co un try a nd w ith in this c ountr y we have wid ely disper sed energ y resources, so th at po int-t o- po int 

tra nsmi ssion o f larg e blocks of p ow er is no t as necessary as it in some 

othe r c oun tries.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. But it is possible to do th is ?

Mr. Swidler. It is possib le; yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. If you wa nte d to.

Mr. S widler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Would the hy drop ow er fro m Ni ag ara into 

New Yo rk, in yo ur opinio n, be cheap er th an stea m powe r produced 

ne arer the load center ?

Mr. S widler. Th ey m ust ha ve calcu lated i t as cheap er or I p res um e 

the y w ou ldn't ha ve bou gh t it, M r. R ogers.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Would Con Ed iso n have pro fite d by using 

hy drop ow er from the N iaga ra a rea ra th er tha n the steam p la nt power 

fro m the sou rces n ea r New Y ork C ity ?

Mr. Swidler. Th ere is only so much pow er at Nia ga ra and I th in k 

they h ave bou gh t a ll t hat they c an, so th at fo r the ir a dd ition al req uirements they mu st look elsewhere. We mu st keep in mi nd in ta lk in g 

about New Yo rk City, th at it ha s special pro blems of pow er supp ly 

because it is in a penin sul a. I t is no t easy to enter. I t is no t easy to 

get fuel in. I t is so congested th at p lants w ith in th e ci ty are a nuisan ce 

because of the a ir polluti on pro ble m and plan ts o utside the city c rea te 

pro blems of tra nsmi ssion a nd of en try in to the New Yo rk C ity area.

It is inhe rently difficult. Whe n Con Ed iso n wante d to pu t up a 

nu cle ar pl an t there were a gr ea t ma ny objections fro m people who 

th ou gh t t hat th is was a poor are a fo r a n uc lea r p lan t. A lot o f people 

th in k it is a poor area to r a steam pl an t because of th e ai r po llu tio n 

pro blem. It s pump ed sto rag e pl an t di dn ’t su it a lot of local peo ple 

either so t hat Con Ed h as more th an its sh are of pro blems in tryin g to 

figu re ou t how to get additio na l increm ent s of power.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. I am sure it does. W as there any evidence , 

Mr. Ch air man, t h at any of th e steam p la nt s were not bein g uti liz ed to 

the exten t t hat th ey could be used fo r au xilia ry purpo ses v ery quick ly 

if som eth ing wen t w rong with th is lo ng hau l ?

Mr. Swidler. Oh, yes. I think our re port demo nstrates th at if t he y 

ha d ha d auxilia rie s at some of th ei r ste am plan ts they could have 

gotte n back int o pr od uc tio n earlier. I f the y ha d au xil iar ies at th ei r 

ste am pla nts the y wo uldn ’t hav e dam aged these three u nits. Th ey were 

dam age d because of th e lack of a ux iliary pow er s upply .

Mr. Rogers of Texas . An au xilia ry is no t mu ch of an au xilia ry if 

you c an’t st art i t unless t he m ain source of pow er is available to do it 

with, is it, becau se if it is an au xilia ry to th e ma in power source you 

won’t need it unless it s m ain source goes off and i f th e m ain source goes 

off you ca n’t sta rt th e a ux iliary.

Mr. Swidler. Co nsolidated Ed iso n Co. could visual ize either th at 

it might lose all of its inte rco nnection s, or th at it m ight lose some, or 

all of its own ste am pla nts , bu t it di d no t visualize los mg bot h. I t was 

always assumed th at th ere would be a powe r supp ly with which to 

start, the ste am pla nts , either fro m othe r ste am pla nts of th e comp any 

or from th e interc onnec ted network. When they lost bo th th ei r own 

ste am pla nts and th ei r interc onnec tions at the same tim e, th is was 

beyond wh at th ey had coun ted on.
44 NORTHEA ST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

There was just one exception. They had one line tha t stayed in 

service and one steamplant, the Arthu r Kill steamplant, that stayed 

in service, and these were indeed very useful in getting the rest of 

the system started.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, I can understand that. I appreciate 

that, but it is a pretty poor explanation to people who are stuck in 

elevators or a subway for 4 or 5 hours, and they are the ones, of course, 

tha t have been complaining most bitterly about this, and I can understand why.

Mr. Swidler. I understand tha t Consolidated Edison has ordered 

a large number of auxiliary generators. That particular erro r will 

not be repeated.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In the rate structure situation will Consolidated Edison stand to make more money, or more profit, out of hauling tha t current from Niagara into New York City than it would 

operating the steamplants in your opinion ?

Mr. Swidler. I assume that their overall calculations indicated 

tha t Niagara power was cheaper, as I said, or they wouldn’t have 

bought it.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Wh at I am really asking, Mr. Chairman, is 

th is : It is my understanding tha t when th at is purchased it is translated into a reduction of cost to the consumer because of the public 

utility rate fixing structure. Simply because they get power cheaper 

at Niagara tha n they would in the steamplant in New York actually 

results in benefit to the ultimate consumer. Is th at correct ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes. If they save money it should benefit the consumer.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In other words, this is all taken into consideration in fixing the rate structure, as I understand it.

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

As you know, this Commission does not have jurisdiction over Consolidated Edison Co.’s distribution and I can’t really speak as to the 

details of that. It is under the jurisdiction of the New York Public 

Service Commission.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I understand. What I actually should say 

is th at if it was under the jurisdiction of the Federal Power Commission it would be taken into consideration, because you do in other cases 

of this particular kind.

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now, with regard to the power intertie or 

pooling—and I think you explained i t very clearly th is morning—the 

difference between a general national intertie which has been quite 

controversial in the news for some time, and power pooling, for instance, most of the electric systems east of the Mississippi River are 

more or less in power pools th at are interconnected in a giant overall 

pool, are they not ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, giant overall interconnection.

I would not call it a pool. If you are making a distinction, I would 

call it an interconnection.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. These pools are interdependent on the north 

pool for their source of power? Mr. Swidler. Yes, there is a degree 

of interdependence within the Interconnected Systems Group.
NORT HEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 45

There are some individual pools of great strength. There are also 

other systems which are only loosely interconnected. I think you 

would find quite a variety of conditions throughout th at area.

Mr. Rogers of Texas.How many areas east of the Mississippi would 

you say would not be in a power pool ?

Mr. Swidler. If I can define terms a little bit.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, sir, I wish you w’ould.

Mr. Swidler. Of course many, many companies operate systems 

which are internally substantial pools in themselves. Fo r example, 

the TVA system is something approaching 20 million kilowatts of 

capacity. It is roughly comparable to the whole Canuse network. 

The American Electric Power System is another illustration of a 

group of companies under a single holding company sponsorship which 

operate, as I understand it, as a unit. Now, there are a number of 

those.

One of the groups in New En gland has operated on pool principles. 

This is CONVEX. They did better than most of their neighbors in 

this power failure. PJM, the Pennsylvania, Jersey, Maryland interconnection, which includes the District of Columbia, is operated on 

pool principles.

I am not undertaking to say that these people are really fully integrated, but I think they are working on it. At least this is their goal. 

They do have a central staff, and they do approach their problems 

from an overall unitary point of view.

Now, there are many other companies tha t are linked into these 

pools and among them. These linkages vary considerably in their 

adequacy.

Now, th at does not necessarily mean tha t they are a hazard, provided tha t they operate in such a way as not to permit cascading, 

provided they are prepared, if something beyond their ability to take 

happens, to make the best of it, rather th an the worst of it.

But I think there is a great deal to be done to improve these linkages so tha t the systems will be invulnerable.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You mean invulnerable from internal situa ­

tions, or invulnerable from one of the other systems? In other words, 

if they were interdependent on each other, you could very well have 

a repeat of what happened in the northeast area, could you not ?

Mr. Swidler. By invulnerable I mean electrically invulnerable, irrespective of ownerships, so whatever happened on any interconnection would not impair their service.

This should be a test of management.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now that would require a great deal of selfsufficiency within each one of the operating agencies, would it not?

Mr. S widler. No, sir. It requires self-sufficiency within the pools.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Self-sufficiency within the pools?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. How large a pool do you have in mind ?

Mr. Swidler. It makes no difference how large the pool is. It could 

be a very large one. The TVA system in itself is 80,000 square miles, 

which is, as I say, roughly the size of the CANUSE area. I venture 

tha t the AE P system is roughly tha t size. The pool in the Pacific 

Northwest is twice tha t size.

66 -5 77 — 66-
46 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As I understand you, th e CANUSE system is 

not a power pool.

Mr. Swidler. No, sir; it is not. What I say is tha t you can apply 

pooling principles in an area at least tha t size, or much larger.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And the CANUSE area would be a group of 

smaller pools ? Would tha t be correct ?

Mr. Swtdler. No, sir ; it could be a single pool.

M r. R oge rs o f T ex a s. Y on s ay i t co uld b e ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now, what is the difference between it and 

what you are describing insofar as TVA is concerned, or other power 

pools ?

Mr. Swidler. What is the difference now ?

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes.

Air. Swidler. The difference now is that you have 28 or 30 companies, each making its own decision on where it puts powerplants, 

where it puts transmission lines, what size, how’ it maintains them, 

what instructions to give to its operators, when it tests its relays, 

what conditions to simulate when it makes tests of its system, whether 

to build one kind of capacity or another. All of this is a matter that 

each of these managements decides for itself.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now, in order to work it out on a power pool 

basis, your jurisdiction at the present time insofar as the Federal 

Rower Commission is concerned has to do with the promoting of 

voluntary power pools, does it not?

Air. Swidler. That is right, sir.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. AVith stress on the word “voluntary” ?

Air. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. If the companies or groups do not want to 

do this, there is no way in the world to force them to do it?

Mr. S widler. That is right.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Do I understand you to mean that you are 

thinking about requesting the Congress for power to force power 

pools where voluntary pooling is not entered into?

Mr. Swidler. One thing that I have clearly recommended is that, 

where companies are interconnected, the Commission should be able 

to review the terms of the interconnection, so tha t where the inte rconnection creates a hazard to reliability of service, the Commission 

should set standards, and implement those standards in order to assure 

a high degree of reliability.

Aly recommendations did not cover the question whether the Commission should have authority to require a company to interconnect 

if it was not already interconnected, but it does go to the question 

of standards for interconnections and for pooling.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Now, in carrying this out, Mr. Swidler, would 

you also feel that the Federal Power Commission ought to have the 

additional authority insofar as facilities and adequacy of service is 

concerned ?

Mr. Swidler. You mean to require the additional facilities?

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes.

Air. Swidler. I think we ought to have the authority to set standards 

which in turn might require the additional facilities.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 47

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. St an da rd s th at would go as fa r as to req uir e 

a public utili ty , wh eth er privately or publicly owned, to measure up 

insofar as dep th of faci liti es were concern ed with r eg ard to au xilia ry i

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. And oth erw ise?

Mr. S widler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Then, Mr. Swidler, if you did this-----

Mr. Swidler. Set min imu m sta nd ards.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, I understand.

Th en if you did this, would you not ext end or nece ssarily get int o 

the rate str uc tures of the local utilitie s, such , fo r instance, as Con

Ediso n?

Mr. Swidler. Th is might res ult in imposin g ad ditio na l cost whi ch 

wou ld in tu rn be reflected in the r ate str uc tur e.

I th in k th is is a que stio n th at needs to be faced, th at some of the se 

prote ctive fac ilitie s will cost money, and will have a ra te impac t.

My own expe rien ce a nd my own guess, if y ou like— it is no more tha n 

an inf orme d guess— is th at the economies of pooling will pa y fo r th e 

ad ditio na l inv est me nt req uir ed fo r relia bility of service.

But I do n’t th in k th at th is is the test. Th e firs t tes t is the one of 

rel iab ility. I f that req uir es a small r at e increase, so be it.

As I say, the indu stry has a lon g way to go to tak e fu ll ad va nta ge 

of the economies of interc onnection an d pool integ rat ion . I think as 

the y proceed with th is prog ram they will save more money t hrou gh th e 

economic fa ct or th an th e cost of sh oring up the ir inte rconne ctio ns and 

streng then ing them.

Mr. R ogers of Texas . You th in k it wou ld mak e good sense to sacrifice economy fo r r eliabi lit y in the over all a pp lic ation ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir. I t hi nk where the re is a conflict, relia bility 

sho uld come first.

Mr. Rogers of Texas . Now, Mr. Sw idl er, suppose you had the 

powe r to force in ter tie s, w ould it be you r p ositio n t hat bec ause of you r 

pow er to force an in tertie th at th at autom ati cally gave the Fe de ral 

Po we r Commission juris diction ove r the connecting com panies, even 

thou gh one m ight be only th e receiving com pan y a nd no t th e d eli verin g 

com pan y ?

Mr. Swidler. So fa r as dist rib ut ion is concerne d, we do not hav e a nd 

do no t seek j urisd ictio n over enti tie s which are enga ged p urely in dis ­

tri bu tio n opera tions.

But if a com pan y is a p art of the pool in the sense that its fac ilitie s 

constitu te a par t of the generation an d tra nsmi ssion comp lex, the n I 

th ink it sho uld be covered.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. Ev en thou gh it m ight be who lly in tras ta te 

insofar as its opera tio ns are concerned, othe r th an the int ert ies ?

Mr. Swidler. When you say “o ther th an the inter tie s,” you hav e 

exclude d the whole basi s o f juris dic tio n. Th e po int is t hat w ith these 

int ert ies it is no t in tras ta te so fa r as bu lk power supply is concerned.

Mr. R ogers of T exa s. That is the point . If you hav e the power to 

forc e th e compan y into intert ies , th en you h ave the pow er to force th at 

com pan y into y our ju ris diction wh eth er the y wan t to come or not.

Mt. Swidler. If you are t alki ng abou t th e a ut ho rity of the Commission to or de r a com pan y whi ch is n ot enga ged in interstate c ommerce
48 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

now, and which is not in any way subject to our jurisdiction at present, 

to become pa rt of the pool, this, I think, is pretty speculative.

I have not reached that in my own recommendations, and I am not 

sure that it would be profitable to speculate on where we might go from 

there.

I don’t th ink tha t there are many such situations. By and large, 

the major elements of the industry are all now operating in interstate 

commerce.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you think, Mr. Chairman, that some of 

these operating companies are hesitant to get into interties or interconnections for power pools for fear of Federal Power Commission 

jurisdiction?

Mr. Swidler. I understand that. I think the most useful thing 

Congress could do would be to remove any inducement to these companies to stay out of these pools, and to enact legislation which would 

persuade them tha t they sliould join these pools, and participate in 

the benefits and add their strength to the strength of the pools.

I think we have a ridiculous situation in which companies, for fear 

of their own Government, deny to their customers the benefits of interconnections in interstate commerce.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Swidler, do I understand you to mean that 

you feel like any legislation tha t will force an intertie would at the 

same time exempt tha t company from coming under the jurisdiction 

of the Federal Power Commission solely because it complied with the 

intertie requirements?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. I think these companies ought to come under 

the Federal Power Commission jurisdiction.

I do not see anything wrong with it, Mr. Rogers. It seems to me that 

this agency is required by law to act responsibly. We are subject to 

your jurisdiction every minute. We act only within the confines of our 

act. It seems to me tha t it is not in the interest of good legislation to 

create incentives for exemptions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Swidler, going back for ju st one moment, 

and then I will quit. With regard to this situation tha t occurred in 

the Northeast, is there in your knowledge at the present time safety 

devices tha t had they been employed and used in tha t situation by 

both the originating group and by the others who got caught in this 

cascade, that this would have probably been prevented ?

Mr. Swidler. I don’t think there is any question, Mr. Rogers, that 

with the benefit of hindsight, and not a bit different equipment than 

they have now, this would have been prevented.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Without any different equipment than they 

have righ t now ?

Mr. S widler. In its massive impact.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Wha t 1 am thinking about is this, Mr. Swidler. Are you speaking of human error? Do you think human error 

had a large part in this ?

Mr. Swidler. When you say “human error,” this sounds like c riticism. With the benefit of hindsight, we are omniscient. You don’t 

expect people to be omniscient about things that have never happened 

before.

I don’t say this critically, but I do say th at with the existing equipment, if these companies had known what was coming, this would not
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 49

have happened, because the first thin g tha t would have been done 

would be, I assume, that Con Ed would have cut itself off, or i t would 

have sloughed off a grea t deal of its load. Then it could have restored 

tha t part of it quite easily.

There are many points at which the situation cold have been saved.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As one witness testified before this committee, 

hindsight is always 20-20, and I appreciate that.

The fact of the matter is this, and what I am gettin g at, to give 

you an example, as I understand it, the situation in the Northeast was 

triggered by a tremendous surge of power tha t knocked out these circuit breakers because the systems could not. take it.

The situation in El Paso was caused because the source of energy 

which created the steam was cut off. In other words, gas. There was 

a defective valve, according to the report. I don’t know whether 

this is true or not, I haven’t examined it, but th at is the report.

Now, isn’t there some way, or isn’t there some safety device, like 

a side track on a railroad, where this power, this upsurge of power 

created by the loss of this line or one of these five lines, could not have 

been sidetracked and dumped ?

Mr. Ross. Mr. Chairman, there was a series of relays which were set 

on the 230 kilovolts interconnection between Canada and the United 

States, at Niagara Falls. This relay unfortunately was not set to 

separate the United States and Canada at the moment of the initial 

surge of power.

It was a time delay relay, so the surge of power was allowed to go 

through and affect the rest of the United States. Had the relay been 

set differently, it would have cut off, just as the relays operated at 

St. Lawrence. In other words, you could have isolated the occurrence.

With a different setting, knowing what we know now, we could have 

set those relays to have avoided any surge coming into the United 

States.

Mr. Harris. That is what I wanted to ask. Is there a known 

method of an automatic circuit breaker th at would act on its own, even 

on a relay. I guess that is what you call reversing it?

Mr. Swidler. There are very fast acting electronic devices which 

I think might have helped.

I really don’t know enough to tell you what improvements they can 

or should make, but I think tha t there are many th at they could.

Mr. H arris. Do we know enough now to know that there are automatic devices that would trigger and cut it off, should it happen to 

overload?

Mr. Swidler. The answer to tha t is yes.

Mr. H arris. Then this situation could be prevented in the fu ture if 

those devices were put in their proper places ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

The big problem is t ha t when you rely on automatic devices, they 

may be triggered by something that you didn’t intend to trigge r them. 

You may create a problem of service that didn’t exist before.

Mr. Harris. You mean they might trigger off when they shouldn’t?

Mr. Swidler. Tha t is right.

Mr. H arris. It would be a lot better for them to be off a minute or 

two or three than to be without service for 14 hours.
50 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Swidler. That is right.

A lot of people don’t appreciate tha t despite the triggering of the 

relays that cut off the lines, the situation would not have been very 

bad if the Beck generating plant had gone off at the same time.

But it was the fact tha t the power continued to be generated at the 

Beck plant and reversed its flow and went south instead of north th at 

created this massive surge. Had the plant gone off the line at the same 

time as th e relays tripped the lines to Toronto, the problem would not 

have been very serious.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. We would have a similar situation of putting 

4 inches of water in a 2-inch pipe ?

Mr. Swidler. Exactly.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It just would not go, and we would cut it off.

Why is it tha t Long Island and northeast Pennsylvania both continued to operate ?

Mr. Swidler. Long Island is served by the Long Islan d Lighting 

Co. It went out. It came back a little sooner because it didn’t have 

the complicated restoration job. But it did go off.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What do you mean, complicated restoration 

job?

Mr. Swidler. I mentioned all the problems of restoring service in 

New York City. Long Island does not present all those complications.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do they have gas-fired turbines there?

Mr. Swidler. They had a little generation going which they used 

to pick up the rest.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What is that ?

Mr. Swidler. They kept a little generation going. They had a 

gas turbine, and they used th at to pick up the rest of the load.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Is a gas turbine easier to operate than a coal 

situation ?

Mr. Swidler. Yn

s, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Why is that? Because you get the heat so 

much quicker?

Mr. Swidler. T think so.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What is the relationship of oil ?

Mr. Swidler. Oil is used mostly in thermal plants. It has to go 

through the furnace, much like coal. I think that the response there 

is very much as it is in the coal-fired plant.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Harris, do you have some questions?

Mr. H arris. I wanted to ask this question. T do not recall anything 

in vour statement as to what caused the line in Canada to disconnect.

Mr. Swidler. The first line ?

Mr. Harris. Yes.

Mr. Swidler. The original triggering?

Mr. H arris. Yes. You just said it triggered the thin g off. It 

opened.

I notice in your repoi-t, on page 53 it is mentioned. I wanted to 

ask you about that, talk ing about—

The line opened at the Beck hydroelectric pla nt of the Hyd ro-Electric Power 

Commission of Ontario by rel ay action, following a tap change of load control at St. La wrence pla nt in the tie with PASNY.
NORT HEAS T POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 51

Mr. Swidler. That is Power Autho rity of the State of New York.

Mr. Harris. As I look on the map, the St. Lawrence plan t is way 

down the river, No. 1, quite a long way from the Niagara plant.

No. 2, what do they mean by a tap change, and why would a tap 

change at the St. Lawrence plan t have anything to do with what 

happened all this distance away ?

Is there any explanation of this to you by other people ?

Mr. Swidler. May I ask Mr. Brown to answer that question ?

Mr. Harris. I imagine it is a highly technical thing. I probably 

would not understand it anyway, but nevertheless, we can get it in the 

record.

Mr. Brown. There is a phase shifting transformer at St. Lawrence 

on the transmission line between the Ontario plant and the St. Law ­

rence-Moses plant. This phase shifting transform er is regulated manually in order to change the amount of power t hat is flowing from one 

country to the other.

One change on the phase shiftin g transformer produces a change in 

load, as I recall, of about 20 megawatts.

The purpose in having this reference in the repo rt was to reflect 

our search for some kind of an incident tha t occurred on the system in 

the way of an additional surge at th at time tha t might have accounted 

for the difference between the 356 megawatts which were read on the 

record of the line that tripped at Beck, with the setting on the relay 

which was said to be 375 megawatts.

People were wondering what happened to tha t extra load. Why 

did it tri p when it was set for 375 megawatts and the load measured 

356 megawatts? So, interrogations were made of Ontario as to 

whether there were any incidents, or any surges on the system that 

maybe would have caused some additional rise in the power.

So their engineer said, “Well, I recall that our man at the plant 

reported tha t he was changing ta ps at the St. Lawrence phase shifting transformer at that time.”

He offered this as a possible explanation for a small surge which 

would make up this difference.

Probably the real answer is that the accuracy of the relay settings 

is just not tha t close, and also that the reading of the gages, or the 

charts, which show the megawatt flows may not be quite tha t close.

Mr. H arris. Wh at is a tap ?

Mr. Brown. A tap is a terminal on the transformer. A transformer 

is usually thought of as a device for changing the voltage. But this 

one is not designed for changing voltage. It is designed for advancing the phase angle of power and advancing the phase angle causes 

an increase in the flow of power.

It is a way of controlling the direction and magnitude of the flow 

of power.

Mr. Swidler. You will notice, Chairm an Harris, t hat in this summary paragraph you read it savs “following a tap change.” It does 

not say “due to.” It may have been the tap change, or it may have 

been, as Mr. Brown says, simply a surge caused some other way, or 

it may be tha t the relay reacted at 356 instead of 375. Maybe it did 

not have that additional tolerance.

Mr. Harris. Did the position of the setting have anything to do 

with it?
52 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Swidler. Tha t just locates it at the particular place for the 

benefit of engineers.

Mr. Brown. There are 10 opportunities for adjusting the phase 

angle on the transformer.

Mr. Harvey. I just want to ask one question. Do I understand 

correctly one overriding conclusion is that the relay was set too low? 

Is tha t correct? In other words, the load had been increased substantially since the setting had been made, so that if we get the benefit of hindsight the relay should have been much higher than 356 

megawatts ?

Mr. Swidler. That is right, and it has since been reset higher.

Mr. Harris. I s there any reason why t ha t relay should not be set 

higher, or do they have to set it according to the demand?

Mr. Brown. The relay was set low in the beginning because it was 

intended to reach way out on the system to look at the possibility of 

a fa ult or a short. When you look about 200 percent of the first line 

distance, you necessarily have to keep the setting on the relay fairly 

low, or otherwise it wouldn’t do you any good.

They are having to sacrifice looking out that far on the line now. 

I think I said this morning th at they had the relay set to look out 125 

percent of line distance. They have raised the setting to 500 

megawatts.

Mr. Harris. This business of tap changing is not very important 

in connection with this ?

Mr. Brown. No, sir.

Mr. H arris. They really don’t know why it did go out. I guess?

Mr. Swidler. They know they were dangerously close. Tha t much 

we know. The flow of power is never entirely smooth. When you are 

operating at a 356 level, it takes only a minor surge, and one that they 

would expect to occur in normal operation, to bring it to the 375 level.

The Ontario people don’t claim tha t 356 is safe with a 375 setting.

Mr. H arris. Thank you very much, gentlemen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Mr. Broyhill ?

Mr. Broyhill. Mr. Chairman, you have given considerable testimony today on whether or not the power companies or power systems 

are going to enter into an interconnection agreement purely on a voluntary basis, and also, as stated on page 28 of your testimony, the Commission’s authority on its own initiative is limited to the voluntary 

pooling among the companies for the purpose of assuring abundant 

and economical supply of electrical energy.

There was a bill introduced in the past session, I believe H.R. 6485, 

which I understand was introduced at the request of the Federal 

Power Commission, that would permit the Federal Power Commission 

on its own motion to require these interconnections. Is tha t correct?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir.

Mr. Broyhill. And the Federal Power Commission does wholeheartedly support this proposal ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir. We have had tha t recommendation in for 

many years, and had it been adopted it would have provided us with 

a measure of authority in this situation.

I don’t think tha t as the situation has unfolded this would now be 

adequate. I think now that the Congress is looking at the broad pic-
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 53

ture, it would probably want to look at the legislative situation in the 

same broad way.

Mr. Broyhill. Do you have any power at the present time to order 

interconnection, either on complaint of a State commission or complaint of any par ty who wishes to have a connection with another 

system ?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, sir; we have authority on complaint to order an. 

interconnection.

We now have some proceedings before us involving-----

Mr. Broyhill. Who are the companies or systems------

Mr. Swidler. Yes, si r; we have issued such an order in the Shrewsbury case, recently affirmed in the court of appeals. We have several 

other proceedings now pending before us.

Mr. Broyhill. All the interconnections have not been on a voluntary basis. You have used your authority to require interconnection?

Mr. Swidler. That is right. But so far we have used our authority 

only to order interconnection to pick up a wholesale customer.

This has been the nature of the problem before us. We have not 

considered tha t we had authority to order interconnections from the 

point of view of reliability or strengthening the systems, but only to 

require that company A serve company B which may be a cooperative 

or municipality. It has been in a different context.

Mr. Broyhill. To what extent has the Federal Power Commission 

become involved in these voluntary agreements? Are you involved in 

them from the very beginning, when discussions start between the 

companies ?

Mr. Swidler. No, we are not. Sometimes when a new interconnection is being planned I will receive a courtesy call from the president 

of one of the companies who will say he does not want me to read this 

in the newspaper, tha t he would like me to know about it, and he will 

give me this information 24 hours in advance.

Th at is usually as early as we know about it.

Mr. Broyhill. Usually when these interconnections are planned 

there is a considerable planning period in advance to finance this?

Mr. Swidler. Yes, there is a substantial leadtime. This would be 

a very useful period to review these plans for adequacy and reliability.

Mr. Broyhill. I have no other questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. If you will yield to me at that point, Mr. 

Chairman, any power th at you have exercised forcing an interconnection, has th at resulted in brin ging under FP C jurisdiction a company 

that otherwise would not have been ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. We can now order interconnections only with 

respect to companies that are already operating as a “public uti lity ” as 

defined in the Federal Power Act.

Mr. Harvey. The diagram shows the lower part of the Michigan 

Peninsula as a part of the system, but they were not affected. Do you 

know why? Is it because of some protective device they have?

Mr. Swidler. It was because Ontario broke apa rt tha t they were 

protected. The western p art of the Ontario system was isolated from 

the rest of the trouble area.

Mr. Ross. They felt the same surge, and Detroit Edison, and Consumers Power came to the aid of Western Ontario. The Ontario system broke apa rt around London, I think.
54 NO RT HE AS T POWE R FAILU RE----NOVEMB ER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. II arvey. Those are all the questions I have.

Mr. O’Connor. Mr. Chairman, to correct something, I have supported the Commission’s legislation on the compulsory interconnection, 

on the theory that this involved wholesale sales, similar to the Shrewsbury case, or for sales to a REA cooperative, or something like that.

I would not at the present time want to go on record as supporting 

compulsory interconnection of pools. It is limited to wholesale sales.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. There is one question I think ought to be contained in this record. It is the question of once the system goes out, 

what percentage or what is the ratio of the amount of power needed to 

put that back into operation, as to the amount tha t is required to 

keep it in operation once you get it started ?

Mr. Swidler. There is an additional amount that is required to get 

it going, to atta in incandescence in bulbs, to overcome inertia in motors. I can’t give you a ratio, but perhaps Mr. Brown can.

Mr. Brown. When a steam powerplant is in full operation, the 

amount of power required by the auxiliary motors to make the plant 

function throughout will vary, but it is in the range of 5, 6, or 7 

percent of the total output of the plant.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. How does tha t compare with the amount 

that is required to keep th at in operation?

Air. Brown. The starting requirements probably would be somewhat less, because you would be working against less pressures on 

the pumps, and so on.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Now, I was advised by several sources of electrical engineers that it took about twice the amount of power to start 

a motor as it did to keep it going.

Air. Brown. Yes, I guess I didn’t follow your question. You are 

talkin g about synchronizing the generation source and picking up the 

load in the city tha t is on the line?

Air. Rogers of Texas. Yes.

Air. Brown. Yes, you have a s tarting requirement there which results from many electric motors being connected, such as for refr igerators tha t have been out of service, where the refrigerators have 

warmed up, and other systems, such as heating systems th at are waiting for the electricity to come on, so you have many more motors 

ready to start the instant power is put back on the line, plus the fact 

tha t most of these motors are induction-type motors, which take a 

sudden surge of power to start that is much higher than required 

afte r they gain normal speed.

So there are several things tha t multiply the load at the start.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Do I understand, Air. Brown, that if New 

York could have been sectionalized that they could have gotten back 

into service quicker?

Air. Brown. Well, they are sectionalized, Air. Chairman. The New 

York City load is sectionalized into 42 different major sections.

Air. Rogers of Texas. This power or service was returned to those 

in 42 different steps?

Air. Brown. One at a time.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Had it not been for this sectionalizing, there 

might be greater trouble than there was?

Mr. Brown. Yes.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 55

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now, another thing, Mr. Swidler, with regard 

to the value of electric power in this country, I notice in this statement you referred to the fact tha t there is hardly anything tha t the 

individual does th at he does not depend on almost daily for electric 

service, and once that is cut off, whether it is hospitalization or anything else, he is in jeopardy.

Did the Commission go into the situation from the standpoint of 

the defense structure, and tha t general area, too ?

Mr. Swidler. In connection with this investigation?

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, sir.

Mr. Swidler. We are in touch with the Office of Emergency Pla nning, and with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense.

I thin k tha t we need to coordinate our work w ith them, to be sure 

tha t we take account of thei r problems and their viewpoints. I can’t 

say tha t we have arrived at close working arrangements as yet, but 

we are in touch.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. That has not been completely worked out 

yet?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. I think there is room for a great deal more 

coordination on the civilian and the m ilitary problems.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The defense structure was not affected, and 

I presume if it had been affected, it would have been classified information and would not have been pu t out, anyway.

Mr. Swidler. I think our repo rt covers tha t situation.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. With regard to the communications media, 

there were wire communications media which stayed in operation completely through this. How do you account for that?

Mr. Swidler. The telephone companies all have auxiliary equipment. They have batteries, and they also have auxiliary generators 

which replenish the batteries afte r a few minutes.

When you get a widespread power outage, then the adequacy of 

this alternate power supply is tested, and by and large it came through 

very well.

But I think this also, as I say, provides an opportunity for the 

telephone network to test adequacy of the ir secondary reliance on alternate methods of power supply.

The amount of power required for the telephone network is fairly 

small, and the telephone companies do have available auxiliary power 

service.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Chairman, one final question. Do you 

feel tha t the measures which have been taken since this blackout in 

the Northeast and the other blackouts throughou t the country are of 

such natu re as to be of sufficient permanency to solve this problem so 

tha t this w’ill not happen again ?

Mr. Swidler. No, sir. We are working prim arily with the companies in the Northeast on specific studies. We are working with 

them to the best of our ability, with our limited staff resources. In 

the rest of the country we are continuing with our voluntary prog ram 

under our national power survey activity.

This is not, in my judgment, a complete answer, either. I am not 

quite sure yet what degree of cooperation we will get at tha t level. 

So tha t I don’t think I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, that without legislation this problem can be solved.
56 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

In fact, I would like, and I am glad you provided me th e opportunity, to express my judgment tha t without new legislation the problem cannot be solved if the question is how to assure th is country of 

the highest practicable degree of reliability of power service.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Let the Chair say this now to the other Commissioners, that if 

any of you feel you want to be heard, the Chair will certainly recognize you for any statement you want to make, or any clarification you 

want to make on the testimony which has been given, and permit you 

to be asked questions and give answers on any subject.

So, if any of you do have this desire, I wish you would advise us.

Mr. Ross. As I indicated this morning, I thin k we are in the process 

of learning additional information that should be very helpful to 

this committee. I know that I, myself, and I think the others, would 

like an opportunity to come back at a later time.

I only have one statement I would like to make at the present time, 

and this is in relation to some of your questions regarding our interdependence with Canada.

It seems to me that as the Northeast becomes more firmly integrated, 

any amount of power that we m ight possibly export or import from 

Canada will be such a small, infinitesimal fraction of the whole tha t 

I cannot conceive that our system designers cannot design our system 

so that whatever happened to Canada, despite the previous experience, would not have an effect in the United States.

I think our utility systems can be designed, as TVA did when it 

lost a large block of power, to withstand the loss of large amounts 

of generation in as gre at quantity as any we can conceivably at this 

point see coming from Canada.

I think our interrelationship with the power systems of Canada is 

a problem that our engineers and the u tility systems of the two countries can work out very practically and very effectively.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes.

Mr. Ross, I certainly did not want to leave the impression by my 

questions that we should break any relations with Canada, because as 

the chairman has so ably pointed out, they have been long and very 

good.

My position is simply this, th at although we ought to continue those 

relations, we ought really to shore up our side of the situation so that 

under any kind of circumstances we can be completely self-sufficient.

Mr. O’Connor. As I think Mr. Ross said earlier this morning, I 

would like to say from my standp oint th at I do not consider this the 

Commission’s final report on this Northeast power failure.

Some of these matters in relation to defense, communications, and 

our own further investigation and analysis certainly should be covered 

in one complete report.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. In tha t respect, Mr. O’Connor, let the Chair 

say this. It is my hope, as I said this morning, tha t we go into this 

matter completely and thoroughly. What we are after is facts on 

which we can base a policy in this country that will withstand almost 

any challenge or any threat.

I hope, and I am expecting, that all the different segments of our 

economy associated with this particular industry will be most helpful. 

I look forward to it very much.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 57

Mr. Black, did you have anything to say ?

Mr. Black. I don’t, Mr. Chairman. I have nothing to add at all. 

I subscribe to the Chairman’s statement and his responses to your 

questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Bagge ?

Mr. Bagge. I have nothing to add to the Chairman’s statement.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you very much, gentlemen, for your 

presentation.

Let the Cha ir say this. Tomorrow the subcommittee will meet in 

executive session to formulate a program or plan for further hearings 

in this matter, which we hope will be complete.

The subcommittee stands adjourned until 10 o’clock in the morning.

(Whereupon, at 3:50 p.m., the subcommittee adjourned, to reconvene in executive session at 10 a.m., Thursday, December 16, 1965.)

INVESTIGATION OF NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE

THURSD AY, FEB R U A R Y 24 , 19 66

House of Representatives,

Special Subcommittee To I nvestigate

Electric P ower F ailures, of the

Committee on I nterstate and Foreign Commerce,

W ashington, D.G.

The subcommittee met at 10 a.m., pursu ant to call, in room 2123, 

Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. W alter Rogers of Texas (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The Special Subcommittee To Investigate 

Electric Power Failu res will come to order for the consideration 

of pending business. The subcommittee has scheduled several witnesses from the Government departments in order to complete the 

information desired from the Government agencies on this p artic ular 

question and associated facets of it.

This morning we are scheduled to hear Mr. Thomas F. Rogers, 

Deputy Director of Defense Research and Engineering, of the Departm ent of Defense.

Mr. Rogers, the Chair will recognize you at this time and you may 

bring to the witness table with you any associates you m ight desire.

STATEMENT OF THOMAS F. ROGERS, DEPUTY DIRECTOR, DEFENSE

RESEARCH AND ENG INEERING, DEPARTMENT OF DE FENSE; ACCOMPANIED BY CAPT. EDWARD W. GENDRON, U.S. NAVY, STAFF

ASSISTANT

Mr. T. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is Captain Gendron of my staff.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You may proceed, Mr. Rogers.

Mr. T. Rogers. Mr. Chairman, I do have a prepared opening statement which with your permission I should now like to read.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You may proceed.

Mr. T. Rogers. Mr. Chairman and members of this special subcommittee, thank you for the privilege of allowing me to appe ar before 

you today to describe the influence which last November’s major power 

failure in the Northeast section of the United States had upon Department, of Defense installations and systems.

The Secretary of Defense has assigned to his Director of Defense 

Research a nd Engineering the responsibility for planning, directing, 

and supervising the execution of technical support for the National 

Military Command System (NMCS) to insure its technical excellence 

and its proper functioning with its related worldwide command and
60 NO RT HE AS T PO WE R FA ILU RE — NOVEM BER 9, 10, 19 65

control systems. In addition, he assigned to the Director the responsibility for acquisition and continued improvement of an operating command system which meets the requirements of the Join t Chiefs of Staff.

I am Deputy to the Director, Dr. John S. Foster, Jr . My title is 

that of Deputy Director, Defense Research and Engineering, for Electronics and Inform ation Systems; support of the NMCS is included 

among my specific responsibilities. My prior professional experience 

was concentrated in research, development, and engineering associated 

with strategic communications and air defense systems.

As I mentioned previously, Capt. Edward W. Gendron, USN, my 

military staff assistant, will assist me.

At the outset, Mr. Chairman and members of the special subcommittee—and this is the most important element of my testimony—let 

me state that there was no loss in vital military capability here in 

Washington, or of any unified or specified command, or of any service 

to accomplish its assigned mission du ring the period of power failure.

Beyond this, however, in order to appreciate the influence of the socalled Northeast power blackout upon operations within the Department of Defense, it is important to have in mind an outline of the 

means a t the disposal of the Department of Defense to discharge its 

responsibilities.

The circumstances of today’s world require tha t our military forces 

be able to execute a selective, deliberate, and controlled response to 

any attack upon us. This is our strategry of “strategic deterrence”— 

a strategy which includes the ability really to respond with the “assured destruction” of any enemy, however powerful, under any foreseeable circumstances. It is clear tha t such a strategy must adjust to 

rapid ly changing international political situations, and requires positive, close, and continuous command and control of all of our military forces.

The line of authority for the command and control of these forces 

flows from the President to the Secretary of Defense, thence, through 

the J oin t Chiefs of Staff, to our unified and specified commanders who 

have their headquarters distributed around the world.

Under these commanders are arrayed the Army, Navy, and Air 

Force components in charge of such major tactical commands as the 

7th Army in Germany, the 7th Fleet in the South China Sea, the 

3d Air Force in the United Kingdom, etc. Along this line of authority, from the President downward, other Government agencies 

may influence, when appropriate, ultimate detailed military decisions.

The system which supports the national command authorities in 

the exercise of command and control is the aforementioned national 

military command system. It consists, among other elements of a 

very large and diverse global communications network, and appropriate methods of data processing and display; its Center is located in 

the Pentagon.

The strategic deterrent forces available to the President are our 

strategic nuclear weapons missile forces (including the widely distributed Minuteman and Titan forces, and the globally deployed Polaris-equipped nuclear submarine fleet) and our nuclear weapon delivery aircra ft, both Air Force and Navy.

The defensive forces and systems include our ballistic missile early 

warning system, our manned bomber warning net and its associated
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 61

interceptor aircraft, surface-to-air missile systems, our continental 

Army forces, antisubmarine warfare task forces, and other antisubmarine warfare systems.

As you might well expect, Mr. Chairman, as a matter of consistent 

routine all of these forces are exercised exhaustively to measure, and 

to insure, the ir readiness. These exercises include inspections of 

emergency procedures—some periodic and planned, some unannounced 

but generated within an organization—and some executed during unannounced and randomly timed visits.

The emergency plans exercised vary from rehearsal of basic war 

plan execution to the demonstration of the readiness of the forces when 

faced with the loss of certain operational capabilities caused by simulated enemy action, storm damage, sabotage, or electrical power loss.

In order to make sure tha t the forces available can cope with all 

foreseeable emergency situations, continuity of the military ability to 

defend and attack has always been a major organizational planning 

and engineering consideration.

The continuity of key functions of the National Military Command 

Center is assured by the employment of multiple, alternate command 

centers. These alternate command centers are both fixed and mobile; 

we maintain a protected underground command center at a remote 

location, airborne command posts on alert, and a command post at sea 

at all times. These alternate command centers are maintained in a 

constant state of readines with fully briefed operations teams and with 

independent power and communications facilities sufficient to assume 

the key functions of the National Military Command Center at any 

time.

They possess the communications equipment, and are practiced in 

the procedures, necessary to reach the national command authorities at 

any time. Fo r example, the Pentagon Center insures continuity of 

its vital operations both through the availability of independent auxiliary power systems, and the interconnecting communications facilities of the suporting military departments.

The Army can make available auxiliary diesel power to provide 

emergency power to the Center as well as to their own war room. The 

Air Force also has auxiliary diesel units which provide emergency 

power to their Command Post and Communications Center and certain 

critical communications facilities of the National Military Command 

Center.

Each of the alternates to this Center has comparable emergency 

power and communications provisions in addition to the greater inherent survivability given them by their dispersion, hardness, or 

mobility.

In addition to the steps taken to insure survival of the national 

military command system elements, every military command itself has 

a plan for continuity of operations in order to preserve its capability 

to exercise command and control under as many contingencies as can 

be foreseen.

The primary means through which command and control is exercised is electrical communications and, of all the activities associated 

with command and control, communications is the most sensitive to 

power failure. Military communications fall into two broad group66- 577— 66,------5
62 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

ings: (1) Vita l, hig hly survivable secure com municatio ns of which— 

even un de r extrem e duress—only a rel atively few low-capac ity circuits a re requ ire d; a nd (2) com munica tion s fo r th e normal day -to-day 

busin ess of supp ortin g ou r forces in rea diness f or which a l arge n umber of r ela tiv ely hig h-c apa city circ uit s is requ ired .

The form er—the v ital circui ts—are designe d throug ho ut to o perate 

in an emergency and any pub lic pow er outag e will have no impact on 

th ei r performa nce . Ma ny of ou r normal com munica tions circuits do 

dep end, to some degre e, upo n public power. Th is ar ra y of circuits 

is designe d, fo r the most pa rt, howe ver, to resist ca tas tro ph ic failur e 

du rin g emergencies—th at is, they are expected to degra de gradually , 

and in lim ited area s, ra th er tha n fa ili ng gener ally all at once.

Mr. Ch air man, now let me i llu str ate ho w th e D ep artm ent of Defense 

pro tec ts its forces again st com munica tion s fa ilu re :

Fi rs t. Ad equ ate alter natio n p ower sources.

M ilitary fac ilities normally use commercial pow er where ver it has 

the relia bility and sta bil ity req uir ed fo r the equ ipm ent it serves. In 

addit ion , however, an alt erna te or sta ndby power source is pro vided 

whi ch has sufficient cap acity to acco mmodate the minim um essential 

op erating elec trical load oi the facility, inc lud ing th at req uir ed to 

pro vid e fo r v ita l operations. In al l ins tal lat ion s w hich prov ide di rec t 

support to op erati ng forces, c ommunica tion s is, of course, defined as a 

vital ope ration.

Second. Red und anc y.

Mu ltip le redu nd an t com munica tion s circuits are provide d to serve 

critical opera tional functio ns. Th is perm its not only transm ission 

rerouting in any emergency t hrou gh the selection of alte rnate circui ts 

bu t also pro vides fun dame nta lly dif fer ent modes of communica tions, 

th at is, cables versus radio, so that any single cause of fa ilu re wo uld not 

nor ma lly be expected to affect the two different modes to the same 

degree.

Th ird . Alte rn ate rou ting.

The De partm ent of Defense opera tes lar ge message sw itchin g ne tworks. Th ere in, we sort th e messages in order of importance , route 

them to the next, switch ing center, and the n forw ard the m to their 

des tinatio ns. Th is routi ng can tak e place over num erous alter nate 

routes depending on pri orities, traffic load , and circuit availabilit y.

Fo ur th. Circu it preemptio n.

Pr io ri ty procedures have been arriv ed at which pe rm it the prom pt 

reassignme nt of less im po rta nt cir cuits to serve cri tic al needs in any 

emergency, that is, transm issions of a certain pr iority can “bum p” 

oth ers o f less imp ortanc e on certa in circ uits . Also, all m ili tary long 

lines hav e a pr iorit y assigned for th ei r restor ati on a fter an y fai lur e.

Fifth . Const ant circuit mo nitoring.

Most military long lines within the Un ite d State s a re a p art o f the 

defense com mun ications system. We main tai n elaborate com munica ­

tio ns m onito rin g and control o f th is system. Th e Defense C ommunicati ons A gency operate s a cent ral control facility sup ple me nt by technical control facilities in all its l arge stations here a nd abro ad.

Sixth . Mobile equipment.

We have military land-based mob ile com munica tion s equipment 

ava ilab le which could be used at critical point s if th e need arose. 

(They w ere not needed dur ing th e N ortheast fai lur e.)
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 63

As you can see, Mr. Chairman, our communications engineers take 

very deliberate and detailed measures to insure continuity of communications in the face of enemy attack, or any other occurrences 

which could jeopardize our basic military posture.

These measures, coupled with the multiplicity, the extraordin arily 

wide dispersion, the hardening, the mobility, and the diversity of the 

weapons systems themselves, afford the United States a deterrent force 

of unprecedented and basic survivability under the consistent control 

of our national command authorities.

Analogous steps have been taken to insure both the continuity of 

adequate warning of attack and of the ability to command and control 

our defensive forces.

For instance, rad ar detection and ground-air communications nets 

have available alternate power sources for use in any emergency. In 

addition, they are designed from the outset to have sufficient overlap 

and redu ndant capacity to permit adequate overall sky surveillance 

and air weapon direction even when an appreciable fraction of the 

total number of individual equipments o r sites is inoperable for any 

reason.

All of the above measures result in our ability to react, flexibly, to 

almost any conceivable contingency in whatever manner the President 

directs. Of course, we continue to improve our command and control 

systems to be even more responsive, and our weapon systems to be even 

more effective, and to be sure tha t they are not excessively costly for 

the country to operate and maintain.

We accomplish this by taking advantage of improved technology, 

more detailed and careful understanding of the results of planned tests 

and actual operations—and such accidental mishaps as the recent 

power failure.

With this background, then, let me outline the immediate response 

of the Department to the Northeast power failure.

The Nation’s vital military resources were completely inventoried 

within a very few minutes after the power failure and it was positively 

determined that there was no impairment of any unified or specified 

command to perform its mission.

Neither was there any impairment of the ability of the national 

command authorities to exercise command and control of our forces. 

Maintenance of full capability of our deterrent-assured destruction 

force was prom ptly verified, as was our defense against any air, land, 

or sea attack, the continued positive command and control of our 

nuclear forces, and our ability to maintain contact with vital points 

internal to the United State s and abroad—including our embassies 

and allies.

We were immediately aware of the loss of power in the Northeast 

area and the general extent of the loss. We were able to determine, 

in a very short time, that the power loss was not the result of an overt 

enemy attack. We were able to determine tha t there was no military 

emergency. We so informed the President and the Secretary of 

Defense, and offered appropriate reassurances to the public.

Of course, as you know, not all of our equipments and facilities 

operated without interruption during the immediate blackout and 

subsequent restoral periods. We did lose circuits—but we did not
64 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE—NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

lose vital communications. We did lose some navigational aids at a 

few military airfields—but no military airc raft were diverted. We 

did lose the* use of a very few military radars—but no important gap 

in sky coverage resulted.

I would recall at this point, Mr. Chairman, an im portant observation 

made before your subcommittee by the then Chairman of the Federal 

Power Commission, Mr. Joseph C. Swidler, on last December 15 

when he remarked, and I quote in pa rt:

I hope I have made clear, Mr. Chairman, the distinction between equipment 

outage and service outage. * * * A service outage results not because equipment has failed or an operator has committed an error, at least not necessarily, 

but because in overall system design insufficient account has been taken of the 

possibility of such failures and errors. * * * in system planning it is customary 

to make severe assumptions as to foreseeable equipment outages and to plan on 

enough reserve capability to continue service despite such outages.

It is upon this most basic principle—that most severe assumptions 

must be made regarding equipment outages and plans made to assure 

operations in the face of such outages—that our defense command, 

control, and weapon systems are designed, installed, operated, and 

exercised.

And it is for this reason that even a massive public power failure, 

such as occurred last November has such a negligible effect upon our 

overall military posture.

For instance, of the more tha n 350 emergency backup power sources 

in the affected area, all but 6 were able to be brought promptly onto 

the line.

And, of particular note, Mr. Chairman, is the fact that no military 

personnel on duty were, to my knowledge, killed or seriously injured 

as a consequence of this widespread emergency.

Soon after ascertaining tha t there was no impairment to our vital 

structure, and that there was no military emergency, the Department 

of Defense was able to offer assistance to the Governors and mayors 

in the affected area, and did so.

I might observe, rather wryly, Mr. Chairman, that “It is an ill wind 

tha t blows no good.” The period of power failure inadvertently presented an occasion—a unique occasion, I certainly trus t—for the Department of Defense to observe the efficacy of certain of its emergency 

procedures on a truly major scale.

Many valuable lessons were learned thereby. First, and most important, the basic soundness of past communications system engineering and current emergency contingency plans were verified.

However, we have had pointed out to us some areas where improvements should be made.

Fo r instance, the power failure did disclose that some commercial 

facilities providing communications service to the Department of Defense did not have adequate emergency power, and th is was the cause 

of considerable inconvenience and some concern.

The organizations involved are well aware of this concern, and I 

am informed tha t they are taking vigorous steps to rectify the situation. Also, we are not completely satisfied with the information exchange between civil and military communications control centers in 

connection with the process of circuit restoral. Then too, we see the 

need for even more vigorous and extensive testing of emergency procedures and for more intensive training of emergency power operators.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 65

Finally, we need to study the possible effects of any similar, or more 

extensive or longer power failures of this nature in the future. The 

Department of Defense is now making these studies.

It does not now appear, however, th at the deficiencies we observed 

warrant any major unexpected expenditures. Nor are than any ra dical changes of Department of Defense organization or procedures 

indicated.

We are now participating in broad studies of the many aspects of 

this general matter with all interested agencies. One of the most important to the Department of Defense is tha t on communications being 

directed by the Director of Telecommunications Management.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, let me repeat my sense of appreciation 

for this opportunity to recount to this special subcommittee the experience of the Department of Defense during the Northeast power failure. 

As arresting and grave an experience as it was for so many millions of 

our citizens, I tru st that it is reassuring to you to know th at the military posture of the United States was not degraded by a power failure 

of even this magnitude, and tha t our basic military emergency planning was verified.

Than k you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Rogers. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Rooney, for some questions.

Mr. Rooney. I have no questions, Mr. Chairman. I would like, 

however, to compliment Mr. Rogers on his comprehensive statement 

this morning. It certainly is reassuring to all Americans to know 

that the vital defense of our country was not affected by this terrible 

catastrophe of the power failure that occurred in the Northeast p art 

of the United States.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. 

Broyhill.

Mr. Broyhill. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to comment briefly th at not having lived through tliis power failure, myself, 

and having to observe it from a distance, it is reassuring to know from 

your testimony today t ha t the power failure did not in any way affect 

the communications network of the Department of Defense. I am 

certain tha t this testimony is very valuable to reassure the American 

people of this fact.

I note that you do recognize that there are some steps to be taken to 

improve upon your communications network and the procedures and 

policies tha t will be followed. I tru st tha t you are taking all these 

steps to put new’ policies and practices into effect.

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, Mr. Broyhill. Immediately subsequent to the 

failure of the power, certain steps were taken—immediate obvious 

steps—being sure tha t, for instance, in the fu ture all of the emergency 

procedures, all of the tests take into full account such a widespread, 

such a massive power failure.

We began immediately to probe in detail all of the forces, all of the 

commands, as to what had transpired, to be sure that, promptly, while 

the experience was still fresh in the minds of these people, we had 

details given to us of what did happen. We have had many reports 

submitted.
66 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

We have many stud ies underway now within the De pa rtm ent of 

Defense th at a re look ing into n ot only wh at hap pened but the implicatio ns th at thi s m ight have f or the fu tur e.

Mr. Broyiiill. You mentio ned in yo ur testimony th at th e power 

failu re did disclose th at some of th e com mercial fac ilities prov idi ng 

com munica tion s services d id n ot have ade quate em ergency power.

You also ind icate th at th ese comm ercial org aniza tions involve d are 

well a ware of th is problem. Is th is an area in which you ca n provide 

ade quate emergency power w hich would be op era ted an d c ontrolled by 

the D ep artm en t o f D efense ?

Mr. T. R ogers. Mr. Broyhill, I do no t believe th at it is necessary 

fo r the Dep artm en t of Defense to prov ide th is power. Th e circui ts 

whi ch did fail were circui ts of va rying degrees of imp ortanc e, most 

of them of lesser imp ortance. W ha t we suffered was an inco nvenience. Th e pow er th at would be need ed and th e alternate routi ng 

procedures and facilities th at wou ld be needed I sug ges t should be 

the respon sibility of t he common carries an d the public utilitie s th at 

serv e them .

Mr. Broyiiill. I am glad to un derst and th at t hey are taki ng th ese 

procedures.

Now on yo ur vit al circuits, the cir cuits th at we do dep end upon.

Mr. T. R ogers. We do have our own alternate pow er sources, our 

own procedures, our own gu ard ing, our own secu rity.

Mr. Broyiiill. Th an k you, Mr. Chairma n.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Th e ge ntle man fro m New York, Mr. Mu rph y.

Mr. Murphy. Mr. Rogers, about 20 minutes af te r the power fai lure 

occurre d I called the Pentagon command pos t an d questioned the 

officer in charg e as to the sta tus of the com mun ications an d th e effect 

on ou r r ad ar systems and was assured th en a t t ha t time t hat t hey were 

gea red to the emergency and therefore could meet any contingency.

I notice on page 9 of you r sta tem ent t hat you sta te that we d id lose 

the use of a very few militar y rada rs but no more g ap in sky cov erag e 

resu lted.

We re these navig ational rada rs and con trol rada rs fo r ai rc ra ft or 

were the y detec ting rad ars ?

Mr. T. R ogers. We would con sider them as ai r defense rad ars, 

detection rada rs, bu t some of the rada rs, alon g wi th th ei r asso ciated 

com putation al and displa y facilities, are sha red with the FA A and 

could be used for na vig ation.

But pr im arily these are pa rt of the Air Defense surveillan ce 

netw ork.

Mr. Murphy. You might not ans wer this if it has any security 

imp lica tion s. You say t hat no im po rta nt gap in sky coverage resu lted. 

Is th is because of ov erl appin g o f detection ra dars?

Mr. T. R ogers. Yes. An d as you know, the way th at the defense 

net is arra ye d is such that, at any reasonable alt itu de , you will have 

mo re than two rada rs looking at the same par t of the sky, and you 

hav e the r ad ar s arraye d in rows so to speak, or envelopes, pro ceeding 

outward tow ard the co untry 's borders. They must be a rray ed in thi s 

way not only because of concern fo r enemy att ack bu t also because all 

equipm ent, of course, have to be tu rn ed off at times for maintena nce and 

fo r rep air .
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 67

The entire network is laid out so th at you can tur n off a sensible 

fraction of these facilities, or lose a sensible fraction, and still not 

allow enough opening or enough gap to permit any major penetration.

Mr. Murphy. Would any of these complementary rada rs use the 

same source of power ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Some of them did use commercial power but they 

were quite widely separated one from another. There were very few 

of them that failed and they were quite widely separated. They do 

depend upon public power. They did t urn to emergency power.

Mr. Murphy. Let us say in these concentric rings backing each 

other, do you have the 9ame source of power affecting let us say 

one power unit of detection equipment then ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Not to a very great extent, no. Now I must be 

careful to answer completely from this point of view because here we 

had a situation in the Northeast where, you might say, there was 

“one” source of power that served throughout the whole Northeast.

In tha t one sense it was a single source of power. We have individual networks, individual companies serving the radars.

There can obviously be several rada rs tha t could be tied back to 

the one source. But in all cases—I should make this point—in all 

cases these vital air defense radars do have alternate sources or they 

do have backup sources.

Mr. Murpiiy. They do have alternate sources on site tha t are controlled by another site, by the Air Force or antiair craft artillery?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes.

Mr. Murphy. They are capable of operating in an emergency 

period ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes.

Mr. Murphy. For how long?

Mr. T. Rogers. Many, many days—weeks.

Mr. Murphy. Do you have a procedure on how they go on emergency 

or auxiliary power for a specified period of time?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, these are tested frequently, usually at regular, 

periodic, intervals but at other times on a periodic occasion. At times 

they will go on to emergency power.

Mr. Murphy. Do you use the international telephone and telegraph 

oversea communications facility for any defense purposes ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, we do.

Mr. Murphy. Can you—did you experience any difficulty with their 

services durin g that period?

Mr. T. Rogers. If I may, may I respond apa rt from the particu lar 

company involved? May I respond that we did suffer degredation 

of message service—of message traffic on international lines.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Murphy, I thin k the chairman of the 

full committee wants you to yield to him if you would.

Mr. Staggers.

Mr. T. Rogers. Have I responded, Mr. Murphy, adequately to t ha t 

question ?

The Chairman. This is off the record, if I may.

(Discussion off the record.)

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Murphy, you may proceed.

Mr. Murphy. I understood that private companies do have the ir 

own auxiliary source of power to operate in an emergency such as oc-
68 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

curv ed bu t fro m my inv est iga tion of th at facility I un de rst an d th at 

th eir au xilia ry pow er went out a ft er 2 h ours of opera tion. I am wonde rin g if the Defense De pa rtm en t has surv eye d the vario us civilian 

com panies or private com panies th at provide these com munica tion s 

services to them to insure th at th eir au xilia ry pow er is ade qua te, and 

secondly th at their procedures of tes tin g for going on th is auxil iar y 

power a re also adequa te ?

Mr. T. Rogers. I certa inl y believe th at we hav e po inted ou t to the 

com panies, I kno w t his to be an absolute f act , no t ju st any one company 

bu t to several of them , the circ umstance s th at gav e us conc ern. The 

Dep artm en t of Defense sta nds rea dy at any tim e an d does in fac t 

ofttimes with the common carriers, sta nd rea dy to give the m informa tio n at our disposal, experi ence a t our disposal, knowledge of eq uipments, a nd techniques t hat might he lp them to b ett er thei r service. By 

an d large, we ex pect th at th is is the resp onsibility of the common carrie rs themselves and the pub lic pow er companies.

Now it is a delic ate matter, as I trus t you will un derst and, for the 

Government to go too fa r int o the detai ls of how any pr ivate firm o r 

organiz ati on would con duct its bu siness. We wa nt to be sure th at we 

ge t the service th at we pay for an d th at we need. On th e other hand, 

we want them to take th e re sponsib ility fo r providing us the service fo r 

whi ch we ha ve con tracted.

Now, ha ving sa id all th at , I am q uite s ure th at o ur technica l a nd our 

op era tio nal peop le in the D ep artm en t o f Defense have discu ssed many 

of the details of wh at happened an d how it could be a voided o r m inimiz ed in the futu re.

Mr. Mur ph y. You s tate on page 9 th at no m ili tary a ir cr af t h ad any 

pro blems as fa r as takeoffs and lan din gs, an d fulfilling th ei r flight 

pla ns. Di d you pro vid e any hav en fo r any civ ilia n ai rc ra ft in the 

vic inity ?

Mr. T. Rogers. There were one or two incidents. I kno w of one 

inc ide nt in pa rti cu la r where I believe it was a Northeaste rn airli ne r 

th at d id land a t the L. G. Han scom Fi eld which, in ad ditio n to b eing a 

mu nic ipa l field is also a military airbase, close to Bos ton. Ca pta in 

Gendron rem ind ed me t hat the re were 10 li gh t a ircr af t in th e Westover 

are a t hat also were assisted .

Mr. Murp hy. Mr. Rog ers, in yo ur testimony you sta ted th at you 

assured the Presiden t th at there was no sabotage connected with the 

pow er failu re at a very early peri od of time. Yet it took the New York 

St ate Pu blic Serv ice Com mission and the Fe de ral Comm unic ations 

Com mission almost a week to mak e th at assurance.

Mr. T. R ogers. Tha t is no t ex act ly what I said, M r. M urph y. I said 

th at we were able to det erm ine very, very prom ptly th at the failur e 

was not caused by overt enemy attac k.

1 agree w ith you, we were n ot sure fo r some time th at this was n ot the 

re su lt of sa bo tage ; but th at is an entir ely differe nt th ing.

Mr. Mur ph y. Th an k you, M r. Ro gers.

Mr. R ogers of Texas . Mr. H arv ey.

Mr. H arvey. M r Rog ers, C ap tain Gendron, y ou r sta tem ent is very, 

very reassu rin g and the questions I have are very gen era l questions. 

On page 3 of the repo rt to the Pr esiden t by the Fe de ral Po we r Commission, which I am sure you h ave looked at, they make a v ery ge nera l
NORTH EAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 69

statement, aft er describing Ontario’s Adam Beck plan t and the 

Niagara plant as follows:

Combined, these developments con stitute the larg est concentration of gene ration capacity in one locality in North America.

Of course, I appreciate tha t these facilities are located there for 

geographic reasons, obviously because of Niagara Falls, bias the Defense Department, however, considered th at massive concentration of 

power in one area of the United States and given thought to it ?

Mr. T. Rogers. To the best of my personal knowledge, Mr. Harvey, 

which is limited in this area, I do not know of any particular consideration. I would suggest, however, that questions of this type are being 

given consideration in the very broad studies being made by, or under 

the aegis of, the Office of Emergency Planning, the Director of Telecommunications Management, et cetera. We are looking, as I mentioned in my testimony, at the matter of to what extent a very much 

more widespread, or a very much longer duration, power outage might 

deleteriously influence our posture.

I can say this, tha t on the basis of asking “Supposing the power had 

gone out not in the Northeast but other parts of the country, or even 

over the entire United States, would this have in any important way 

affected our vital posture ?”

The answer is “No, definitely not.”

Mr. Harvey. The very massiveness of the concentration at this 

particular location, however, makes it more vulnerable does it not, not 

only to power failure such as this but more vulnerable to enemy attack 

or more vulnerable to sabotage or other factors? In other words, if 

this had happened anywhere else in the country it would not have 

affected nearly as big an area, would it ?

Mr. T. Rogers. That may very well be so.

Mr. Harvey. If it had happened in the Northwest, Southwest or 

Midwest for tha t matter, you would not have affected perhaps more 

than a portion of a State, you would not have affected the large areas 

tha t you did here in the Northeast.

Mr. T. Rogers. I would like to distinguish between the influence 

which a massive power failure might have on the country as a whole 

and the influence which it has upon our vital deterrent forces. These 

forces are distributed throughout the country, to a very good fust 

approximation, independent of the public power system. They are 

arrayed with very, very basic strategic considerations in mind, and 

they have to operate independent of the public power.

On the other hand, of course, such a large public power failure 

does have a deleterious influence on many other aspects of defense 

operations.

Mr. Harvey. The other thin g tha t struck me as I read the repo rt 

to the President was that this sequence of events could have happened 

not only in the manner in which it did happen as we all know but it 

could have happened for many other reasons.

It could have happened by a stroke of lightning or then it could 

have happened by a plane striking one of these lines, or it could have 

happened under many, many conditions which could have knocked out 

one of these lines and in turn pushed all the pow’er over onto the other 

lines. Has the Defense Department considered that ?
70 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. T. Rogers. Our plans, by and large, Mr. Harvey, are drawn up 

to be responsive to, to be able to accommodate, failures of this kind 

regardless of the cause. It makes little difference, in the last analysis 

afte r all, to the Strategic A ir Command why there is a power fa ilure; 

it could be for any of the causes you have given, or the ones that did 

happen, or sabotage or a massive attack.

We must and do draw up our plans to accommodate these circumstances, regardless of the cause. Now the concentration of competence 

and talent in the country to deal with the p articular cause or similar 

causes of public power failure probably is not to be found in the Department of Defense. We would turn to the Federal Power Commission and the public utilities for such advice and experience as they 

might have.

Mr. Harvey. Thank you very much, Mr. Rogers.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Staggers, chairman of the full committee.

The Chairman. I have just one observation.

I think tha t you have answered in my mind tha t under the present 

circumstances there was no security danger from this power failure 

but that there could have been under the other circumstances probably 

but this did serve a useful purpose.

Perhaps in all the harm tha t was done and the fear tha t was caused 

in the northeast probably some good came out of i t so far as the Department of Defense is concerned for the future.

Mr. T. Rogers. Th at is a correct statement, realizing the impact to 

the people involved, you are quite right, Mr. Staggers. This was a 

very powerful investigative tool for us and we have taken and are 

now taking full advantage of it.

The Chairman. I heard Mr. Swidler’s testimony and have read 

part of the investigation that they conducted. I am sure this does not 

have to do with your responsibility because your responsibility is national defense but I gathered from it that it had to do with a little 

instrument tha t had not been upgraded or there had not been enough 

attention p aid to it in Canada th at touched this whole thing off.

Mr. T. Rogers. Tha t is our understanding.

The Chairman. Out of this investigation there was a general concensus there was a lack of instruction and p lanning of all the operators 

throu ghou t the entire system, tha t if they had planned and been instructed up to date tha t this could have been avoided throughout a 

great deal of the system and that there w ill be an upgrading and training and instruction to all operators as to what to do in an emergency.

This is my interpretation from reading the report that was made to 

the President.

Is this your interpretation ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Aly understanding is as you have described it; it was 

one p articular component tha t failed. This was the proximate cause 

of the failure. Bu t my own personal view, of course I am not a power 

engineer, but my personal view’ from reading all of the testimony is tha t 

what must be addressed is the w’hole system problem. This is the conclusion that I thin k one can draw’ from reading the reports.

I would defer to the Federal Power Commission in this sense but 

tha t is th e general lesson I believe I would drawrn from this: tha t one
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 71

must look at the organizations, the standards, and the proper relation ­

ships of the operating procedures of the whole system.

The Chairman. That is my understanding from reading the report, 

that it was a system failure. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers, your statement, of course, is excellent. I am very happy 

to have that information. But your expertise, as reflected by your 

statement, is in the field of electronics, as applied to the defense of this 

Nation, is this not so?

Mr. T. Rogers. That is right.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Are you prepared, Mr. Rogers, to address 

yourself to any of the other associated problems tha t might arise out 

of the power failure as they might affect the defense of this Nation?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now with regard to your own particular responsibilities and specific duties, your statement would lead me to conclude that insofar as the communications system and the firepower tha t 

is dependent upon electric energy are concerned, tha t there was no difficulty at all or no reduction in ability to perform 100 percent.

Mr. T. Rogers. Tha t is right.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now are there other matters of p rimary importance in the defense structure tha t are dependent on electrical energy other th an these two th at m ight have been affected by this sort of 

situation ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Well, while I emphasized communications because, 

as I pointed out in my statement, this is the most sensitive area and 

part of our overall command system, we do depend, of course, on power 

in some way or other in all of our so-called bases, camps and stations, 

our hospitals, our airfields, all of the normal day-to-day business of 

training our forces, what we call “our force in readiness posture.” All 

of these things do depend upon, in the first instance, public power, and 

a great many of them—probably if you were to inventory the total 

facilities of the Defense Department you would find a very, very large 

fraction wholly dependent upon public power.

Now the loss of certain operations came about from the simple fact 

that we have priorities in the Defense Department. We must be positive that our vital needs are met first, and then our very, very importan t, and then our important, and so forth.

Under these circumstances you are bound to find many, many of 

our installations and people affected by failure of public power. At 

the present time we are going back over these plans in the light of the 

experience of the power failure and asking ourselves once again, “Have 

we the proper prio rity system for these facilities underneath this vital 

structure? Have we the proper amount of emergency power available? Do we have the proper alternate procedures throughout the Defense Departments?”

Mr. Rogers of Texas. With regard to the communications side 

of the picture it would not be too difficult or relatively speaking too 

expensive to provide support and backup facilities in order to insure 

an absolute continuity in your communications system, would it, Mr. 

Rogers ?

Mr. T. Rogers. No. Well, I won’t say it has not been expensive but 

we do have this now, Mr. Chairman, so far as our vital circuits are 

concerned. We do have this.
72 NORTHEAST POWEiR FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As fa r as th at is concerned—tha t opera tion 

and let us say the firepower opera tio n ins ofa r as m issiles a nd th at sort 

of thing are concerned th at might dep end for electri c energ y—this 

could be done. Whethe r i t is or not m ay no t even be a pr op er question. 

I realize those are cer tain classified are as in which we may not go in 

public session, bu t the Defense De partm ent itself could main tai n 

sep ara te, distinct, adeq uate fac ilitie s to meet these r equ ireme nts could 

the y not ?

Mr. T. Rogers. It does.

Mr. Rogers o f Texas. An d in y ou r o pinion, acco rding to your statement, it has am ple sup po rt and backup fac ilities to prevent, any break 

in thi s co ntinuity?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, to meet all of o ur vital concerns in the lig ht of 

any foreseeable contingency.

Ag ain , in my testimony, I am tryi ng to dis tin guish ca refully between the adequate, the com pletely adequate, pro tection of the vit al 

key fun ctio ns, eve rythin g we need to be alert and responsive , and 

greater t otality of ev ery thi ng we need to stay on a normal day-t o-d ay 

business.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Ac tua lly the De pa rtm ent of Defense is not 

depen den t upon outside sources for public power for ful fillin g the needs 

in this pa rti cu lar area?

Mr. T. Rogers. Not fo r vital fun ctio ns. On the other ha nd we do 

look to private ind ustry to supply us service of th is type at a cost and 

in a manne r th at would pro bably prove difficult for us wi thin the 

Government to match.

Mr. Rogers o f T exas. Yes. Of course this would certa inly be a reasonable and sensible approa ch to the problem. It would sim ply pr ovide you with an addit ion al or sup pleme ntal source for transm ission 

facilities if you needed it. So w hy not use it, it is there. Bu t my point 

is th at you are not depend ent upon it in the vit al areas th at you ou tline d in your statement.

Mr. T . R ogers. Th at is a bso lute ly corre ct.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now with rega rd to the other are a th at you 

were addre ssing you rself to, t he facilities in the defen se stru ctures th at 

need electric energy , what p erc entag e of those—if th is is a p ro pe r qu estion—would be dependent upon pub lic pow er or outside sourc es of 

power, outside of the Government?

Mr. T. Rogers. I have no t a qu an titative answ er to th at , b ut my first 

reactio n would be to say the vast majority of our ins tal lat ion s within 

the Continen tal Un ited State s are depend ent lo r most of t he ir opera ­

tions u pon public power.

Mr. R( xjers of Texas. We could assume, of course, the re was no 

bre ak in the defense str uc ture inso far as the No rth east power blackou t was concerned. Th at o f course is a conclusion based upon exactly 

wh at hap pen ed. Now let us assum e t hat this had been the fo rerunn er 

of an attack wh at would be the answer the n with rega rd to in terfer ­

ence with th e defense st ructu re?

Air. T. Rogers. It would be no different.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It w ould be no di lferent ?

Mr. T. Rogers. No.

Mr. Rogers of T exas. You are speaking o f c omm unic ations and inform ational service and firepower?
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 73

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes. If I understand your question and your assumption to be that of “Supposing that this power failure were caused 

by an overt attack would our response have been any different, would 

our needs be any different ?”

I don't believe they would.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You don’t then think they would have been?

Mr. T. Rogers. No, 1 don’t.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Does this extend to the defense structure 

proper and your airfields, your installations, your camps?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes. Well, again now, under an a ttack such as you 

would assume, there is a whole rank—ordering of things then that 

suddenly becomes what you have to pay attention to, your priorities 

change. Then, perhaps, there would be certain installations, certain 

facilities that could be set aside temporarily, tha t would just in the 

natu re of things have to be set aside temporarily.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. One of the things I have in mind is this. A 

blackout of this kind, assuming there was some kind of attack, could 

certainly trigg er a conflict between the immediate movements of civilians and military, if you follow me. Let us say, for want of a better 

word, panic that would be created by such a situation, tha t would 

create many problems.

Mr. T. Rogers. Oh, yes.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The source of this problem would be to a great 

extent not only the attack but would also be the blackout whereas if 

there was available electric energy, much of the conflict as between the 

civilian and the military could be avoided.

Now what attention has been paid by the Department to this pa rticu lar facet ?

Mr. T. Rogers. I might say—wTell—two or three things to that, Mr. 

Chairman. The first thing I would say is that I am not the best man 

that you could have before you to answer such questions as these. 

Certainly, the people in the Office of Civil Defense, certainly many 

other agencies, the Office of Emergency Planning, for instance, the 

Director of Telecommunications Management, all of these men and 

others in the D epartment of the Interior, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, many o f these, other Government organizations are responsible for and concerned with elements of response to such a broad question as this.

I can say that we do have now going on in the Department of 

Defense, in the light of these circumstances, studies addressed to the 

question of what would be the problems associated with and the preparation we would have to make for a prolonged or a much wider pow’er 

shortage.

If such a power shortage were to last a week or months, then many, 

many things tha t present no difficulty over a period of hours or days 

would become much more important.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Then, Mr. Rogers, with relation to your statement which is directed to the Northeast power blackout, I am sure the 

Department of Defense has primary interest in all blackouts and I am 

satisfied tha t proper investigation has been made of all of them. For 

instance, the El Paso situation in Texas and others that, have occurred. 

Would your statement w ith regard to the Northeast power blackout
74 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

be more or less the same if you were addressing yourself to any of these 

other blackouts?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, it would, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. T have one fur the r question, one further 

thought. 1 notice that you refer in your statement to this accidental 

breakdown in the Northeast power situation. I understand tha t you 

concluded very promptly that there was no overt enemy attack, am I 

right, almost within minutes, and tha t you have since gone into the 

matter further in regard to the possibility of sabotage and have reached 

the same conclusion in that respect that was reached by the Federal 

Power Commission?

Mr. T. Rogers. I am not at this moment prepared to respond to tha t 

question. T am not sure of my facts. However, I would not want th at 

to be understood to mean th at I do have any information tha t would 

lead me to believe that sabotage was responsible, but I am just not 

positive.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. My next question has to do with reaching a 

determination that no sabotage was involved. It is my understanding 

tha t this occurred in a foreign country of course, at least tha t is the 

information th at the subcommittee has at this time. I am wondering 

if you have any information as to the extent of the investigation or 

the exploration of these facilities and their operation in making the 

determination and whether or not any effort was made to determine 

the affiliation of the employees of the Adam Reck plant or the organization tha t would have had access to this source of this trouble?

Mr. T. Rogers. To my knowledge the Department of Defense has 

not made such investigation. T would assume that such investigations 

were made promptly and in detail. This responsibility I understand 

to be one of the Department of the Interior, the Federal Bureau of 

Invest! gation-----

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You mean the Department of Justice?

Mr. T. Rogers. Excuse me, just a minute. I am in error.

My understanding is th at the Department of the Interior specifically was assigned responsibility for the development and preparation 

of national emergency plans, and preparedness programs. You see, 

there is a very definite difference in the responsibility which the Department of Defense has prior to, and then subsequent to, an attack or 

prior to, and subsequent to, the declaration by the President of a 

national emergency.

It is my understanding that it is not the responsibility of the Department of Defense to determine to what extent there was sabotage, 

if any, under the circumstances.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes, I can understand that, Mr. Rogers. 

What I was driving at is this, whether or not the Department of Defense is addressing itself in the overall defense structure of this Nation 

to knowing for sure, either through the FB I, the Department of the 

Interior, or the Central Intelligence Agency, that there is a complete 

and thorough understanding of the affiliations of all employees in 

these different plants located in a foreign country where a source of 

trouble like this can originate.

Mr. T. Rogers. I might make two responses to that, Mr. Chairman. 

Within the United States there is drawn up by the Department of
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 75

Defense, or at least under its direction, a list of key facilities, and they 

number in the thousands or tens of thousands, and then the Department of Defense and other agencies do take very, very definite steps 

to help these people ascertain the appropriate characteristics of their 

employees, to help with—to help them with certain security and emergency procedures and so on.

Now, insofar as our forces abroad are concerned I think the only 

answer tha t one can make there is that we must be properly responsive 

to the sovereignty of the countries in which we find our forces and, on 

a case-to-case basis, we will do different things.

But to a very good first approximation, and I have been concerned 

with the design of defense and communications systems abroad, to a 

very, very good first approximation the same rules apply there tha t 

apply here. Where our vital concerns might be affected we will take 

whatever steps are required to protect them.

Captain Gendron has brought to my attention tha t the Internal 

Security Act of 1950, as amended, does make it unlawful for a member of a Communist or Communist-action organization to work in a 

defense facility and directs the Secretary of Defense to inspect such 

defense facilities. This is the defense facility list.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is the Adam Beck p lant located in Canada 

in that defense facility list? I understand we can control that in this 

country and do. My concern has to do with what access do we have 

to information as to who is manning these plants in other nations 

where this trouble started ?

Mr. T. Rogers. I can only suggest tha t this is beyond my area of 

competence, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. I understand. I was just wondering if you 

had the information on it. Mr. Rogers, do you know of any other 

areas where the source of electric energy may be located outside of this 

country, where a similar situation could take place which took place 

in the Northeast?

Mr. T. Rogers. This is highly speculative. I would not be surprised if occurrences similar in nature could take place in any fairly 

advanced area where there was not a fully coordinated and standard ­

ized power system.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. What I am getting a t is where the source of 

the trouble would be located beyond the borders of this country. For 

instance, is there much danger in the general area of Detroit? Do we 

get any of the power from Canada in tha t general area ?

Mr. T. Rogers. Yes, and in the Northwest.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I should no think you would have much 

trouble with the Northwest on account of Bonneville, would we ? We 

have ample power there which is all located within the United States.

I think perhaps the El Paso situation was -the reverse of the Northeast situation. I think Juarez blacked out because they were getting 

their power from our side of the border, not us from Mexico.

Mr. T. Rogers. Perha ps I have not stressed tha t our vital forces, 

Mr. Chairman, are globally distributed. We have major elements 

of our deterrent forces located in many parts of the world. By and 

large the same basic rules generally apply. We do try to take advantage of the services offered by the appropriate public utilities. 

But our vital posture must be protected against any contingency.
76 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It is your opinion, Mr. Rogers, that in any 

place this might occur along the Canadian border, the position of the 

Defense Department would be the same as it was in the Northeast, 

that is, unaffected both as to the source of power and as to the continu ity of transmission?

Mr. T. Rogers. That is correct.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. I doubt if the question would be appropriate 

or fit with regard to the Mexican border as except as to the power 

dam on the Rio Grande which of course does not affect any major 

installations.

Thank you very much, Mr. Rogers, and Captain Gendron. Are 

there any further questions? Thank you very much, gentlemen, for 

your presentation. It has been most helpful.

Mr. T. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now our next witness this morning is Mr. 

John W. McConnell, Assistant Director of Civil Defense (Plans and 

Operations), accompanied by Mr. Charles Shafer and Mr. Charles 

Wartm an.

Air. McConnell, if you will come forward the Chair will recognize 

you.

Mr. McConnell. I have with me from my staff Mr. Charles Shafer 

and Air. Charles Wartm an on my left.

Air. Rogers of Texas. You may proceed.

Mr. McConnell. Air. Chairman, I have a prepared statement 

which I will read if you desire.

STATEMENT OF JOHN W. McCONNELL, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF

CIVIL DEFENSE (PLANS AND OPERATIONS), DEPARTMENT OF

THE ARMY

Air. McConnell. Chairman Rogers, gentlemen, the Otfice of Civil 

Defense, Department of the Army, appreciates the invitation to appear before this distinguished subcommittee in order to report on the 

effectiveness of the civil defense organization and systems during 

the Northeast power failure of November 9, 1965.

The civil defense organization, contrary to popular belief, is not a 

special entity apart from day-to-day government th at emerges in time 

of crisis to direct and control emergency operations. Rather, civil 

defense is simply government in emergency—comprising the regular 

police, rescue, medical, engineering, and other emergency services of 

government—directed by the mayor or the Governor. The role of civil 

defense in peacetime is to arrange for special training and assistance 

for the emergency services, so that they will be able to provide the best 

service to the people in a nuclear attack upon the Nation.

The prime function of civil defense in peacetime is to arrange for 

fallout protection for the general public, and to coordinate advanced 

preparation of the essential elements and services that would be 

needed by the Governors, the mayors, and their top staffs for directing 

survival and recovery actions at State and local levels of government. 

These essential elements at the local level include: (1) emergency 

operating centers with fallout protection which will permit centralized 

analysis, direction, and control of survival and recovery; (2) a reliable
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 77

system fo r receiving warning inform ation fro m the Fe de ral Gov ernment an d for disse mi natin g it to the general pu blic; (3) fallo ut pr otected com municatio ns fac ilitie s req uir ed fo r direction, control, an d 

warning ; and (4) eme rgency pow er fo r the se civil defens e system s i n 

case commercial pow er fails.

I hav e empha sized these elem ents because all of the m were in use 

du rin g the No rth east pow er failu re. A t the na tio na l level, th e Direc ­

tor of Civ il Def ense ha s been deleg ate d the necessa ry leg islati ve and 

executive au th or ity and res ponsibi lity to develop a n ationwide s he lte r 

syste m and a war ning a nd co mm unications system to assist t he N ation 

to surv ive a n enemy att ack. Th e Dire ctor o f Civil Def ense works , as 

necessary or ap pr op riate, throug h othe r agencies by co ntra ctur al or 

other agreem ents, as well as w ith S ta te and local leaders . The se fu nc ­

tions include bu t are not lim ited to the d evelopment and execution o f:

1. A fal lout shelt er prog ram, which I mentioned pre vio usly;

2. All fun ctions pe rta inin g to com municatio ns, includ ing a war ning netw ork , re po rting on ra diation m on ito rin g, instru ctions to sh elters, 

and co mm unications betwe en a ut ho ri ties ;

3. Pr otec tio n an d eme rgen cy op era tio nal ca pa bility of St ate and 

local governm ent agen cies in Keeping wi th plan s fo r th e continuity 

of g ov ernm en t; an d

4. Pr og ra m s fo r making financ ial co ntr ibuti on s to th e State s (i nclu ding perso nnel and ad minist rativ e expense s) fo r civil defense 

purposes.

Th e Office of Civ il Defense does not have direct line of com mand 

and contr ol below the OC D regional level. At St ate and local levels, 

the OC D prog ram obje ctives are accomplished by technical guida nce 

an d assista nce as well as Fe deral fina ncial assistance.

W or ki ng th ro ug h norm al governm ent cha nnels we are ass isting 

eve ry St ate, county, and com munity to develop a ca pa bility fo r pr otection fro m th e effects of radioa ctive f all ou t. In achie vin g a fea sib le 

system to lim it dama ge as a co lla ter al acc omplis hment, a com mu nity 

also at ta in s a respec tab le an d hi gh ly e ffective capa bility to cope with 

lesser disast ers . Th is was true in the Nor thea st pow er fa ilur e and 

it has been the case in most rec ent n at ur al dis ast ers such as th e severe 

up pe r Mississip pi floods of 1965, the Good Fri day tor na do es of last 

year, H ur ric an es B etsy, Ca rla , a nd D ora , an d the A laskan e arthqu ak e 

of 1964.

Th e powe r fa ilu re began at ap prox im ately 5 :16 p.m ., E.S.T., on 

Nov ember 9,196 5, co inc iding with the perio d of peak po pu latio n m oveme nt in the most densely po pu lat ed p ortio n of o ur Na tion. St at e an d 

local governm ents in the affec ted are a quick ly assumed fu ll em ergency op erationa l postu re.

St ate ac tiv ities were geenra lly the same in th e States m ost seriou sly 

affected by the po we r ou tag e; nam ely, Connect icu t, Rh ode Isla nd , 

Ma ssachu setts, New Yo rk, and Vermo nt. The se St ates all ac tiv ated 

and ma nned th ei r Sta te emergen cy op erating centers; alerted th e 

St ate Na tio nal Gua rd an d placed t hem on s tand by stat us ; est ablished 

com mu nicatio ns w ith low er a nd highe r echelo ns o f g ov ernm en t; m aintai ned co nta ct wi th th e Go verno r o r G overn or’s office; e sta bli shed conta ct with the new s media, rad io, tele vision, an d news papers, and in 

some cases m ade pu bli c inform ation releases.

66 -5 77 — 66------ 6
78 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

The States of New Jersey, and New Ham pshire also activated their 

State emergency operating centers and checked the emergency communications capability of the State portion of the national warning 

system (NA WA S). The State of Maine had no problem with the 

power outage and, therefore, did not alert their civil defense organization.

At the local level, civil defense preparations resulted in three things 

being done, generally, throughout the blackout area : emergency operating centers were activated and emergency communications manned; 

communications equipment and auxiliary generators were made available to public service agencies; and regu lar police and fire services 

were augmented with trained volunteers.

There were some calls to emergency operating centers for specialized 

needs. Requests for equipment tha t were transm itted to the EOC ’s 

were provided from supplies immediately available to the local civil 

defense office such as emergency generators. For example, in New 

York City trucks delivered 78 emergency civil defense generators to 

hospitals, fire, and police stations. One such unit provided illumination for the mayors disaster committee which was meeting at city 

hall. (In most areas, as you know, the power was out for relatively 

short periods of time. The longest period was about 14 hours, with 

partial restoration occurring in about 9 horn’s.)

Response of civil defense augmentation forces was significant in 

some cities throughout the area. Auxiliary police, in particular, were 

used to augment regular personnel. Auxiliary police, other civil defense volunteers, and National Guardsmen in New York City evacuated thousands of passengers from stranded subway and commuter 

trains. Civil defense trained radio operators were used in many areas.

In general, city and State governments quickly assumed full emergency operational posture but the emergency did not reach a point 

where central coordination of government effort was required. Response of augmentation personnel was excellent but requests for equipment were limited, generally, to standby civil defense equipment.

At national level, upon notice of the power failure, I activated 

our operations room in the Pentagon at 5 :45 p.m. By prio rity longdistance call to our region 1 director, our Regional Operating Center 

at Harvard, Mass., was also activated a t 6 p.m. Our national warning 

system, which has 97 warning points in the Northeastern States as well 

as an extension into Canada, remained operational throughout the 

power failure. This 24-hour-per-dav landline, voice communications 

system provided a ready source of information that indicated the general extent of the power failure and the subsequent progress of power 

restoration. This system, which is leased from the telephone company, 

is independent of commercial power, and can operate up to 14 days 

from emergency generators at the key centers of the telephone company. During the power failure, the national warning system was 

also used extensively by State and local governments for their direction and control activities.

The national warning system was used at 5:40 p.m., eastern standard time, on November 9, 1965, to assure the warning points in the 

Northeastern States that there was no defense emergency and that the 

warning system was normal. Upon notification of the power failure,
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 196 5 79

one of our three national warning centers which is just outside Washington, immediately checked with our National Warning Center at 

Colorado Springs and the National Military Command Center to 

verify that the situation was normal. After verification, the following 

special announcement was made to the warning points in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic S tat es:

The warnin g system is normal. Powe r failures are repo rted thro ughout the 

Northea st. Appropriate announcements will be transm itted over this system 

should the s itua tion w arrant.

News accounts recorded some apprehension on the part of the public 

on the nature of the emergency. But apprehension is several miles 

removed from panic. There was no panic. Credit for this is due 

largely to the manner in which reporters covered the story and the 

way it was broadcast by radio newsmen. This general tone of reassurance to the public was reinforced by several civil defense directors, 

including Allan ft. Zenowitz, director of th e Massachusetts Civil Defense Agency.

After receiving the message from the OCD National Three Wa rning Center that “the warning system is normal,” State Director Zenowitz informed Governor Volpe that the power failure was not due to 

enemy attack or sabotage; and he gave the following message to radio 

stations:

The Massachu setts Civil Defen se Agency was informed by the National Warn ­

ing System with in a minute af ter the black out happened th at it was due to a 

massive power failu re, and was not from sabotage o r enemy atta ck. The rap idity by which the National Wa rning System clarified the situ ation is direct proof 

of the efficiency of the warnin g system to respond in any type o f disaster.

The Vermont State civil defense director is quoted as making the 

same assumption after receiving the National Warnin g System message. The Rutland Vermont Daily Herald rep orted:

He said he knew rig ht away from communications from Washington that the 

failur e was a mechanical one. We heard from Washington that everything 

(Civil Defense Systems) was operation al so I know it was a mechanical failur e 

th at caused the lig hts to go out.

Another factor attributed to reassuring the public in the affected 

area was the ability of certain regular commercial AM stations to sustain broadcast operations through the use of emergency generators. 

Of the 174 commercial AM stations in the general area, 64 stations 

were disabled for the du ration of the power failure, 65 resumed operations within 1 hour with emergency power, and the others were off 

the air for more than an hour or experienced no local power failure. 

As part of our overall support program to the emergency broadcast 

system, we have assisted selected stations under our “Broadcast Sta ­

tion Protection Program,” to assure capability for postattack pro ­

graming of Presidential and high prio rity civil defense information 

to the general public. The support provides an austere, fallout protected studio, an emergency generator and two-way radio communications with the State or local emergency operating centers.

Fifty-five AM stations in the general area affected by the power 

failure had been or were scheduled to be furnished emergency generating equipment as a part of OCD’s broadcast, station protection program. Of these 55 AM stations, 43 experienced electric power outage.
80 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Th irt y- on e of the 43 s tat ion s th at experienced pow er outag e retur ned 

to the ai r by using equ ipm ent pre vio usly furnish ed un de r OC D’s 

broadcast sta tio n pro tection program . The oth er 12 of the 43 sta tions 

were off th e ai r for the du ratio n of th e pow er failu re because their 

emergen cy generators had no t yet been completely installed . Many 

of the 31 sta tio ns th at ret urne d to the ai r were h igh -po wered 50 kilowatt stations. I might say at t hi s po int th at when our broadcast staion prote cti on p rogram is c omp leted, it will include 658 key commercial AM s tation s.

Our lim ite d stud ies as well as the December 6, 1965, re po rt of the 

Fe de ral Po we r Commission and the Ja nuar y 6, 1966, repo rt of the 

Fe de ral Com municatio ns Commission emphasize: (1) the need for 

sta ndby electri c generat ing equ ipm ent as a matter of cou rse fo r all 

elem ents of the com munity th at mu st sus tain esse ntia l emergency 

fun ctions, an d (2) the prese nt ina deq uac y of sta ndby equ ipm ent in 

ma ny comm unities.

Incide ntally, an autom atic reaction to imp rove the sit ua tio n as a 

result of th is experience h as tak en place aro und the country . For in ­

stance, ju st a few’ days ago I w7as notified by the New Yo rk State Civil 

Defense dir ector , Gen. Manuel J . Asensio, th at in New7

 Yo rk Sta te, 

as a direct result of the Nov emb er 9, 1965, No rth east power failur e, 

On ondaga Co unty Civil Defense , in con junctio n wi th three local rad io 

sta tio ns, has establis hed a local eme rgency rad io network designe d to 

perm it ra pi d dissem ination of civil defe nse inf orma tio n du ring any 

local emergency. Ea ch sta tion is equ ipped with emergen cy power 

ge nerat ors and has provide d private-lin e connections to the county 

eme rgency op erating center. The St ate civil defe nse commission has 

established a sim ila r network using the fac ilities MUZ AK , AM and 

FM broadcasting stati on, and New’ Yo rk Tel eph one Co. Th is system 

is rep orted to have the capability of bringing emergen cy messages 

fro m the Gover nor to all MU ZA K insta lla tio ns between Albany and 

Buffalo an d enter ing 10 a.m. radio sta tio ns sca ttered thro ug ho ut the 

Sta te. Ex pansion of these facil ities fo r gr ea ter coverage is in 

pro spect.

Th ere fore, we are conti nuing our support prog ram to assist State 

and local gov ernme nts with matc hin g funds fo r the pro cur em ent of 

electri c generat ors fo r essential St ate and local gov ern me nt commu nic ations base sta tio ns fo r emergen cy op era tin g centers, and for 

other com pon ents of governm ent th at are conside red su pp or tin g elements of the eme rgency op erating centers. Also, we are con tinuing 

our p ro gram to p rov ide standby generat ors fo r these 658 key commercial broadcast stat ion s o f the emergenc y bro adc ast system.

However, we are n ot su pp ortin g the pro cur em ent of generators for 

sto ckpil ing purp oses . Th e red uction in att ack wa rning tim e bro ught 

about by the interc ontin ental ba llistic missile and the resu lta nt need 

for people to move immediately to she lter, places gr ea ter emp hasis on 

the req uir em ent to have e mergency equipment in place. Th e accessibil ity , movement, and insta lla tio n of stockp iled equip me nt du rin g a 

period of fallo ut as w’ell as othe r emergencies is questionable, at best. 

The lim ited fun ds ava ilable to the Office o f Civil Defense must be a pplied to those items whicli will hav e the gre ate st prob ab ility for 

emergen cy use.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 81

We have tak en, and are co nti nu ing to take, ap pr op riat e cor rec tive 

actions as a res ult of ou r experience in the pow er failu re. For 

ex am pl e:

1. A t our request, the tele pho ne com pan y is making a natio nw ide 

survey o f the N ational W ar ni ng System ter minal equ ipm ent to de termin e wa rning po int locatio ns whi ch req uir e commercial pow er to activ ate some elem ents of the system. Th ree such warning po ints were 

revealed in the No rth easte rn State s by the powe r failu re. Ac tion is 

being tak en to replace the com mercialy pow ered com ponents with 

com pon ents a cti vated by power over te lep hone circuits as th e cases are 

discovered.

2. We have reem pha sized the necessity fo r rou tin e op eration al 

checks and sche duled pre ventive ma intena nce on au xilia ry ge ne rators to our reg ion al dir ector s an d to St ate an d local officials.

3. Loc al civil defe nse outdo or wa rning systems, pr im arily sirens, 

wou ld have been serious ly degra ded by the pow er failu re since more 

th an 95 per cent of thes e outdo or wa rning devices are dependent on 

com merical power. To provide nece ssary backu p we hav e assi gne d 

pr io rity em phasis to o ur cu rre nt w ork with the FC C fo r: (a) Devel oping ind oor rad io aler tin g devices, and (b) dev elo pin g impro ved pr oced ures f or tran sm itt in g attack w arning over com mercial radio br oa dcast stations. Also, we shal l continu e to s up po rt and encourage, with 

match ing fun ds, the insta lla tio n of outdo or wa rning systems, even 

thou gh these are dep end ent u pon commercial pow er, because th e lik elihoo d of p ower av ail ab ility on a nat ion al basis is re aso nab ly high , even 

in the eve nt of a su rpris e a ttack.

Su pp lemen tin g the major elem ents of the na tio nal civil defe nse 

pr og ram, which I have men tion ed, are less tan gible elem ents of the 

pr og ram which are des igned to cause th e indiv idua l citizen an d th e 

fam ily to be more self-relia nt. I think thes e have direct ap plicati on 

in eme rgency caused by loss of com mercial power. For example, we 

offer a 12-hour course in civil defense ad ult edu cation (pe rso nal and 

fam ily s urviva l) which more than 1 m illion pe ople have taken. Also, 

over 2 m illion p eop le have ta ken our med ical s elf-help course which is 

prom ote d thr ou gh the P ub lic H ealth Service .

We are dev elo pin g fo r issue th roug h the re gu lar fire depa rtm en ts 

a trai ni ng k it to provide i nstru cti on a nd guida nce f or ho useholders in 

the basic elem ents of fire prev ention a nd fire exti nguis hm ent, in cooperatio n with the In tern atio na l Ass ocia tion of Fire Chi efs. Thi s will 

be of sign ific ant valu e to peop le who live in isol ated are as and to 

hou seholders un de r conditio ns of tem po rary loss of com municatio ns, 

such as occ urred in ma ny com munities because of cir cuit ove rload 

du ring the power fail ure .

To provide St ate and local officials an op po rtun ity to practic e and 

exercise cen tralized ma nag em ent of eme rgency services, we are extend in g our emergency opera tio ns cen ter sim ula tion prog ram. We 

will cond uct 147 of these sim ula tion exercises thro ug h the respec tive 

St ate unive rsities in 43 St ates du ring t he n ext fiscal year.

In sum mary, Air. Ch airm an , the civil defe nse s yste m and or ga niza ­

tio n, as a functio n of Fe de ral, State and local governm ent, general ly 

perfo rm ed well du ring th e No rth east power fai lur e. Ho we ver , thi s 

system and organiz ati on fro m a n ati on al sta nd po int is being d esigned
82 NO RT HE AS T POWE R FA ILU RE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 1965

basically to cope with disaster conditions that would accompany a 

nuclear war. The capability to deal with peacetime disasters, such 

as power failures, severe weather, explosions, and so forth, is one of 

the valuable byproducts of the overall civil defense system. We 

shall continue to strive for this capability nationwide by assisting 

directly or indirectly as many as the some 20,000 political subdivisions 

which so desire.

Mr. Chairman, this completes my statement. Thank you.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. McConnell.

Mr. Staggers, do you have any questions?

The Chairman. No, I really have no questions w ith the exception 

that I would like to say tha t I think your statement is very good, 

Mr. McConnell and very appropriate at this time. I think it is 

reassuring to the people of the country tha t you are developing your 

network and th at you see some deficiencies probably th at w ere present 

and these are to be corrected on a nationwide scale, you are continuing 

to work on them.

I think you do not deal with the pow’er failure in itself, the cause 

of it, but only as it affects your agency. This is true, is it not?

Mr. McConnell. Yes, sir, as I said in my statement, as a result 

of the experience by many of the local governments involving their 

own activities, and the activities of their supporting services which 

operate in an emergency, their capability was upgraded I believe.

The Chairman. Thank you.

Than k, you Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Broyhill.

Mr. Broyhill. No questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Harvey.

Mr. Harvey. I have no questions.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Mr. McConnell, as pointed out by Mr. Staggers, most of your activities have to do insofar as power failure is 

concerned, with communications, as to whether or not the people 

should even be on the alert for attack or a disaster of any kind.

What I have some difficulty in understanding is how you were able 

so quickly to convey messages to outlying areas that there was no 

sabotage in this, that it was the result of an accident?

Mr. McConnell. If you will permit me, Mr. Chairman, I will say 

the same thing tha t Mr. Thomas Rogers did. I believe you misunderstood the message which was given which did not specify that it was 

sabotage or it w as an accident.

I would like to quote again the only message tha t we gave in a 

short length of time afte r discovery of the powder fa ilure as a result 

of inform ation available to us, which is basically from the North 

American Defense Command at Colorado Springs, and I quo te:

The w arn in g sy stem is no rm al . Pow er fa il ure s re por te d th ro ughout th e 

N orthea st . A ppro pri ate an no un ce m en ts w ill be tr an sm it te d ov er th is sy ste m 

sh ou ld th e si tu ati on w arr an t.

Now this statement was interpreted by the State civil defense director as well as other people as a reassurance of no enemy attack or 

action or in the extreme case, as no sabotage.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. They were the ones that put out the inform ation that it was a mechanical failure ?
NORT HEAS T POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 83

Mr. McConnell. Tha t is rig ht , sir.

Mr. R ogers of T exas. Th is is th e th in g th at ha d me guessing, because 

certa inly if the ligh ts go out th ro ug h mechanical fa ilur e the que stio n is who caused th e mec han ical failu re, an d how was is cau sed . 

That is the th in g th at everyone seemed to stop at and no t go behin d. 

Of course in your offices you wo uld make no in vestigatio n o f th at , would 

you ?

Mr. McConnell. No, sir. I th in k it wou ld be in ap pr op riat e fo r 

the Office o f Civil Defense to ge t dir ectly involved in th at type o f in ­

vestigation.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. You were ale rte d at the tim e an d were ca pable by virtu e o f you r w arning system, i ns of ar as y ou r offices were con ­

cerned , to no tif y the m if the re was any need to pu t into effect any 

civil defense prog ram in th eir general area ?

Mr. McConnel l. T hat is correc t, sir , by indica tin g th at there wa s 

no change in the defens e po stu re of the Na tio n, so to speak, th at the 

war ning system is norm al.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. But you would hav e th en had to re so rt in some 

instan ces to radio or tele visi on com mu nicatio ns and the y were av ailable, because y ou r sirens w ould n ot blow, due to b ein g t ied to co mm ercial powe r sources ?

Mr. McConn ell. T hat is c orrect, Mr. Ch air ma n.

Mr. R ogers o f Tex as. Ha s any othe r th ou gh t been giv en to pr ov id ­

ing alte rn at e sources of power fo r sire n systems or wa rning systems, 

noise war ning systems, especially in the more congested areas ?

Mr. McConn ell. Yes, indeed, Mr. Ch air ma n. Ou r rese arch depa rtm en t, w hic h is coordi nated an d works closely w ith the research a nd 

dev elopm ent de pa rtm en t of the Dep artm en t of Defense is constan tly 

loo king at new way s to alert or wa rn the pub lic. Ma ny devices are 

being researche d at the present time, inclu ding p yro tec hnics and as I 

mentioned in my sta temen t an indo or rad io-ac tiv ated al er ting device 

which c ould be u sed by the pub lic.

The se at a ce rta in level of a civil defense prog ram cou ld be im plemented de pending on t he cost and th ei r relativ e life savin g ca pa bility 

or po tential ca pa bility to o ther elem ents of the prog ram . Th e i ns ta llatio n of au xilia ry powe r to a ll th e sirens in the Na tio n would be quite 

an expensive op erati on if funded wholly by the Fe de ral Governm ent 

or even 50 percen t.

We wou ld have to com pare th is to othe r things th at we could do 

wi th th e same a mo unt of money which w ould hav e m ore im pact. For 

instance, t he chances of power f ailu re occu rri ng when sirens are needed 

based on the war ni ng of atta ck on the U ni ted St ates is prob ably f ai rly 

low. In othe r words, th e sirens sti ll have a pr et ty high perce nta ge 

of rel iability. Th ere are alternate me tho ds of wa rning , as you me ntioned , in the p ublic new s media area—radio, televitio n, an d so for th — 

wh ich t does a fa ir ly good job of no tif yi ng a lot of people in a sh ort 

len gth o f time.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. Do you hav e a sepa rate broadcast facilit y 

wi th avail ab ility of wavel eng th th at would make is possible fo r you 

to no tif y people by radi o signal tra nsmi ssion th at is backed up by a 

pow er source no t d ep en dent upo n com mercial pow er ?

Mr. McConn ell. A t th e presen t tim e th e Office of Civil De fen se 

does no t have such c ap ability. We ha ve in th e final stage s o f rese arc h
84 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

such a system which is being developed and tested at the present time. 

This would rely upon low frequency transmission of either a teletype 

or voice message on a regional basis to essential local government installations. This could be used also to broadcast directly through 

commercial radio stations to the public.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you have at the present time any mobile 

generating facilities to be used in connection with commercial radio 

stat ions, to back them up in case of a disaster ?

Mr. McConnell. Mr. Chairman, we do not have any tha t are earmarked lor tha t purpose. As I mentioned we are installing emergency generators at a hundred percent Federal cost in the 658 key stations throughout the country, which gives somewhere above 95 per­ cent population coverage because of the strength of those stations.

We also have some emergency generators tha t are stockpiled with 

water pumping and other engineering equipment which could be used 

for any power purpose so desired. As I mentioned in my statement, 

the probability of noninstalled or portable generating equipment being gotten to the right place at the right time from a stockpile configuration is very problematic.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now, Mr. McConnell, you probably are aware 

of the fact tha t there have been several suggestions made concerning 

the limitations or conditions upon licenses issued by the FCC and one 

of those conditions would be the requirement tha t alternate power 

facilities be available for use in the event of an emergency. What is 

the position of the Office of Civil Defense on that particular problem ?

Mr. McConnell. Mr. Chairman, I think we have no position on the 

need for such legislation or licensing requirement in tha t we have 

found a way to get basic coverage through the limited funds that we 

are using to provide this power. Aly personal opinion is that it would 

be a good thing and tha t radio stations as well as hospitals and other 

essential facilities should, as a m atter of normal course, install alternate sources of power.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Of course this involves the problem of economics, too. I was just wondering if you felt th at perhaps a standby 

should not be something within the confines of the responsibilities of 

the Office of Civil Defense.

Because we get into a situation where we have a man with a small 

radio station and then you have a fellow with a large radio station and 

economics play a major part in this picture. I understand tha t efforts 

are being made at, the present time and are being worked out to install 

auxiliary facilities, generating facilities, tha t will cost a substantial 

sum of money in all post offices of a certain classification or having a 

status of so many pieces of mail being handled.

It seems to me tha t the Office of Civil Defense would be more interested in gettin g this information out by radio or television quickly than 

they would by sending it through the mail.

Mr. McConnell. Mr. Chairman, I am not familiar with the Post 

Office program but I assure you th at the Office of Civil Defense is only 

interested in the minimum requirements to satisfy the elements of our 

responsibility.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Broyhill ?

Mr. Broyhill. Mr. Chairman, I just want to ask a couple of questions along the line of the questions you have been pursuing here. On
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 85

page 9 you state you have a broadcast station protection program and 

when it is completed it will include 658 key commercial AM stations. 

When will this program be completed ?

Mr. McConnell. Unless we advance funding from other sources, in 

this fiscal year we will still have approximately 68 stations to complete 

in fiscal year 1967.

Mr. Broyiiill. Is this a voluntary program or mandatory program 

on the part of the commercial stations ?

Mr. McConnell. It is voluntary.

Mr. Broyiiill. Do you know the cost of development of this program ?

Mr. McConnell. We provide 100 percent of the cost of the elements

1 mentioned, a fallout protected studio fo r the fallout personnel. Radio connection to the local government operating center and the emergency power.

Mr. Broyiiill. One other question tha t is not related to this. 

Throughout the country there are a number of clubs organized in citizens band radio groups. Did you find in this emergency, or have you 

found in any emergency, th at they were of value in establishing communications to certain remote areas?

Mr. McConnell. Citizens band radio for the most part is very short 

ranged. FCC licensing does not permit class D equipment, which represents the bulk of the users, to operate in the kind of emergency tha t 

our program is designed for, a civil defense emergency declared by the 

President.

Therefore, except for the class A portion, we do not watch for, recommend, or promote the citizens band equipment. We have a very 

close connection and find some reliable value in the RACKS program 

which is an amateur operation and very valuable to local government 

in many cases.

Mr. Broyiiill. You are saying tha t the citizens band group or communications network, if it has any value it is on a local basis?

Mr. McConnell. Yes, sir.

Mr. Broyhill. Thank you.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you have anything, Mr. Harvey ?

Mr. H arvey. No questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you very much, Mr. McConnell. You 

have been very helpful.

Mr. McConnell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The subcommittee will stand in recess until

2 p.m.

(Whereupon, at 12 noon the subcommittee adjourned, to reconvene 

at 2 p.m. the same day.)

AFTER RECESS

(The subcommittee reconvened at 2 p.m., Hon. Walter Rogers of 

Texas (chairm an of the subcommittee) presiding.)

Mr. Rogers of Texas. The subcommittee will come to order fo r consideration of the pending business. I believe our witness th is afternoon is Mr. Franklin B. Dryden, Acting Director of the Office of 

Emergency Planning.

Mr. Dryden, we are glad to have you before the subcommittee and 

if you will come fo rward to the witness chair you will be recognized.
86 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

STATEMENT OF FRANK LIN B. DRYDEN, ACTING DIRECTOR, OFFICE

OF EMERGENCY PLANNING; ACCOMPANIED BY ARNOLD LEWIS,

CHIEF OF CONSTRUCTION, PRODUCTION AND POWER RESOURCES

OFFICE

Mr. Dryden. Tha nk you, Mr. Ch air ma n.

Mr. Ch airm an , Mr. Rooney, th an k you fo r the privileg e of ap pe ar ­

ing befo re th is comm ittee.

As an agency charg ed with res ponsibility fo r emergency plan ning , 

and fo r co ordina tin g Fe de ral assistance fo r the Pr esiden t in case of a 

dis aster or catas tro ph e, we a re keenly in ter est ed in y our work.

I t is sign ific ant th at m embers of th e O E P sta ff w ere on d uty and ou r 

emergen cy com munica tion s and inform ation system, gea red fo r enemy attack or major disaster, was in op era tio n when the No rth ea st 

blacko ut occurre d. Th is is n ot u nusua l. T hat is wh at we are t ra in ed 

for.

I t was tru e in case of the Alask a earth qu ake, west coast floods of 

1964, H ur ric an e Betsy, and numerous othe r d isa ste rs and emergencies.

Sh ortly fol low ing t he first flash of th e blackout in New Yo rk City, 

ou r plan for emergencies, i ncludin g an emergency inform ation ce nter, 

went into effect. Governo r El lin gton , th en ou r Direc tor , and I, as 

De puty Di rec tor, wer e kept adv ised by special pho ne an d by car 

telep hone.

Imme dia te com municatio n was e stablishe d wi th o ur regiona l directo r (A. D. O'Co nnor) in Boston who has r esp onsib ility fo r the N or th ­

easte rn States wh ich were affected by the bla cko ut.

A ft er con firm atio n of wha t ha d happened, com municatio n was imme dia tely establ ished an d ma intai ned wi th the W hite House. The 

Di rector o f O E P was constan tly in tou ch with the Preside nt.

On the possibility th at sabotage was resp onsible, or more th an an 

acc ide nta l pow er failu re was involve d, ou r emergenc y o pe ratin g he ad ­

qu arters were quick ly ale rted an d placed on a full emergency basis. 

We were also routi nely in tou ch with the Jo in t Ch iefs of Staff. 

O E P ’s emergency site is staffed “arou nd t he c lock” for such emerg encies. In ad dit ion , ou r eight region al offices were immedia tely a dvis ed 

of the sit ua tio n throug h ou r special an d prote cte d com municatio n 

fac ilities.

Now in more detai l, I will outlin e step by step how ou r eme rgency 

plan s and pro ced ure s were im plem ente d.

A ft er being ale rte d to the serio usness of the sit ua tio n by ou r regional office at H ar va rd , Mass., and by news wire services, ou r Di saster Inform ation Ce nte r at nat ion al head qu arter s serv ed as a pri ­

mary source of public inf orma tio n on the Federal response to this 

emergency. (H un dr ed s of calls were received from the press, oth er 

media, officials, and citiz ens fro m all over the U nited Sta tes , Canada, 

and Eu rope.)

Im me dia tel y follow ing the powe r failu re, ou r regional office was 

fully activate d. Const ant conta ct was main tai ne d with the na tio nal 

office of O E P and with man y of the Gover nors of the affected Sta tes. 

Region 1 includes the State s of Maine, Vermont, New Ha mp shire , 

Massachusetts, Co nnect icut, R hode I slan d, New York, and New Je rse y.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 87

Within 80 minutes afte r the blackout our regional director learned 

the source of the trouble and reported it to Director Ellington who 

advised the President.

Contact was also maintained with State and local officials, and 

with representatives of the electric power industry. The OE P headquarters emergency operating center was activated and telephone 

comunication was maintained with the affected area. All OE P regional offices are equipped with standby generator's for emergency 

power. Thus, the OE P office at Harvard was capable of operating 

during the blackout period.

The assistance of the Federal Government was offered but no 

actions were required of O EP, although State and local civil defense 

organizations did assist local communities. As the Swidler report 

pointed out, the national warning system (Nawas) remained operational during the entire period of the power failure. This system, 

which is operated by the Office of Civil Defense, consists of leased 

telephone lines, open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, with the main 

control point at Norad headquarters in Colorado Springs. It reaches 

over 700 cities across the country.

Based on what we now know and in preparation for possible future 

blackouts or emergencies of this nature, OE P in cooperation with 

other agencies has taken the following actions:

1. Our national office is working with the Federal Power Commission and the Defense Electric Power Administration in developing an information gathering system in cooperation with the electric 

utility industry for reports to the President through OE P and to 

various levels of government in the very early stages of disasters or 

such occurrences as the Northeast power failure. The reports will 

cover the cause of the trouble, the extent of the disaster, restoration 

schedules and problems, and possible Government actions. These 

reports should provide essential facts and conclusions of valuable 

assistance to us in refining and improving our emergency planning 

with the electric power industry. When the plan has been perfected 

with respect to power, it is planned to extend the techniques to cover 

transportation, communications, and other essential resource areas.

2. OE P has requested the Departments of Commerce, Interior, and 

Agriculture to conduct a survey among leading industrial concerns 

in their particular resource jurisdictions to determine the effect of 

blackout on operations. This survey will include such industries 

as electrical equipment, petroleum, chemicals, and food processors.

3. OEP, as a result of this experience, has improved its ability to 

respond to this type of significant incident by installing strategically 

placed telephones; an automatic staff reporting system; and establishing closer working relationships with other agencies, including 

DOD, in connection with reporting such instances, and in lessening 

their impact by producing quick, accurate information to local authorities and to the public. The power failure also emphasizes the 

need for emergency generators in all essential facilities, including 

hospitals. In addition, it seeks to highlight the need, in power pools 

such as Canuse, for a central organization to serve as a source of 

information and contact whenever difficulties develop.
88 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

The inquiry conducted by FF C was attended by OEP ; the continuing studies by special technical groups growing out of that inquiry 

as well as this one will be looked to as a source of essential information 

and findings which could provide a base fo r f urther improving emergency preparedness with the electric power industry. In addition, 

the surveys undertaken by the Federal agencies at the request of OF P 

should provide useful information to enable us to further refine the 

level of emergency preparedness in other essential industries.

United States-Canadian cooperation: I should add at this point that 

as a result of a 1963 exchange of notes with Canada there is an agreement between the two countries on civil emergency planning and we, 

therefore, maintain almost daily contact with our Canadian counterparts. Accordingly, we have been in touch with the Canadian Emergency Measures Organization and the Office of the Secretary to the 

Cabinet on the blackout and the lessons to be learned from it. Our 

reports and other data have been furnished the Director General of 

the Canadian Emergency Measures Organization who is preparing 

a report to his Government on what the Canadians refer to as an emergency of a “character and magnitude never contemplated.”

As your committee has been informed, the power failure, according 

to Canadian officials, was traced to the Ontario Hydro-Generating 

System along the Niagara River in Canada. As I previously indicated, this was also reported to O EP headquarters by our northeastern 

regional director shortly afte r the blackout. It was later confirmed 

by Chairman Ross Strike of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of 

Ontario. This was also reported to Governor Ellington by Chairman 

Swidler. Your committee is familiar with the technical details as to 

what happened, so I will not repeat them.

Finally, we would observe th at this disaster, like most others, poses 

unique challenges and problems. Fortu nately, there was no need for 

Federal disaster or financial assistance as has been the case in so many 

disasters caused by flood, hurricane, and other natural causes during 

recent years.

Thank you.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Dryden, for your statement. 

The Chair recognizes Mr. Rooney, the gentleman from Pennsylvania 

for questions.

Mr. Rooney. Mr. Dryden, I would like to commend you on your excellent statement. I would like to know what the relationship of the 

Office of Emergency Plan ning is with the Director of Civil Defense 

and also with Mr. Rogers’ organization who testified this morning.

Do you work with one another?

Mr. Dryden. Yes, sir. The Office of Civil Defense is a division of 

the Department of the Army, of the D epartment of Defense. We are 

two separate organizations with two separate responsibilities. We 

natu rally have very close relationships with them because there is an 

interrelationship of our work.

Mr. R ooney. You spoke about the possibility that sabotage was responsible for the outage. What did your agency do t o investigate this ?

Mr. Dryden. You will recall th at originally there was absolutely no 

information whatsoever on what had happened. The lights just went 

out across that area quickly.
NORT HEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 89

Through our emergency operat ing center we were able to get in touch 

immediately with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and their monitoring system to determine tha t to their knowledge there apparently was not sabotage involved.

It was too widespread and there were no indications of uprisings 

or explosions or other unusual, unna tural acts tha t would lead us to 

believe that there was sabotage.

I might add tha t we, not knowing certainly tha t there was not, did 

go on full alert in our agency, which we still th ink was the rig ht tiling 

to do.

Mr. Rooney. But your agency did not pinpoint the failure of the 

power ?

Mr. Dryden. Not for about an hour.

Mr. Rooney. You stated about 80 minutes after the blackout your 

regional director learned the source of trouble. Did your agency conduct this investigation ?

Mr. Dryden. What happened, Mr. Rooney, in this particu lar instance, is tha t within a few minutes the blackout enveloped the Northeast area which all falls within the jurisdiction of our regional director 

at Harvard, Mass.

He is very much in touch with all the industry people throughout the 

Northeast, such as Boston Edison and Consolidated Edison, in New 

York. He was in touch with them all, trying to pinpoint just what 

had happened. Through one of the companies he did get the message 

tha t the blackout had been initiated in this general area.

Mr. Rooney. Your regional office at Ha rvard in the case of an overt 

attack, could it have been wiped out or would it have survived?

Mr. Dryden. At the present time if there had been a nuclear detonation in that general area, it very probably wTould have been wiped out.

I might add a t the present time, Mr. Rooney, we are in the planning 

stage for seven protected facilities for our regional offices; we have 

one in being at Denton, Tex., at the present time. For the other seven, 

money has been appropriated by the Congress and plans are now 

at the stage where we can begin construction in the next few months 

on some of them.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Harvey.

Mr. Harvey. I have no questions, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Dryden, the Office of Emergency Pla nning, does tha t mean that you come into being after an emergency or 

do you devote much of your time and energy to making plans to avert 

emergencies ?

Mr. Dryden. Mr. Chairman, we like to think tha t we are devoting 

full time to planning to handle emergencies except for the times when 

we are in one. We are in one quite often these days to the tune of 

25 or 30 declared disasters by the President each year. But between 

those we are constantly planning.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Does your Office make any basic planning to 

determine what the needs might be to meet the electric energy requirements of this country and to help lay a predicate and advise the President as to what ought to be done to promote this in order to avert 

emergencies where you have a blackout?

Mr. Dryden. I would say tha t we are, certainly in the case of electric power today. I would, I think, be remiss to say we were doing
90 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

much about it before that. There has been a constant study and constant planning by the electric industry itself over the years to make 

these grid systems as foolproof as they can be. The hearings brought 

out there are several schools of thought on whether they have oversafeguarded their systems which may have contributed to the problem 

tha t took place at this time.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I notice th at in the economic affairs office it 

says “it developed measures to strengthen U.S. resources and for the 

use and management of its resources to meet the requirements of any 

national emergency.”

Now was there any planning or work done with regard to a possible 

blackout in the Northeast prior to the time this happened?

Mr. Dryden. Mr. Chairman, I have Mr. Arnold Lewis here, my 

expert on power tha t I would like to ask to respond to tha t if he could.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Yes. Your name is Arnold Lewis?

Mr. Lewis. Yes.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Your capacity ?

Mr. Lewis. Chief of the Construction, Production, and Power Resources Office in OEP.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Fine.

Mr. Lewis. There are continuing studies on resource availability 

in event of an emergency, including electric power. In this connection 

the Defense Electric Power Administration in the Department of the 

Interior, which has a delegation to perform certain emergency planning functions for electric power, conducted a survey on the vulnerability of distribution systems in the electric power industry. The 

study included New England and New York and was carried out 

against a backdrop of nuclear attack assumption.

The Fed eral Power Commission also has an Executive Order assignment for emergency planning. They prepare studies and reports on 

availability, capacity, and requirements for electric power generation. 

They collect current data from the electric industry on a regu lar basis 

so tha t the information sources used for the studies are the latest. 

OE P is presently engaged in another study on electric power supply 

demands which would come within the description you have just read 

to reexamine the likelihood of power availability in an emergency.

So there are continuing studies on power capability and demands 

for power after a nucler attack going on in our agency with the help 

of the other agencies.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Had there been any anticipation of a possibility of such a thing as the Northeast power blackout from your 

studies as to electric energy resources and transmission systems?

Mr. Lewis. No, sir, our study was directed toward the eventuality 

of nuclear attack, the substance of these studies reflected tha t there 

would be enough generating capacity remaining to handle the load 

of the surviving population.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do I understand by that now that your planning was confined simply to what to do in the event of a nuclear 

attack?

Mr. Lewis. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In doing this you would, of course, make 

studies and research with regard to the amount of available electric
NORTH EAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 91

power or energy or any other facilities tha t you might need to meet 

such a situation ?

Mr. Lewis. Yes. Tha t was the key Study that had been performed, 

and we assumed therefrom that capability to meet current nonnuclear requirements would be easier to achieve than under a nuclear 

condition with heavy damage to the generating and transmission 

facilities.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now in doing this I would presume that you 

would make a very close and thorough and exhaustive study of the 

availability of electric energy to the extent that you would know every 

kilowatt t hat you would have available for use by this country either 

as a primary source or as a substitute source?

Mr. Lewis. Yes. This is always considered in our studies. I 

might add, and should have stressed earlier, tha t the Federal Power 

Commission within its statutory authority, conducted a national power 

survey on power availability and demand projected through 1980. So 

tha t we had studies based on nuclear and nonnuclear assumptions.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Now are any studies utilized for the purpose 

of tryin g to lay a predicate to avert a possible emergency ?

Mr. Lewis. Yes, to the extent tha t we can determine any shortages 

or difficulties and to the extent we can work with industry or encourage them t.o take corrective action, this would improve our readiness.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You are beginning from a different premise. 

What I am beginning from is a premise of getting this thing worked 

out in a planning basis so that you don’t have an emergency. As I 

understand you, you are working from the premise you are going to 

be prepared and when the emergency occurs you are going to be able 

to meet it.

Wh at I want to do is avoid the emergency in the first place.

Mr. Lewis. When it comes to the technical aspects of the power industry such as averting an incident as occurred, our agency has not 

been doing anything on tha t. We relv on the advice and the competence of the technical agencies in the Government such as FPC.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Would not your Office be charged with having 

full and complete information as to the continuity of the availability 

of electric energy th at m ight be needed in any area of this country and 

especially in a thickly congested area ?

Mr. Lewis. Yes, I believe th at this information is available to us. 

We so use it and I must say t hat up until the incident occurred I don’t 

believe any technical talent h ad been able to foresee a combination of 

circumstances or events such as occurred to throw this tremendous 

load in the area.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Let us get to the incidents themselves. It 

seems tha t everybody quickly accepted the fact t ha t it was an accident. As I recall, the Federal Power Commission testimony was to 

the effect that they concluded quite soon after the blackout that there 

was no sabotage involved, tha t this was the result of the failure of a 

switch of some kind in Canada, in Ontario. Now has there been any 

information available or is there now any information available as to 

what made that switch fail ?

Mr. Lewis. To my knowledge nothing specific. The immediate 

cause was the switch trip tha t created the entire sequence of overloading and cascading.
92 NO RTHE AS T POW ER FAILU RE----N OVE MBER 9, 10 , 1965

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What caused the trip ?

Mr. Lewis. The immediate causes were low settings, plus overload 

due to repairs in the system. I do not think we know how the settings 

and repairs are coordinated, or why not.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you know anybody who does ?

Mr. Lewis. No, sir. At this moment I have not been in touch 

with anybody who might know. I assume tha t this will be developed 

as a result of further studies by the FPC.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Let us go a little furth er. What could have 

caused that switch to trip ?

Mr. Lewis. I don’t believe I can say, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Could it not have been by a human element?

Mr. Lewis. All indications are that it was mechanical although 

it does not eliminate, I suppose, the possibility of some human element.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. By mechanical, as I understood the Federal 

Power Commission, a load could have been put on th at particu lar situation, I don’t know the parlance of the game sufficiently to use the 

righ t terms, but whatever it was that tripped, t hat a load could have 

been p ut on tha t circuit to where it would have caused tha t to trip 

and apparently they just stopped right there.

What I am interested in, was it a load that caused it to trip. If it 

was extra load tha t caused it to trip where did that load come from ?

That load could have been started if I understand this thing right 

by some human action somewhere down the line, maybe many miles 

from the point where the switch tripped.

Is tha t right?

Mr. Lewis. It is a possibility. There is no doubt tha t a load exceeding the limits or the backup relay caused the trip. If I recall 

from the FPC report, there was a combination of circumstances which 

built up to generate this load which I thin k is pretty well explained in 

the report without perhaps gettin g down to the contributing causes 

for the actual tripping. The FPC studies should provide answers on 

these causes.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now this shows in this Northeast Power 

Failure Report by the Federal Power Commission:

The dis tu rb ance w as in it ia te d on one of th e m ai n tr an sm is si on line s ta kin g 

po wer nort h fr om th e Be ck Sta tion of O nta ri o H ydro on th e N ia gar a River . * * ♦ 

a t 5 :16 p.m. a ba ck up pr ot ec tive re la y * * * ca us ed th e cir cuit bre aker to dis ­

co nn ec t th e lin e.

Now the point I am ge tting at is, everyone was so quick to assume 

tha t there was no sabotage. Of course, it is very good news if there 

is not sabotage. I would certainly hope tha t this would be the case 

but I don’t think that we ought to close the door to the possibility of 

sabotage in a situation of this kind, that if there was no sabotage at 

that time the sequence of events th at happened might put some ideas 

in the minds of the enemies of this country to where sabotage may be 

the thing the next time.

What I am think ing about, is, are we doing the proper emergency 

planning to find out the source of this situation ?

Mr. Lewis. I think tha t the FP C in its continuing studies will 

attem pt to determine the causes for the tripping . I believe t hat the
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 93

re po rt did not get to th at . I th in k it ind ica ted th is was yet to be 

deter mi ned throug h its studie s of op erating instr uc tio ns and pr ocedures , eq uip me nt s tat us, stability, et cetera.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now in making thes e studie s of ava ilable 

ele ctric ene rgy w hich I u nd erstan d fal ls on y ou r Office, have you made 

any inv est iga tio n at all or do you have access to record s in the Ca ­

na dian Government or legal entities, corpo rat ion s, whoever might be 

su pp lying the power, as to th ei r per son nel who man these installatio ns t ha t we d epe nd o n?

Mr. Lewis. We ju st star ted wo rk wi th Ca na da on the exchang e 

of elec tric power in emergency. We me t in Aug us t 1965 to lay the 

grou nd wo rk fo r jo in t studie s on powe r av ailability and exchange in 

the event of an emergency.

We did not get into any de tai ls concern ing th e excha nge of data. 

Th is m at te r undoubted ly wou ld arise in the ne xt few mee tings.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. To wha t exten t are we dependent upon Ca nad a in th at pa rtic ul ar are a where the Ad am Beck Pla nt is located? 

To wh at ex ten t are we dependent upon Ca na dian sources fo r power?

Mr. Lewis. I believe the in terti e wi th Ont ario hy dro is part o f the 

system t o meet peakloa d req uir em ents in our No rth east are a an d also 

to prov ide to Ca nada w ha t th ey w ould need, thr ou gh this interc hange.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. You say we would be dependent a c ertai n pe rcen tage o f th e time whic h would probably be go verned by th e p eak loa d 

require me nt ?

Mr. Lew is. Yes.

Mr. Rogers of Tex as. Ac tuall y the times th at both of these facilities ge t in tro ub le is at peakloa d times, is it not, in so fa r as electri c 

energ y is concern ed? I f you di d no t hav e thes e peakloa d requ ire ­

me nts you could save a lot of money, save a lot of tro uble, an d get 

away fro m a lot o f emergencies ?

Mr. Lew is. Peakloa d is ine vitable in a power system. I th in k the 

purpose of the intertie is to reduce the am ount of reserve r equir ed for 

sta nd by , prob ably t he lea st economical aspect of a system. Also , the 

interties h elp reduce the cost fo r t he reserves.

I believe thes e are some of the fun ctions and purpo ses of the 

interti e.

Mr. R ogers of Tex as. To me the me aning of peakloa d situatio n is 

prob ably d iffe rent tha n in t he ord inar y electri c e nergy ta lk. Pe ak loa d 

means no t only the req uir em ents bu t it also mea ns the ab ility of the 

pr od uc ing en tity to provide the nece ssary requirements.

Of course, the prod ucing fac ilitie s are bu ilt to meet wh at you consid er yo ur pea kloads insofar as req uir em ents are concerned. One 

th in g th at distu rbs me is wh eth er or no t th is coun try has an d can 

be co mplete ly self-sufficient in meetin g peak loa ds in a civilian economy 

an d to have a sufficient backlog o r s up po rt process to meet w ha t would 

be a subs tan tia lly gr ea ter peakloa d in an eme rgency or m ili ta ry 

sit ua tio n.

Mr. Lewis If you are talk in g about civ ilian economy dem and s, I 

believe the proje ctions to 1980 ind ica te thes e loads will be met. In 

an emergency with undue gr ow th in dem and , we can pu t into effect, 

as we did in Ko rea and W orld W ar II, a system of use pr iorit ies 

and cu rta ilm en ts which dir ected t he distr ibution of energ y well away

66 -5 77 — 66------ 7
94 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

from unessen tial uses. If we are conside rin g a nucle ar sit ua tio n, 

studie s thus fa r seem to ind ica te th at you lose more load, th at is more 

dem and , than you do ge ne ratin g capacit y, so th at the balanc e would 

ma intai n in th at kind of situation.

Mr. Rogers o f Texas. Ru t don’t you th in k th at yo ur plan ning and 

the Office o f Em erg ency Pl an ning ought to addre ss them selves to the 

pro position of nuclear att ack?

Mr. Lewis. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers o f Tex as. Th at ou gh t to be t he ir peak load, sho uld it not 

and th ei r req uir em ents should be measu red by a nucle ar attack and 

wh at occurs, yo ur needs, immediately af te r?

Mr. Lewis. Yes, s ir; this is wh at we have done in th at stu dy. The 

initial dem and s are q uite low comp are d to peac etim e dem and because 

of the loss of po pulat ion and the loc ation of the consumers.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is t he U nited States a t the presen t tim e selfsufficient to meet those req uirem ent s wi thou t calling upo n forei gn 

sourc es for electric energy?

Mr. Lewis. I wou ld say on an overa ll basis our stu dy seemed to 

ind ica te this. Th e reason we wen t to Ca nada to discuss pla ns for 

the exchang e of pow er in eme rgen cy is th at you may have unusual 

situatio ns or needs in certa in localities, depending on the kind of 

attack and the effects it h as, so th at t he re m ay be some isolate d areas 

th at might be req uir ed to seek assista nce no rth of ou r boundary.

So, we are tryin g to includ e in ou r pl an ning all possible sources 

of electri c pow er th at could be used at t he time af te r a nucle ar attack.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. In De tro it are we tied in pr et ty close with 

Ca nada ?

Mr. Lewis. T o my knowledge t here is an inter tie connection at Detroi t, also.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You un de rst an d, I am no t ma d at Ca nada. 

I don’t wa nt peo ple to th in k I am ma d at Ca nada. I don’t wa nt this 

country to ge t in t roub le sim ply b y no t ge tti ng m ad at Ca nada. I f i t 

is ne cessary to g et mad a t Ca na da to g et th is c ountr y str aigh tene d out 

so th at it will n ot have vuln era bil ity , if t h at is wha t is requir ed, I th in k 

th at is wha t we oug ht to do.

Has y ou r Office, yours or M r. Dry de n’s, m ade any recom mendatio n 

or do you have any recom mendations in the making wi th rega rd to 

str en gthe ning ou r electri c energ y reso urces in th is c ountr y?

Mr. Lewis. I would say th at at th is sta ge of the studie s th at are 

underway as a resu lt of th e Nor thea st failu re, wh at we are presently 

doing is tryin g to accu mu late all th e findin gs of the various in ve sti ga ­

tions. Th ere hav e been ma ny conduct ed by indiv idua l agen cies with 

resource responsibilitie s th at consume electric power. Of course the 

key to the sta bility and stre ng th of t he e lectric pow er in du stry is the 

studie s th at are b eing made by the Fe de ral Powe r Commission.

As th ei r December 6 r ep or t ind ica tes , th ere are ma ny avenues and 

ma ny are as of fu rthe r stu dy yet to be con sum mated which I th in k 

would be qu ite cruc ial to any. rec om mendations we m ight care to make.

So we w ould wa it to see wha t t hes e s tud ies look like.

Mr. Rogers of T exas. Is t he h ead of the Office of Em erg ency P la nni ng a member of the Na tio na l Se cu rit y Cou ncil?

Mr. Lewis. Yes, sir.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 95

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As I understand you, this matter is all g ath ­

ered together, this information is all gathered together, and he is a 

member. Who is the head of the Office of Emergency Planning ?

Mr. Dryden. I am the Acting Director.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. You have a vacant position at the top?

Mr. Dryden. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. That is righ t, Mr. Elling ton resigned.

But as a member of the National Security Council it is my understand ing that recommendations were made to the Security Council and 

by the Security Council to the President of the United States as to 

measures which should be taken to provide a means or method of meeting any challenges against this country.

Certainly to my mind tha t would encompass adequate supplies of 

electric energy to meet our military needs and certainly the civilian 

needs.

Mr. Dryden. This is tied into this continuing report, Mr. Rogers, 

tha t is underway now. I think it will bring out any deficiencies 

which might show up. With respect to the Canadians, we have this 

past year I think, more than in the past, developed closer ties with 

their civil emergency organization.

We have had them down here several times, we have been up there 

several times, to work in closer coordination with them in all resource 

areas and try to develop arrangements so tha t we can help each other 

at any crucial time. I think tha t probably before the study is over 

this matter will be determined as to the cause of that relay switch 

operating.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Don’t you think, Mr. Dryden, so long as 

you have mechanical operation that all of them are subject to human 

erro r ?

Mr. Dryden. They certainly are.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It is just one of those things you can’t get 

away from. Tha t if this country is in the least dependent on a 

foreign country, friendly or unfriendly, that we ought to have access to all information on the people manning the plants ?

Mr. Dryden. I think tha t is not unreasonable a t all.

Now, Mr. Rogers, the grid system as I understand it, and I am 

not a technician in this field, was devised and designed and engineered 

to reduce the likelihood of this kind of failure. There are some schools 

of thought, as I said before, tha t feel maybe it was overengineered, 

tha t i t is so delicate, so finely toned and honed to keep something like 

this from happening, tha t the slightest dislocation set it off in an 

effort to stop it bu t instead of stopping it, pushed it forward.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I thin k the overrefinement is pointed out by 

the fact tha t they had every gadget known to mankind on a huge 

board to tell where the trouble was but when the lights went out 

they could not see the board. Maybe we have overrefined the situation 

too much.

I am a little b it confused th at Office of Emergency Plan ning seems 

to be primarily dedicated to working with an emergency after it has 

happened. I am wondering why perhaps more attention should not 

be paid to averting an emergency rath er than all of the work done 

to work with it after it has occurred.
96 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Dryden. I certainly think your question is well put. I might 

point out that the philosophy of the Office of Emergency Plan ning in 

its inception, as I understand it, was for the purpose of giving the 

country resources and the ability to recover from nuclear attack. I 

think this was one of the originating purposes behind it.

Xow in the past 18 to 20 months the impetus has not been so great in 

this area because of the feeling that the possibility of nuclear attack 

has lessened. People have become more intelligent on this subject. 

However it is—the possibility of limited war such as we have now has 

become greater at the same time, and the philosophy and the policies 

of the Office of Emergency Planning have been changing to meet this 

different challenge.

1 think this in great pa rt would account for the fact tha t perhaps we 

were not as capable of meeting this challenge because we had not been 

developing ourselves in that direction up to that time. This last year 

we have done a lot of this kind of planning rather than nuclear attack 

planning.

Mr. R( xjers of Texas. Of course I can appreciate the fact that your 

office would not be able to avert a nuclear attack. That would be a 

matter for the Department of Defense. You would have to assume 

the premise tha t there was a nuclear attack and the best thing you 

could do would be to make it less cumbersome upon people.

In that connection it would seem to me that if such a thing should 

occur, one of the primary things that would be needed would be as 

much energy available in the unhit areas as possible and the continuity 

of transmission. And on the other hand I don’t think we can confine 

our thinking simply to a nuclear attack.

Because if this Communist situation across this world is going to be 

practiced in the U nited States and surrounding countries as it has in 

their brush-fire operations for many years back, whether it is Korea, 

Vietnam, or wherever it is, tha t we should anticipate tha t efforts will 

be made to protect this country from every kind of situation like the 

Northeast blackout that these people could use.

Mr. Dryden. We feel that we are on this course rig ht now.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Murphy, did you have any questions?.

Mr. Murphy. No, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Broyhill ?

Mr. Broyhill. Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask Mr. Dryden this 

question: On page 3 of your testimony you state tha t the Office of 

Emergency Plan ning is takin g certain steps and you enumerate them 

there.

Were these actions initiated by you or were they initiated by someone 

else?

Mr. Dryden. No, sir; they were initiated by us. We felt this is a 

part of our responsibility, Mr. Broyhill.

Mr. Broyhill. Some of these actions cover several other agencies 

of the Federal Government. Do you have the legal authority to require these other agencies to cooperate with you or is it purely a 

cooperative effort on th eir part that they will work with you to coordinate their efforts, to come up with policies and procedures to limit 

the impact of such a disaster as this ?
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 97

Mr. Dryden. Th is is no t a “Y es” or “No” t yp e of question . Und er 

the Ex ecuti ve o rders issued by the Pr esiden t, th e Office o f Em erg ency 

Pl an ning ha s the res ponsibi lity to p rovid e guida nce a nd to c oordi nate 

the emergen cy pl an ni ng activ ities of the vario us de pa rtm en ts an d 

agencies in ce rta in fields.

Th ro ug h th is Ex ecuti ve or de r we wo rk wi th these agencies an d wTe 

like to t hi nk i t is -with—we d on ’t di rect th em to do an ythi ng a s such— 

bu t we wo rk with them an d coord ina te ou r efforts so th at we do n’t 

hav e duplications, so t h at we do cove r th e a rea s th at n eed to be cov ered 

and f ollow a general mon ito rin g-type of service w ith them.

Mr. Broy iiill. Th e Fe de ral Po wer Com mission came in an d said 

the y wer e ta ki ng ce rta in steps to set up new pro cedures. Th ey in ­

dic ate d th at th e com mercia l pow er com pan ies were doing th e same. 

We ha d two agencies come in here th is morning to say they were 

ta ki ng certai n steps.

I am ju st wo nd ering if there was, or is, any coordina tin g agency 

here.

Mr. D ryden. Whe n you ask about us, we are pa rtic ip at in g in these. 

When the Pr es iden t called on Mr. Sw idler to develop this stu dy, to 

call th e peo ple in, we were a part of his com mittee because w’e were 

vi tally inter ested in it fro m th e emergency sta nd po int. Likewi se 

wi th thes e othe r de pa rtm en ts.

Where they hav e been giv en dir ectio ns to do som eth ing in the are a 

th at is with in ou r sphere of res ponsibi lity we coo per ate wi th the m in 

th at are a. W he re th ere are gaps, we urge action.

Mr. Broy hill. Tha nk you.

Mr. Rogers of T exa s. Mr. Ha rvey.

Mr. Harvey. I ju st hav e one que stio n, Mr. Ch airm an , alo ng the 

lines o f w hat Mr. B royh ill w as a sking.

W ha t, Mr. Dr yd en , c an you te ll us of th e n at ur e of th e i nv estig ation 

th at C anada has been con ducting?

Mr. Dryden. Ca n y ou answ er th at , Mr. L ewis?

Mr. L ewis. I do n't th in k I am fa m ilia r w ith th at , sir.

Mr. Harvey. Does Ca na da hav e an Office of Em erg ency Pla nn in g 

such as we hav e?

Mr. Lew is. Ye s; they have an em ergency organizatio n wh ich is t he 

equ iva len t o f our O E P.

Mr. H arvey. I ga th er th at yo ur agency has no t done any inv estiga ting as to t he cause of t hi s bla ckout in Ca na da wh ats oever; is th at 

righ t?

Mr. Dryden. T hat is rig ht . I t was assign ed to the FD C by th e 

President.

Mr. H arvey. Do y ou know wh eth er any of o ur agencies have m ade 

any inv estig ati on in C an ad a or have they relied solely upo n inv estig ations made by the Ca na dian s them selv es? Ha ve the y investi ga ted 

the thi ng jo intly o r how h as this been done?

Mr. Lew is. I am no t sure wh eth er it is jointly , bu t I kno w th er e 

is a close wo rking relatio ns hip betw een the FPC and Ca na da , an d I 

know the C an ad ians came down he re on th e 1 5th o f N ovember to r eve al 

th eir find ings on the fa ul ts in the ir system. Th ere was a very easy excha nge o f inform ation and findings.

66-577^—66-------8
98 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. Harvey. W lia t abou t t he perso nnel? Is i t deep enough so th at 

we know the bac kgrou nd of the various person nel in the Ca nadia n 

situation ?

Mr. 1 jEWIS. To my knowledge we d on’t.

Mr. H arvey. Does thi s bot her y ou at all th at we don’t have access 

to that inf orma tio n or d on't k now that?

Mr. Lewis. I would assume th at a pp ro pr ia te cl eara nce a nd s ecu rity 

measures are tak en by the C anadian people, since ene rgy is a hig hly 

sensitive enterprise.

The extent, of course, we ju st don’t kn ow. Th en th ere is a lwa ys the 

prob lem th at they would want to know abou t the backgro und of our 

people. 1 guess it would be a rat he r l ength y exc han ge of inf orma tio n.

Mr. H arvey. Wo uld it bothe r you pa rtic ul ar ly so fa r as ge tting 

a rep eti tio n of the same thing occurring again ? From the po int of 

a civil defense measure or jus t preven tin g this fro m happ en ing again 

should we have more know ledge from th at sta nd po int?

Mr. Lewis. I think it should be checked into as pa rt of o ur surv ey 

on the cause and what remedia l action should be take n to minim ize o r 

prev ent anything like this from happening .

Mr. H arvey. I have no fu rthe r questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texa s. Mr. Dryden, is it my un de rstand ing th at a 

tho rou gh exp loration of all of the repo rts of th e int ere ste d agencies 

is bein g made at the presen t tim e and that, a repo rt or recommenda ­

tion will be mad e to the Pr esiden t as to wh at should be done?

Mr. Dryden. T hat is my un derst andin g.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you have any ide a when th at will be 

available?

Mr. Lewis. I think much more technical and opera tional in form ation is to be developed before a repo rt is to be made. Th ere are 

many areas essential to a det erm ina tion of our next courses of acti on 

which have yet to be explored by FPC , and we have some work yet 

to do with agencies responsible fo r esse ntial pow er using ind ustries.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you hav e any inf orma tio n as to wh eth er 

or n ot Canada is depe nde nt upo n this Na tio n to any e xte nt fo r electric 

ene rgy ?

Mr. Lewis. Ju st to the exten t of thes e int ert ies they would draw 

upon us for th ei r needs as we draw on the m when we h ave the need. 

I t is a joint, m utu ally beneficial arrangeme nt.

Mr. Rogers o f Texas. If someone tri gg ered a sw itch in this cou ntry 

while C anada was a t its p eak load and d rawing off us, the y would have 

an Fas t Canada blackout?

Mr. Lewis. Th ey could. AIv un de rst an ding tho ugh, is, a s a res ult 

of t his inciden t, t hat certain ly the U.S. pow er companies alr eady ha ve 

tak en steps t o strength en the b rea ker s on this side of the r ive r so tha t 

a surge of pow er which could trig ge r a sim ila r occu rren ce could be 

preven ted or minimiz ed in its effect upon our systems here. I would 

expect th at Ca nada also has tak en ap pr op riate action. Whil e then 

it could h appen, each one of these action s reduces the effects a nd m ini ­

mizes the impact.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. An d hav e you done any inv estiga tion of t he 

El Paso, Tex., bla cko ut?
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 99

Mr. Lewis. We have done no investigations. FP C was directed by 

the White House to do that. 1 believe they have completed their 

studies.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Are there any f urt her questions?

Thank you very much, Mr. Dryden. Th at concludes the testimony 

this afternoon.

The subcommittee will stand adjourned until 10 o'clock in the 

morning.

(Whereupon, at 2:55 p.m., the subcommittee adjourned, to reconvene at 10 a.m., Friday, February 25,1966.)

INVESTIGATION OF NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE

FRID A Y , FEBRU A RY 25, 196 6

H ouse of Repr ese ntative s,

Specia l Subcomm ittee T o I nvestigate

E lec tric P ower F ailure s of th e

Com mittee on I nterstate and F oreign Comm erce,

IFashington, D.C.

The subcommittee met at 10 a.m., pursuant to call, in room 2123, 

Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. W alter Rogers of Texas (cha irman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. The subcommittee will come to o rder for the 

fur the r consideration of the matter before the subcommittee.

This morning our first witness is Mr. David Thomas, Deputy 

Administrator for the Federal Aviation Agency. Mr. Thomas, I 

apologize for being late but several of us were at the White House 

and the meeting lasted a little longer than we had anticipated.

You may proceed.

STATEMENT OF DAVID THOMAS, DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR, 

FEDERAL AVIATION AGENCY

Mr. T homas. Mr. Chairman, I have a prepared statement. If i t is 

agreeable w ith you, I will read it.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You may proceed.

Mr. Thomas. Mr. Chairm an and members of the subcommittee, I 

am David D. Thomas, Deputy Administrator of FAA. On behalf of 

myself and Adm inistrator McKee, I wrant to thank you for the opportunity to appear here and discuss with you the problems created for 

aviation by electric power failure.

The Federal Aviation Agency is charged with the responsibility of 

assuring that a safe and efficient air navigation and landing system is 

available to meet the needs of aviation. On November 9, 1965, a 

massive power blackout in the Northeastern United States dramatically 

demonstrated how the level of safety and efficiency could be drastically 

impaired. I would like to describe what we learned from it, and the 

steps we are taking to protect the safety and efficiency of these operations from future power failures.

Prior to the November 9 blackout w7e had, of course, recognized the 

possibility of localized power failure and the need for a standby power 

source. There were two ways considered acceptable for providing an 

auxiliary source of power: (1) installation of an engine generator or 

(2) a hookup to a second commercial power source. Of the two 

alternatives, the second commercial power source was considered the 

most desirable because of the lower maintenance cost, less timelag for

101
102 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

switchover if tlie primary source failed, and usually lower initial cost. 

At the same time, it was recognized tha t most separate sources, if 

traced back far enough, would prove to be not trul y separate, but 

sometimes would be supplied by the same source as supplied the 

primary source. A general understanding was reached tha t if the 

powerlines to the aviation facility did not share the same pole line, 

duct, transformer, substation, or other component which could be 

knocked out bv something less than a m ajor catastrophe, the sources 

could be considered as separate. Based on the premise that two 

separate commercial sources would not be lost at once, both FA A and 

many airport operators installed dual commercial power sources at 

many facilities both on and off airports. At other facilities, engine 

generators were installed.

The effects of the November 9 blackout on air traffic control, navigation, and landing facilities varied from outages of a few seconds at 

facilities equipped with automatic standby engine generators, to complete loss of service for periods exceeding 12 hours at facilities relying 

on dual commercial sources.

The New York and Boston terminals presented the most serious 

problems.

At John F. Kennedy Airp ort, the airport surveillance radar was 

out of service for 12y2

 hours. The Kennedy instrument landing systems and the runway and taxiway lights were out for liy 2

 hours. The 

tower was out. All of these systems were served by dual commercial 

power.

At LaG uard ia the tower, including all communications, was inoperative for over 11 hours. The runway lights were also out. As a 

makeshift communications system, a radio transmitter/receiver was 

set on a truck, and an American Airlines DC-6 radio, and a Northeast 

Airlines aircra ft radio were used to land 240 aircraft on a runway 

with flare pots. All standby power at LaGuardia was dual commercial power.

At Logan Field in Boston the tower and radar were inoperative for 

4 hours; the instrument landing systems, for 3 hours. Here some systems were provided standby power by dual commercial source and 

some were served by engine generators.

Except for those airc raft which were landed at LaGuardia and a 

few at Logan the a ircraft inbound to the Boston and New York areas 

were diverted to other areas.

Besides airpo rts, the other most critical aviation facilities are those 

FAA facilities which provide en route traffic control, the Air Route 

Traffic Control Centers which are equipped with radar and computers. 

These are not greatly affected because all of those involved—Boston, 

New York, and Cleveland—had standby generator power. Because 

these centers remained operative, we were able to guide aircra ft safely 

to airports not affected by the blackout—to Philadelphia, Newark, 

and Washington, among others.

All aircra ft operating during the blackout were landed safely and 

there are no known significant instances of personal injury or property 

damage due to aviation mishaps. Clear weather, a moonlit night, the 

professionalism and ingenuity of pilots and ground personnel, and
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 196 5 103

the fact th at the en route facilities continued to function, all combined 

to permit what otherwise could have been disaster. However, it 

should be rememliered tha t while no physical injuries or damage 

occurred, a considerable amount of delay, inconvenience, and expense 

resulted for the air carriers and their passengers.

At F AA, our reaction, as it had to be, was immediate. Recognizing 

tha t alternate sources of commercial power are not adequate in the 

massive blackout situation we were experiencing, we immediately 

surveyed our own facilities to insure that engine generators were 

located at the most critical spots. In addition, engine generators were 

shipped on an emergency basis from FAA stock to seven key airports 

(Joh n F. Kennedy, La Guardia, O’Hare, Miami, Los Angeles, Atlanta, 

and Seattle) to insure the availability at each of those airports of the 

control tower and one instrument runway with lights.

Beyond that, we have identified 50 airports across the country as 

continuous power airports. It is the intent that they be equipped with 

power generators adequate to power all facilities necessary to provide 

for landing under instrument conditions on at least one runway. 

These 50 airports were selected on the basis of activity and location 

and include every major and the majority of the medium hubs. The 

airpo rts selected are generally not more th an 200 miles apart, so tha t 

they provide rather complete coverage for the contiguous United 

States.

These steps are only the initial ones. In addition we are developing 

a longer range program which will make our system an d the airports 

throughout the country more self-reliant.

The November 9 blackout taught us valuable lessons and focused our 

attention on the problem areas. We are confident th at the deficiencies 

we found are correctable.

I will be happy to answer any questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Thomas, for your statement.

Mr. Rooney.

Mr. Rooney. Mr. Thomas, you gave two alternatives to the problem tha t the Air Force was confronted with a November 9. First 

you talked about the installation of an engine generator and second 

about hookup to a commercial—second commercial power source. 

You also mentioned that the pow’er source at JF K and LaGuardia 

were dual power sources, is that right ?

Mr. T homas. Right.

Mr. Rooney. Wh at were the two companies ?

Mr. T homas. I do not know, sir. I believe in the case of J FK they 

had three sources but I do not know the companies.

Mr. Rooney. If you have two companies or three companies serving one airport and there is a catastrophe such as the one tha t occurred 

on November 9, if one of the companies were to be knocked out would 

you assume tha t the other two would be? Because aren’t they interpower pools and integrated power pools ?

Mr. Thomas. Sir, it was my intention to leave the impression, and 

I guess I did not, t hat in the future we would rely on engine generator 

power for the major airports th at we wanted for safe havens for the 

airc raft rather than on a second commercial source, because in every
104 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

case there were second and third sources available where we h ad the 

blackout.

In those cases where we had engine generator power we were able to 

maintain continuous operation.

Mr. Rooney. Why does the FAA stock generators when they knew 

they could anticipate such a catastrophe?

Mr. Tiiomas. Why did we stock them ?

Mr. Rooney. Yes.

Mr. T homas. Mr. Rooney, we have in our system now around 2,500 

generators. We have a large number. We use them. We rely on 

them. It had been our practice at one time to put in engine generators 

at most locations. Recently we put in engine generators at only those 

locations where the second or third source of commercial power was not 

available; tha t is, at the more remote sites or unreliable power sites. 

For this reason we had some excess generators in our warehouse. But 

fundamentally we have a large number of engine generators installed.

In Alaska we operate almost exclusively on engine generators, as we 

do in remote parts of the country, en route aids, and facilities which 

are generally not in large cities and not accessible to sources of commercial power. We have 75 or 80 percent of our remote facilities 

equipped with engine generators. These operated perfectly.

Mr. Rooney. For all intents and purposes you are not going to rely 

on the second commercial power sources for major airpo rts from here 

on?

Mr. T homas. This is correct for the essential facilities we desire to 

operate a hundred percent of the time.

Mr. Rooney. I have no further questions.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Thomas, when you refer to the second 

commercial source, those were the means th at you were using at the 

time of the Northeast blackout ?

Mr. Thomas. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What do you mean by a second commercial 

source ? A different company ?

Mr. T homas. Not necessarily. It could be the same company but 

it would be so situated that local disturbances would not affect the 

power. This could he a second substation of the same company. It 

could have different lines, different entries into our facilities. It could 

be the same company. Really, it would not have anything to do with 

the company but it would not be so th at one transform er could be 

knocked off a powerline and our facility would be in darkness.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. That is the point. Your second commercial 

source was actually a dual line, whether it came from the same company or not, in anticipation of some mechanical defect in connection 

with the airpo rt proper or the nearby vicinity, where this other line 

would be available to switch over to.

Mr. Thomas. Yes, sir. This frequently happens. A wind storm or 

trees will knock down a line, something like this, and the second source 

being a separate line, will continue. Up until the massive blackout it 

proved to be very rel iable.

Tha t is why we had discontinued engine generators.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. What you had done was not go back to the 

source of your power ?
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 105

Mr. T homas. No, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. This is the situation that caused the failure 

and the extensive blackouts at the airports was the fact you had not 

gone back to the source of power. If you had three companies or four 

companies w ith separate lines into an airport and the source of the 

power failed you will still have—you would still be blacked out, would 

you not ?

Mr. T homas. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Because all the lines would be dead.

Now’ in the program tha t FAA has pursued through the years ana 

tha t they are following now in helping to build airpo rts throughout 

this country, what attention has been paid to requirements in building these airports and in the grants made by the U.S. Government to 

the localities tha t they again be adequately supplied with electric 

energy ?

Mr. T homas. Mr. Chairman, I do not believe that we have made our 

gran ts in most cases conditional upon the second source. As a matter 

of fact, most airports have had the second source but we have considered the second commercial source as being adequate.

Even in our own facilities where we furnish the approach lights, 

which is an integral par t, we have considered the second commercial 

source as adequate and have not provided engine generator power.

We will consider the engine generators as qualifying under the Federal aid to the airport program for Federal participation in the pu rchase. We have not at the moment made it mandatory although we are 

trying to work on some sort of a safe haven grid so that there will always be landing facilities available even though all the 9,000 airports 

in the United States w ould not be so equipped.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now’ there has been some discussion and I 

think the bill has been introduced with regard to Federal gran ts for 

hospitals, making it a requirement to qualify for the grants that the 

particip atin g agency, local or regional or whatever it is, must show 

tha t they have provided a backup or a secondary source of power tha t 

is firm in the event th eir primary source goes out.

Is this the kind of think ing that is in the Federal administration— 

the Federal Aviation Agency at the present time ?

Mr. T homas. Not f or all the grants, Mr. Chairman. Certainly for 

the key points. We have, let, us say, 2,500 airports which have at one 

time or another obtained Federal aid. We have about 600 airpo rts 

tha t now have scheduled air carrier service. We have about 170 ai rports, military airports, which do have adequate power supply. That 

is locally generated power supply.

Our thought was th at if we could get a g rid, protect it so t ha t we 

would always have a safe haven, wre then w’ould not require the small 

airports to be so equipped but possibly require the air carrier airports.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now’ let us take, for instance, the Kennedy 

Airpor t at New York. Have you any figures or data as to what it 

would cost to provide a secondary standby source of power, local and 

confined to the Kennedy Airport? To take this a little further, if 

the lights went out and you had 10 lines in there, tha t you could, 

whether it be by a gas generator or what, you could sw’itch on tha t in 

pretty short order and build up your load where you could carry it?
106 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Mr. T homas. Mr. Chairman, in the case of Kennedy, because much 

to our consternation, and I did spend a great deal of the n ight down 

here in our control communications control center, before daylight that 

morning we had arrangements to ship engine generators out of our 

stocks to Kennedy and Kennedy is now equipped. It does have engine 

generators on radar. As a matter of fact, I don’t have the price but we 

had to supply about 11 engine generators, separate ones, on Kennedy 

to supply the tower, the runway lights, the approach lights, the radar, 

communications, the instrument landing system, and various components of the instrument landing system.

We supplied engine generators there ranging from 8 to 125 kilowatts. 

Tha t airport happens to be now equipped. We have moved in in the 

Northeast on quite a few locations. As a matter of fact we are in 

pretty good shape. Dulles was already equipped. Our airport at 

Atlantic City, our National Aviation Facilities Experimental Center 

was equipped. Andrews was equipped. Washington National was 

equipped. Philadelphia and Newark stayed on. Boston did not. But 

we moved in to La Guardia, J.F.K., Boston, and the other airports 

with generators and we are in fairly good shape in the Northeast on the 

major airports.

Our guess is that the installation price is around $125,000. I don’t 

think tha t included the price of the equipment.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Are these units that are there now, are they 

the permanent type or are they just the mobile type.

Mr. T homas. They are permanent. When you get to 125 kilowatts, 

it is a large diesel machine. They do belong to us. They are on a 

loan basis, the Po rt Authority of New York will replace them 

ultimately.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Would it not make good sense, say, ju st for 

insurance, if you had available in these airports, say a gas-fired turbine 

generator that can be moved in quickly ?

In these other types of generators, as I understand it, it takes some 

time to get them fired up and get the production of electric energy 

on the line?

Mr. Thomas. The ones that we have in every case, and as a matter 

of fact this is getting to be not good enough, will start in 15 seconds. 

Some of them take up to 45 seconds.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is tha t diesel fired ?

Mr. Thomas. Yes, sir. Now this is not good enough. In our 

places that have computers we have to go into a continuous power 

supply because if you drop the computer off the line for 8 seconds, 

most of them will lose the information in it. So, in our big radar 

and our computer centers we are going into continuous power so there 

is no drop. We also have a little bit of problem with some of our 

more delicate equipment with the big generators even if they come 

in in 2 seconds, as some of them do, coming in with different phases 

or different frequencies or different voltage which gives a problem 

for a moment or two.

So our requirements scale from continuous power in the big radar 

computer locations to just having standby power available tha t a
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 107

man can star t, just so he can get it back on at other locations. In 

most all cases they are automatically started. When the voltage 

drops on the commercial line an engine generator kicks on automically.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You say they kick on automatically. I would 

presume that this automatic kick-on is caused by electric energy-----

Mr. Thomas. By a battery.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. By a battery ?

Mr. T homas. Yes. It is like the emergency lights you see in many 

public restaurants, when the voltage drops down. The drop actuates 

a relay to cause the ligh t to go on.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Why was not the Kennedy Airp ort equipped 

with the necessary facilities at the time as was Dulles and Washington National?

Mr. Thomas. I guess the only answer I can give you, Mr. Chairman, 

is tha t neither we nor the airlines or the port authority had th at much 

brains. We had three sources of commercial power and we felt it 

was good enough. We just learned a lesson.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. When Kennedy Airport was built then it 

just was not anticipated that this could happen ?

Mr. Thomas. We did not thin k this could happen.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Did you have more points of supply to 

Kennedy tha n you did to Washington National ?

Mr. Thomas. Yes, sir. I believe there were three there. In the 

case of Washington National my recollection is tha t we have two. 

At Washington National we have had engine generator power for 

years. When we built Dulles we were very concerned about continuing it as an all-weather, reliable a irpo rt and we also put in engine generator power there.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Have you made any investigation as to 

whether or not—as to why facilities of the private power companies 

which were supplying you and I suppose these were, you were tied up 

with private power companies at Kennedy ?

Mr. T homas. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As to why their auxiliary supplies did not 

function there ?

Mr. T homas. No; we have not. Th at is outside of our competence 

to do so. It has been explored as you know by study groups in the 

Federal Power Commission so we have not looked into it. We have 

simply accepted the reports which have been made available to us. 

We accepted the fact t hat it did happen. We accepted the fact tha t 

if you do have an isolated source of power that most likely engine 

generators are more reliable—I would like to say in one case we had 

engine generator trouble during the blackout. We had generators 

going and the commercial power came on instantaneously and this 

knocked the engine generator out. It was not all 100-percent perfect 

but it was 98-percent perfect.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. You have a grea t concern as to why the 

auxiliary power of the private company did not come on but you are 

permitting us to do tha t investigation ?

Mr. Thomas. Yes, sir ; we have no competence.
108 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Air. Rogers o f Tex as. But it is of p erip he ral inter est to you an d if 

this cannot be ad juste d so t h at it will be tak en care of in the fu ture , 

wh at are yo ur plan s?

Air. T homas. Our pla ns, Air. Cha irm an —we hav e some fac ilities 

th at we could lose and we do lose fo r o th er reasons th an po wer fai lur es. 

Fa ilu re s are no t alw ays catas tro ph ic. When an isolated en rou te 

naviga tio na l aid goes out it is rarely catas tro ph ic. I t could fa il by 

tub e failu re or some o ther failu re.

Nevertheless , a t a ll the places where we have large volumes of traffic 

or the system is hea vily relied upon, such as comp ute rs an d rada rs, 

con trol tow ers, we will pro vid e altern ate sources of power. In the 

tow ers we are go ing one step further an d we are providing for ba tte ry - 

opera ted t ra ns m itt er s and rece ivers to maintain com mu nicatio ns now.

W ith the new, solid sta te designs where the y consume very little 

pow er t here is a p rac tic al, a no the r practic al backup th at does no t rely 

upon—th at is not rel yin g upon an engin e ge ne rator star t.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Do you have or are you prom ul ga tin g rules 

an d reg ulati on s fo r the co nstan t an d continuing inspec tion of these 

backu p o r au xilia ry so urces ?

Air. T homas. Yes, sir.

Air. Rogers of Texas. I was on a tr ain one tim e th at ca ug ht fire 

an d the y ha d a whole lot o f fire ex tin gu ish ers on it bu t there was not 

any ex tin gu ish ing mate ria l in the fire ex tin gu ish er so it did no t help 

very m uch.

Air. T homas. Air. Ch air man, in the las t 3 m onths I p ers onall y hav e 

either p ulled or a rran ge d to have p ulled the com mercial pow er switch 

at p robably 25 of ou r fac ilitie s to mak e certa in that th e e ngin e ge ne rators were op era tin g.

In these cases we notified th e c ontro lle rs so we d id no t en da ng er any ­

one. I am ha pp y to rep ort in no case was the outag e mo re th an a 

bli nk of an eye.

Air. Rogers of Texas. Do you—you do have fac ilities so th at if 

som eth ing is mecha nically wrong it c an be quickl y repa ire d in orde r 

to br ing yo ur local au xilia ry un its into pla y?

Air. T homas. In ou r major facil ities we have ma int enance men 

arou nd the clock who are cap abl e of re pa irin g a malf un ction . Of 

course in the winte rtime we keep the fluids hea ted. Th ey are in the 

build ing s an d we do tes t the m perio dic all y to see th at they are there 

because the system as you sta ted is very likely no t to wo rk whe n you 

need it unless it is exercised.

Air. R ogers o f Texas. Th e excuse o f t he pe ople on the tr ai n was th at 

the reason th at the fire extin guish ers d id n ot w ork is th at they d id not 

hav e to use the m fo r a long time.

Air. T homas. Well, we pull d ril ls co nstan tly to make certa in th at our 

emergen cy e quipm ent does work.

Air. R ogers o f T exa s. Now a t L aG uard ia ; did y ou say y ou do hav e 

now at La Gua rd ia backups too, or auxilia ry un its ?

Air. T homas. LaG ua rd ia req uir ed six au xilia ry un its to be installed. Th e lig ht s are ins talled . Th e tow ers are ins talled . The
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 05 109

rad ar is installed. The ILS complete installation will not be completed until March 7 but on March 7 th at will be completely installed. 

All main facilities are in at LaGuardia now.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now this of course would appear to be, up to 

this point, a concentration in this generally thickly populated area 

from Washington which has this?

Mr. Thomas. Yes.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. All up in the metropolitan complex, Boston, 

New York, Newark. Now these are all fields where if something happened like the Northeast blackout, something tha t could not happen 

did happen, and there was not any way to get light, th at there would 

be a saturation of these facilities tha t would be very difficult to knock 

them all out at one time, where planes coming in would have ample fuel 

to get to these other fields ?

Mr. Thomas. Yes, sir.

Our plan is that an airplane, generally speaking, and let me say 

again generally because in some of the areas of th e Rocky Mountains 

this is not quite literally true, but generally speaking, no airplane 

would be more tha n 200 miles from a continuous power airport.

By “continuous” we mean one which has its own generating capability, for at least the one runway, at least one instrument landing system and necessary rad ar and communications.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Is your 200-mile situation the extreme or is 

tha t the average ?

Mr. Thomas. That is the extreme. What we did, we have divided 

the communities into w hat we call hubs. The giant hubs or the major 

hubs are all those communities that generate at least 1 percent of the 

traffic in the United State s; a place like Chicago generated 21 million 

passengers last year, which is far more than 1 percent.

J.F .K. had around 16 or 17 million. But in those major hubs in 

every case it will be provided for. Then we have what we call medium 

hubs. This generates between a qua rter of 1 percent or 1 percent. We 

have accommodated about half of those. Then we spread geographically so that we could in the Rocky Mountain areas provide a safe 

haven within about 200 miles flying time.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Where do you go out of Chicago? What 

other place have you equipped ?

Mr. Thomas. In Chicago, Midway and O’llare.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Wh at outside of there ?

Mr. Thomas. The ones th at are to be equipped and unfortunately 

we have a c hart which I did not bring, Mr. Chairman, we can furnish 

one if it would be of help, but if you are looking in the radius around 

Chicago we would go to Minneapolis, St. Louis, Cleveland, Denver, 

Pittsburgh, Detroit, Cincinnati.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I think it would be he lpful if we had one of 

those charts.

Mr. Thomas. All righ t, sir. We will be g lad to furnish both the 

names and the chart if you so desire.

(The chart referred to follows:)
CONTINUOUS POWER AIRPORTS

O

SAN FRANCIS CO 

I N T lA j

LO S ANGELES. 

IN T L .

'SAN DIE GO IN TL

guardia

JOHN F • 

KENNEDY^ 

Xphil adelp h

IN T L . 

BALTIMO RE 

.DULLES IN T L .

_____ ^ N A T IO N A L ARP

CHAR LO TT E.A ND REW AFB

I AMI 

IN T L .

F igure 1

NORT HEAS T POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 111

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Have you had this blackout situation to any 

extent out in California ?

Mr. Thomas. No, sir; we have h ad power interruptions and shortages almost every place. I do not believe that we have had anything 

unusual in California. We had two in the El Paso area since the 

blackout and for a few minutes duration.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Yes. Most of those tha t you have had though 

have been sort of momentary, relatively speaking ?

Mr. T homas. Yes, sir. As a matter of fact last week when we had 

some difficult weather that came throu gh here, also went through 

New’ York, a tree fell across the powerline going to our New York 

center which is our largest center.

The engine generator responded. We do have transformers fail, ice 

gets on powerlines, this sort of thing. But usually it is minor. We 

are prepared for it and the alternate source takes over.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now these auxiliary units tha t you are putting 

in, do you simply tie those onto the existing lines and if you have a 

line above ground is tha t tied onto th at or do you p ut in a new system 

underground ?

Mr. Thomas. Generally they are not underground. They may be 

in the larger airports and of course on the airports themselves they are. 

But they are tied into what we would call our bus-bar facilities themselves and it is a matter of switching over at the junction point tha t 

feeds the facilities. They are not part of the same line.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you feel, Mr. Thomas, that the lessons that 

have been learned from th is Northeast situation insofar as aviation is 

concerned and the deficiencies th at were present have been pre tty w’ell 

cured and can be handled ?

Mr. Thomas. They are being cured. They have not been cured. 

They are being cured. For example, we do not have continuous pow’er. 

We are getting on to tha t in our larger facilities. We are procuring 

now a program—a complete installation program on our own facilities 

which will run $3% million, which we have reprogramed from another 

program to take care of our most critical location.

We have probably around $30 million worth of engine generators in 

the system now. So I would not say w’e are well but we are on our way 

to being well.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It seems rather strange to me that as advanced 

as w’e are in so many things, flying around out into space, then on the 

spur of the moment we end up landing planes in the greatest metropolis in this country by flare pots. It seems rather unusual th at man’s 

projective thinking would not encompass such a possibility.

Mr. T homas. That is right. It disturbs us a great deal, Mr. Chairman. I think we could all take our hats off to the pilots and controllers. They did a superb job that night. At 9 o’clock that n ight I 

would not have given you any odds that we would go through to morning without incident but we did.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I thin k it was tremendous. I think the job 

tha t was done was tremendous. Maybe it won’t happen again.

Mr. Rooney.

Mr. R ooney. I have no questions.
112 NORTHS AST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

Air. Rogers of Texas. Thank you very much, Mr. Thomas and we 

may be calling on you again.

Mr. T homas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. I notice we have with us Judge Loevinger, 

the Commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission who 

is scheduled to appear at 2 p.m. this afternoon but we were able to 

work things along a little faster, so, Judge, if you will come forward 

and bring with you any assistants that you might want, we will be glad 

to hear from you.

STA TEM ENT OF HON. LEE LOEVING ER, COMMISSIONER, FED ERAL 

COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION

Commissioner Loevinger. Thank you very much, Mr. Rogers. My 

name is Lee Loevinger. I am delivering this report to this committee 

as the Defense Commissioner for the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC has delegated to the Defense Commissioner by a 

regular rule the emergency and defense functions of the Commission.

From time to time various Commissioners act as the Defense Commissioner. Commissioner Bartley has most recently, preceding me, 

been the Defense Commissioner and he did a wonderful job over a 

period of years.

I am relatively new in the job. And I am accompanied by Mr. 

Kenneth Miller, w’ho is the head of our office of emergency 

communications.

I have no prepared statement, Mr. Rogers. We have recently completed and delivered to you and filed with your committee a report 

by the FCC on the Northeast Power Failure and its effect on 

communications.

(The report, referred to may be found in the committee files.)

Prior to tha t we had secured and delivered to you a repo rt of our 

industry advisory committee.

(The repo rt referred to follows:)

Federal Communications Commission,

Office of the Chairman,

Washington, D.C., January IS, 1966. Hon. Oren Harris,

Chairman, Interst ate and Foreign Commerce Committee, House of Representatives, Washington, D.C.

Dear Mr. Chairman : I am pleased to enclose for your information a copy of 

the Report “Effect on Communications of Northe ast Power Failure , November 

9-10, 1965” which was prep ared for the Commission by a special National 

Industry Advisory Committee Working Group.

While we have not yet analysed this material, we believe th at you and your 

staff will find i t of interest. We have it und er activ e study, and will soon report 

to you our evaluations and recommendations.

Sincerely,

E. William Henry.

[P ub lic Notice— G7 8694, Ja n . 13, 1966]

Report to FCC on Effect on Communications by Northeast Power Failure

The Federal Communications Commission today made public a detailed report 

on the impact on communications by th e elec trical power fail ure of November 9, 

1965, t ha t blacked-out New York City and much of the Northeast. Information 

obtain ed from over 1,000 Commission licensees in the 80,000 squa re mile affected 

area (New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire,
NORT HEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 1 1 3

Vermont an d sev era l small pocke ts in Maine, Pe nn sylva nia an d New Je rsey ) 

in dic at es :

(1) With in the affect ed area, 34 radio stat io ns continued broa dc astin g w ith ­

ou t any interrup tio n of service an d wi thi n an ho ur a ft er the powe r shu tdown, 78 

stat io ns (in clu din g 13 da yt im ers) op erating with au xi liar y eme rgency pow er 

equ ipm ent, were able to res um e broadc ast ing. Sig nals from the se stat io ns 

covered the en tir e ar ea affected by the blacko ut. The av ailabilit y in the ha nd s 

of th e pub lic of tran si st or radios abl e to receive inform ati on con cerning th e 

na tu re of the emergenc y may well ha ve preven ted a ca tastro ph y of m aj or 

pro portio ns.

(2) Th e Am eric an Tel eph one an d Te leg rap h Com pany, Ass ociated Bell Compan ies, an d th e ind ependent telephone com pan ies sh ift ed im me dia tely to sta nd by 

au xi lia ry pow er equ ipm ent, an d hand led emergency busin ess and an extreme ly 

heavy loa d of loca l an d long distan ce calls with ou t m at er ia l delay. Th ere wa s 

no breakdow n of comm unica tions aff ectin g th e Natio n's na tio na l defense.

(3) Vita l sa fety an d spe cial radio servic es such as those serving police, fire, 

marin e an d aviatio n con tinued in op erati on at all ti m es; am ateu rs, citize ns ban d 

an d m obile u nits also play ed an im po rtan t role in tran sm itting me ssages of imp ortanc e dur in g the em ergency.

While h igh lig hti ng th e ab ility of our N atio n’s comm unica tions facilit ies to reac t 

prom ptly an d estab lis h a wo rka ble comm unica tions system to meet an un foresee n emergency, the re po rt co nclude s th at “comm unica tions in all form s ar e vital 

to th e econom y and th e pub lic w ell-being” an d t hat “a sou rce of continuous reliab le 

electric pow er is essential to conti nued com mu nic ations op erations.” The re po rt 

co nt ains recom me ndations des ign ed to prev en t a recu rre nc e of a prob lem of this 

ma gnitu de, inc lud ing th e need f or a dd iti on al a ux ilia ry power sup plie s, radio link s 

to police, fire, civil defen se he ad qu ar te rs and othe r key officials, the de sirabilit y 

of establish ing a contr ol source fo r the dis semi natio n of emergency inf ormati on 

and a cam paign to presua de the pub lic th at a tr an si st or ra dio is a nec ess ity in 

eve ry home.

Th e re po rt is un de r activ e stu dy by th e FCC. Par ticu la r emphasis is being 

pla ced on th e estab lis hm en t by Com mission licensees of relia ble com mu nic ation 

ce nt ers to which the pub lic can tu rn in tim es of emergenc y for vital inf orm ation.

Th e re po rt was prep ared un de r th e dir ectio n of Defense Com mission er Lee 

Loevinger, by a spe cial Na tio nal In du stry Advisory Comm itte e Wo rking Group. 

The Com miss ion is pa rtic ul ar ly in debte d to Mr. W. Elme r P othe n of the A merican 

Teleph one and Te leg rap h Com pany for t he common ca rr ie r aspe cts of t he rep ort , 

to Mr. Gr an vil le Klink of Radio St ati on WTOP fo r the broa dc ast ma teria l, and 

to Mr. Joseph M. K ittn er fo r th e inform ati on re la tin g to sa fety and special radi o 

serv ices.

A mo re detai led summ ary of th e pow er fa ilur e effect on Broadcast, Common 

C ar rier an d Safet y an d Special Radio Serv ices follow s :

BROADCAST

Bro ad ca st licensees, th e radio an d televi sion network s, an d th e pre ss wire 

ser vic es provide d th e public with vi ta l inform ati on fo r which the y have rece ived 

pr aise and com mendation from Fe de ral, st at e and local officials and th e general 

public. Th e repo rt ma kes cle ar th at radio pla yed a significant, if no t th e sole 

role in telling t he g en eral p ublic wha t was happening a nd wha t to do in the early 

hours of th e blacko ut. At th e sam e tim e it recognized th at many broa dc asters 

we re un pr ep ared fo r th e predica me nt in which they fou nd themselv es and were 

at a loss to know w ha t to do.

Wh ile th e repo rt co ntains a de taile d bre akd own of the services pro vided by all 

br oa dc as t s ta tio ns in t he ar ea, the most sig nifica nt fa ct s a re as follows :

In t he six s ta te s th a t were blacked-out, 34 sta nd ar d broa dc ast sta tio ns rep ort ed 

no com me rcial pow er ou tag e an d continued un in te rrup te d ope ration s.

An ad ditio na l 4S stan da rd b ro ad ca st stat ion s, 18 FM br oa dc ast sta tio ns, an d 12 

TV br oa dc ast stat io ns resumed opera tio ns with eme rgency au xi lia ry pow er 

with in 15 m inu tes of th e com me rcial electric pow er f ail ure.

W ith in two hours , an ad ditio na l 26 stan da rd broa dc ast sta tio ns, 11 FM br oa dca st stat io ns and fo ur TV br oa dc as t sta tio ns had resum ed op era tio ns with 

emergenc y au xi lia ry pow er.

The bla cke d-out ar ea was th us complet ely covered with in two ho ur s with 153 

br oa dc ast signals, prov idi ng reas sv -ing inf orm ati on and in stru ctions from gov66 -5 77 — 66------- 9
114 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

eminent officials and public utility officials concerning the commercial power 

blackout.

Vital services performed by those stations th at were able to remain on the 

air, to resum e broadcasting, or by personnel of the broadcasting ind ustry included getting in touch with electric and power officials, telephone company officials, m ayors, police and fire departmen ts, the offices of governors, civil defense 

organizations, wa ter commissioners, school supe rintendent, Red Cross and other 

services. Special news roundups were prepared and aire d on traffic and travel 

conditions, ways and means to avoid losses stemming from the power failure, 

and oth er public service messages. Many station s, partic ularly day tim ers which 

had closed down at local sunset, reta ined their staffs and relayed news to the 

public by an swering telephone inquiries. Remote pickup faciilties were mobilized 

and dispatch ed to key locations thro ughout service areas, relaying back to the 

station vital info rmation for immediate broadc ast (where the station was on 

the ai r) or for taping for broadcast later when the station r etu rne d to the air.

The radio and television networks and press wire services were active in 

mobilizing the ir staffs and quickly gathering vita l information concerning the 

electric power failure. Network pro gram and news organizations e ither con tinued 

from New York City or were switched to oth er cities unaffected by the power 

failure. Network television facilities in the blackout area were impaire d to 

the gre ate st exte nt, with ABC, NBC and CBS reporting the switch of control of 

television operations to other cities.

Over the past thr ee years, the broadca st industry, in cooperation with the FCC 

and other Federal, state, and local authoritie s, has volu ntarily contributed many 

thousands of d ollars and man-hours in the developm ent of new emergency plans, 

systems, and procedures. As a result, cooperatio n with autho rities during the 

power failu re was outstanding, vital information concerning the fac ts of the 

blackout was promptly aired and those with tra ns ist or radio receivers received 

reassuring inform atio n with in minutes concerning the emergency.

COMMON CARRIER SERVICES

Common ca rri er service in the blackout area depended upon the ava ilab ility 

of emergency or altern ative power sources, and the switch ing or tra nsferri ng of 

cer tain traffic loads to unaffected a reas . The telephone companies for m any yea rs 

have equipped cen tral offices and comm unications cente rs with emergency power 

arrang ements; and in spite of abnormally heavy loads the telephone companies 

handled all emergency business and most of the offered reg ula r calls. Long 

distance service was unim paired as was local service except for the problems of 

providing service to equipm ent which depended upon local power sources for 

operatio n of the customers’ communication equipment, such as teletypewriters 

and other printing equipment.

Most of the telegraph company main offices and radio relay points have 

emergency power system s and a small num ber of portable power generating 

units cover sma ller offices in limited emergencies. The main Western Union 

office in New York City, however, was out of service because both of its commercial power sources were lost, altho ugh the office was equipped for emergency 

power protection for a failur e of either AC or DO commercial curren t. The 

intern ational record common carri ers operating in New York City did not 

have sufficient independent emergency auxiliary power at the time of the 

failur e to provide for normal operations. To meet the problem, emergency 

generators were sought and some business was rerouted or car ried thro ugh 

arrang ements with the telephone companies.

Bell Associated companies immediately switched to emergency power. Overseas service was unaffected. In the New York Telephone Company are a the 

system handled double the normal load of d ial traffic. Delays in traffic requ ired 

keeping some lines open at times for prior ity and essential service. Long distance service was largely unimpaired. Pre-planned emergency procedures were 

used in New York and 12 regional centers in the U.S. and Cana da to control 

congestion and tak e advanta ge of the full capa city of the nationw ide network. 

Vital militar y agencies and civil government systems had no loss of command, 

with only short periods of service difficulty. Radio and TV netw orks th at 

could not be fed from New York were rerouted by AT&T to permit orig ination 

of programs in Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles.

Independent operating telephone companies furn ished service on a nearly 

norm al basis. While not all offices had emergency equipment perm anen tly
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 115

located, the small una ttended community dial offices had ade qua te batte ry 

supplies to continue operation until portable generating equipment could be 

placed in service. There were only a few failur es of long distance circuits 

because of AC power failur e on ca rrier circuits. These were only portion s 

of routes and oth er facilities were available to hand le the offered business.

Large militar y and other government use rs of special telephone services 

had largely unim paired service th at permitted them to execute all essential 

functions.

Western Union handled traffic with minor delays except for New York City. 

Major offices of Western Union Telegraph Company equipped with sta tionary 

emergency service and smaller offices covered by portable units protected service 

into and through the cen tral office, but could not prev ent its loss to local 

users since failu re of commercial power disabled the equipment on their 

premises. Restoration of service was completed at Buffalo and Albany, N.Y., 

imme dia tely; a t Syracuse, within nine minutes; a nd at Boston, in sligh tly over 

one hour.

The Defense Departme nt’s elec tronic and electro-mechanical switching centers 

and tru nk s continued in operation without interrupt ion . Any disruptions of 

defense communications were temp orary and were restored by rerou ting.

The int ern ational common ca rri ers suffered a mom entary imm ediate blackout of public service dependent on commercial power. Ca rriers having emergency power supplies imme diately made these operational, but norm al public 

service could not be offered because of the lack of power in the customers’ 

offices. A Defense Department agency supported the carri ers by making available mobile gen erators from reserve and activ e units. Each ca rrier established 

rerouting services with overseas poin ts via their gateways in Washington and 

San Francisco.

The r eport concluded th at only through the provision of emergency gen erating 

equipment can th eservices of domestic and int ern ational common carriers 

continue during a general power fa ilure ; and users of the services of these 

ca rri ers who have comm unications equipment requiring the use of electric power 

should consider the provision of alt erna te power supplies, depending on the 

need for continuity of operations.

SA FE TY AN D SPE C IA L RADIO SE RV ICES

The Safety and Special Radio Services include a highly diverse grouping 

of station licensees, both individual and others. With the limited time in which 

to collect necessary data, the information ava ilab le for each service is largely 

incomplete, and comprehensive d ata f or the whole service is not available. Generally, the replies to the inquiries indicated an alert, serious, and efficient 

response by these licensees to the emergency. In the Land Transpo rtation 

services for automobile, bus, rail and truc king licensees, the impact of the 

emergency was minimal. There was some failu re of rai lro ad base stations, 

but mobile stations replaced the inoperative base stations. In general the commun ication facilities of the railro ads were adequa te to continue railro ad operation on a limited basis d urin g th e emergency.

The larg er systems of the indu str ial service for electric power, water, and 

gas distribu tion or those covering a large geographic are a are equipped with 

auxiliary emergency power. Police and fire dep artments were generally not 

adversely affected by the power blackout because the na ture of the ir function 

necessitates auxiliary emergency power at lea st for limited operation throug hout the blackout period. Those witho ut auxil iar y power have made plans to 

use mobile radio facilities to han dle comm unications in an emergency. Ship 

operations were not adve rsely affected because all ships generate th eir own 

power. Common ca rrier coast telegraph stations continued to function throug h 

the use of emergency power generators. The power failur e had but minor effect 

in the common ca rrier marine telephone service.

The problem of the aviatio n services was minimized by the time of day. 

Scheduled ai r ca rrier operations contin ued and sufficient reliable communication s between the airc ra ft and supporting ground fac ilities were available . In ­

ternational air operatio ns in the North Atlantic are a and to the south th at 

were temporarily unable to communicate with New York used the fac ilities at 

Miami, San Jua n, Bermuda and Gander. Support land line fac ilities were 

seriously affected, bu t there was no adverse effect on a ir sa fety.
116 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9. 10. 19 65

Licen se es in th e am ate ur se rv ice em erge nc y net w or k w er e al ert ed an d op ­

era ti onal. hu t li tt le em er ge nc y traf fic w as ha nd led. Some ci tize ns ra dio li ­

ce ns ee s fu nc tion ed as au x il ia ry unit s fo r polic e an d fire dep ar tm en ts , ar ra ngin g 

fo r em er ge nc y tr an sp o rt ati o n an d ass is ti ng in tra ffi c co ntro l.

Our office of emergency communications is a very small part of even 

our small agency. It lias only a few men and a few secretaries in it. 

For normal emergency planning we think tha t this is probably adequate. When something like a power failure requires a lot of manpower for quick investigation it means th at we simply do not have the 

manpower within our own organization unless we abandon our normal 

activities. We do have industry advisory committees composed of 

representatives of various communications industries. In this case 

we called upon the industry advisory committee to assist Mr. Miller 

and his group in making the investigation.

As I say they did get an enormous amount of information which 

is included in this large report dated Jan uary 6, I960. A large part 

of this is contained in the appendix. For example, at the back there 

is a very large group of folclout pages—I have forgotten the number, 

I think about a hundred of them—which give the elementary data, 

the specific facts regarding each broadcasting station in the power 

failure area so that you get the identification of the station, its location, its normal power, the hours of the commercial power outage, the 

time tha t the station was actually on the air, whether or not it has 

emergency power, what its emergency power capacity is, its duration 

during the emergency, whether it has power for remote control, 

whether its communications facilities operated durin g the power 

failure, an estimate of the adequacy of the communications, the assistance it gave to State and local authorities and its future plans.

As I say this is reported in a purely factual manner so that anyone 

interested in going back and checking our conclusions can go over the 

data for himself.

Referring to our report I will not really summarize it but skim 

throu gh it and note some of the high points. I think the most outstanding point so f ar as the FCC is concerned is the fact first that 

communications facilities generally operated remarkably well, and, 

second, th at the lessons of the blackout have resulted in the voluntary 

initiation by most communications carriers of corrective measures.

In fact they have not even waited for the FCC to pass judgment, to 

issue orders, or make suggestions but are taking action. We have in ­

cluded as an appendix to our current report dated February 23, 1966, 

letters from communications carriers, the most recent letters reporting 

on the action that they have taken since the power failure to insure 

the continuity of service in the event of another power failure.

We will continue to follow up on this to see that these actions are 

taken. However, these letters themselves are the most eloquent testimony and I think the most persuasive demonstration of the willingness of the carriers to take action and the effectiveness of the action 

they have taken.

We have reported on the communications facilities of the FCC itself. 

We have some 18 monitoring stations scattered throughout the country engaged in very important communications work. All of these 

have standby power. Only one of them was in the blackout area and 

it was on its own standby power within 30 seconds so that it was out 

of operation for only 30 seconds.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 117

In our own offices here the telephone service apparently is reliable. 

This is, of course, tied into the A.T. & T. lines. One problem we would 

have would be the signal lights which run off the commercial power. 

If there were a commercial power failure we would have some difficulty in knowing which lines to use for outgoing calls because of the 

failure of signal lights in our downtown offices.

We could always go out to our Laurel monitoring station and communicate from there through our FCC systems. We are studying the 

possibility of doing something about our own power on telephone 

signal lights here.

With respect to the broadcasting area, again the most outstanding 

fact I think is tha t broadcasting is what probably prevented public 

panic and very likely tragedy. It seems to me tha t had there been 

this power failure without the service th at was in fact rendered by 

the broadcasting stations, primarily AM and also some FM, tha t the 

public would have been panic striken and tha t there is simply no telling what would have happened. Almost certainly there would have 

been tragedies far greater than any that did occur.

One hundred twenty-one standard broadcasting stations continued 

in operation at various times throughout the area. We do think tha t 

there is evidence tha t a number of stations should have equipment 

that in fact they do not have and we are drawing to the attention of the 

broadcasting industry the fact tha t this is the responsibility of the 

local station.

The local station has the responsibility for prep aring its own emergency operational plans and providing its own emergency equipment. There is a program by the Office of Civil Defense which provides some subsidy for some stations that are part of the national 

chain in the emergency broadcasting system. Under tha t plan some 

of the stations have received Federal help but even those stations 

tha t do not have Federal help have, we believe, a responsibility to insure tha t they are able to serve their communities in time of emergency.

Television generally did not function efficiently during the blackout. I think that realistically we must recognize tha t in periods 

when there is likely to be a power shortage or a power failure television is not as useful a communications medium as AM and FM radio.

Generally the power requirements for television broadcasting and 

to a lesser extent for television reception are considerably higher than 

they are for AM and FM radio.

Another factor limiting the use of television is the fact tha t you 

cannot receive the audio or sound without the video or picture. With 

the loss of commercial power it becomes very difficult to transmit the 

video. One station did very ingeniously continue on the air by transmitting a so-called black picture. In effect what this does, however, 

is to drive the components at maximum power producing complete 

blackness on the television receiver tube. This ages components very 

rapidly and therefore is not a recommended procedure.

Consequently we must, I think, continue to rely on AM and FM 

radio for communications with the public in this kind of emergency.

There is some confusion in the public mind and to a lesser extent 

in the minds of some of the broadcasters regarding the emergency 

broadcast system. The EB S was not activated during this emergency.
1 1 8 NORT HEAS T POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10, 19 65

The EBS is a system for activation only by the President of the 

United States or his specific delegate. It is intended for use in the 

event of an actual or a threatened attack upon the U nited States.

There was no occasion to activate EBS in this emergency and I think 

it would have been improper to do so. There have been very detailed 

facilities and procedures arranged to permit the President to communicate with the country in thp event of a military emergency. 

These are, many of them, quite highly classified and I am not prepared 

to discuss them. But they simply are not involved in this. Wh at is 

involved however, is th is : It is possible to use the stations in any State 

or locality tha t are part of EBS on a State network or hookup for 

peacetime emergencies, weather emergencies, or something of that sort.

For example, in the State of Florida they have established a State 

FM network to give hurricane warnings.

I understand it has functioned most efficiently and during the last 

hurricane season if was responsible for preventing a good deal of 

damage to life and property. The ESS A, Environmental Sciences 

Service Administration, of the Commerce Department which now includes the Weather Bureau has spoken to us about establishing similar State hookups in a number of the east coast States.

The FCC has indicated its readiness in this—to coopearte in this 

and we are moving forward with plans to set up State hookups utilizing EBS facilities within each State for nonmilitary emergencies.

One of the things tha t the FOC can and is doing is to advise its 

staff and applicants tha t in consideration of comparative cases for 

AM and FM licenses it will take into account the proposed acquisition 

and use of auxiliary power equipment as an element. We have never 

done this before. I am sure j ust because nobody ever th ough t of it. 

It has been called to our attention and we will do this now.

The situation as to common carriers I think is fairly well known. 

By and large the telephone companies, both A.T. & T. and the several 

independent companies, have standby power and performed very well. 

The one problem tha t arose was that a great many people rushed to 

the telephone and tried to call.

Many more than normal calls were made. This resulted in overloading some lines. As a result, the telephone companies were forced 

to use what is called line load control. What this does is cut out the 

outgoing calling ability of a certain percentage of the lines.

In other words, in certain homes the person using the telephone 

cannot call out, he can still receive calls but he can’t call out. The 

way line load control is used is that different lines are subject to this 

form of control so that for 10 or 15 minutes, say all the homes in one 

area will be deprived of ability to call out.

Then after 10 or 15 minutes the limitation will be applied to another 

area so tha t eventually everybody does have the opportunity to call 

out. This apparently enabled the telephone company to handle the 

burden of calls.

One of the problems involved is that many of the facilities of the 

telephone and telegraph companies and facilities of such organizations 

as A P and U PI depend not only upon the communications lines but 

on local power to run the equipment for receiving the communication.

That is, teletypewriters depend not simply on the incoming signal 

which controls them but also upon the availability of commercial
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 1 19

power at the point of reception, in order to operate. We have been 

investigating the possibility of providing local auxiliary power in 

order to keep these facilities operating in places where they are 

important.

One of the problems is a very technical problem and one on which 

we have yet no conclusion. That problem is t his: These are fairly 

sensitive instruments and the control, the communication as you can 

imagine is a relatively slight electronic signal. Consequently the 

source of power must be quite constant as to power or voltage and as 

to cycle or frequency. Too great a variation in the electric current 

driving the instrument causes the instrument to misbehave or not to 

deliver the communications except in a garbled fashion.

The auxiliary power sources, at least the smaller ones, are not as 

reliable in their power and in their cycling as the big commercial power 

stations are. Consequently there is a question as to the degree to 

which auxiliary emergency power sources can be substituted for commercial power in handling such instruments as teletypewriters and 

local reception devices.

All I can say is that we do not have conclusions on this. We are 

having investigations made. We have had reports from the telephone company and some of the other carriers and we will simply 

have to continue technical work on this so to see what the reliability 

of auxiliary sources is and what the tolerance of the reception device 

is so th at the two can be combined in order to increase the reliability 

of service in the event of another power blackout.

The th ird great category7

 of FCC licenses is the so-called safety and 

special radio service. This includes the amateur radio services, aviation radio services, citizens radio services, industrial radio services, 

land transportation radio services, the maritime services, and public 

safety such as local government, police, fire, and similar services.

Taking the safety and special radio services all together, the FCC 

has in the six-State area tha t was affected by this blackout approximately 500,000 licenses.

Now this is just a very large number even to make an inquiry to. 

Simply to send out one series of letters, becomes a substantial expense. 

So we do not have a complete survey of these services.

However, here again the industry advisory committees for each of 

the services have given us a very good sampling and we think we have 

pretty good information on this.

The most dramatic of the services involved of course was the a viation radio service. You have just heard Mr. Thomas and he has told 

you considerably more about the aviation situation than I possibly 

can.

Very briefly, my understanding with respect to aviation is this: By 

and large the aviation communications service continued to function 

rath er effectively. The airlines have a private company known as 

Arinc, which provides commercial communication service between the 

airplanes and the various terminals.

Arinc in the area affected did have auxiliary emergency power. 

Apparently it found out tha t the power failure was coming and I 

understand shifted to auxiliary power before the power failure hit its 

facilities, and consequently was never off the air at all.
120 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

There was some communications failure that limited the use of HF— 

high frequency—which is used primarily for transoceanic communications. As a result some of the planes that were out over the Atlantic 

had to shift their point of contact from New York to some of the 

other stations.

I understand also that because of failure of landing lights and other 

facilities in the New York area th at many of the planes were diverted 

to other points for landing. However, I am advised th at reliable communications between the airc raft in the air and the ground facilities 

were maintained throughout the period of the power failure so that 

there was no real communications failure in the aviation service.

Similarly, the railroad telephone circuits by and large really remained open and operative since the railroads had their own power 

service. In such things as motortruck and maritime, of course the 

stations are largely aboard either the trucks or ships which have their 

own power source, so they were almost wholly unaffected.

Police and fire departments were generally not affected since 90 

percent of those that we have been able to question are equipped with 

auxiliary emergency power and continued to function.

A major complaint however of the police and fire departments was 

what they characterized as the initial unreliability of the telephone 

systems due to overload. The police and fire departments by and large 

respond to complaints or messages incoming to them from citizens 

by telephone. Since the telephone system got overloaded the messages 

were somewhat delayed and in some cases were missed. As far as I 

know however, there were no serious situations arising out of this.

To summarize very briefly, the action items t ha t we have derived 

from our study, of which there are 10, are these:

First, we note tha t corrective action has been voluntarily initiated 

by most segments of the communications industry. We have followed 

up on this and will continue to follow up and many of the reports are 

presented in this report.

Second, our office of emergency communications is studying the 

problem of outgoing calls from the FCC office in the event of a blackout.

Third, we are emphasizing to the broadcasters tha t each broadcasting station should establish its own emergency operating procedures.

Fourth, we are aware that the emergency broadcasting system must 

be adapted to use in peacetime emergencies. We have in fact a special subcommittee of the national industrial advisory committee at 

work on this. This was appointed June 30, 1965, and we believe is 

making good progress.

Fifth, we are aware tha t completion of detailed State operational 

plans for the emergency broadcasting system is needed. This is a 

very slow process since this takes place through the various State and 

industry advisory committees. It is a matter of seeing that each State 

committee completes its own plans and in each State coordination is 

required with the local committees.

All we can do is to emphasize to the State committees th at we so 

wish them to go ahead and push these plans.

We have not attempted to impose a uniform plan on all the States 

nor to tell the States what we thin k the details of the operational
NORT HEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 121

plans in each State should be. So th at this is a much slower business 

than would be the case if we did not have 50 States whose cooperation is required.

In the sixth place the FCC is aware that the widespread ownership 

and use of transisto r and battery operated sets is a great asset to the 

country. We have thou ght tha t it was not appropria te for a Government agency to undertake a promotional campaign to encourage 

the sale and purchase of these sets. We have, however, encouraged 

the broadcasting industry to do so.

Seventh, the Commission has supplemented its statement of criteria 

to be used in comparative cases to indicate th at the provision of auxiliary power equipment in AM and FM stations is an important factor 

so far as the Commission is concerned in choosing between applicants.

Eighth, the FCC is requesting continuing regula r reports from communications common carriers as to the progress they are making regarding installation of emergency power systems at strategic centers.

Ninth, the Commission will consider, if necessary, requiring as a 

matter of regulation, tha t carriers provide emergency power system 

at important locations. We have not yet reached any conclusion that 

such a regulation is necessary. This is merely a matter for future consideration.

Tenth, the Commission is continuing its study of the service and 

safety and special radio fields to determine which ones may require 

regulations providing for independent auxiliary power sources. In 

view of the diversity and the number of these services this again is 

nothing that can be done quickly or arbitrarily. There is such great 

diversity and such large numbers involved t hat we feel we must rely 

by and large on our industry advisory committee. It would be unfair 

not to pay tribute to them.

They have rendered magnificent cooperation and have done some 

excellent work.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Loevinger. Mr. Roonev.

Mr. R ooney. Judge, how many radio stations were in this six-State 

area?

Commissioner Loevinger. There is a complete listing of them. 

There were 174 standard broadcast stations, 125 daytime-only stations, 1G8 FM stations, and 51 television stations.

Mr. Rooney. Of all of the stations there were only 121 tha t were 

operating during the emergency ?

Commissioner Loevinger. Yes. As I say on pages 5, 6, 7 of our 

report, this is broken dowm by categories of service. Some of the 

AM stations were daytime-only stations tha t had already gone off the 

air because of the limitation of their hours. One hundred of the 124 

had signed off for the day. Thirteen, however, resumed operation 

with emergency power; went on the air despite the fa ct th at they were 

daytime-only stations, in order to render service.

As I say, so far as television stations are concerned, although a 

number of them did as a m atter of public service continue operation, 

my own feeling is that this was not really a crucial or important factor 

because there are relatively so few battery-operated television sets.

It is no good for them to transmit unless somebody can recieve them. 

There are a lot of battery-operated AM and FM sets but relatively few 

television sets.
122 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE----NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

Mr. Rooney. Wh at are the voluntary corrective measures th at the 

companies are using to insure continuity in case of either emergency ?

Commissioner Loevinger. Which companies, sir?

Mr. Rooney. The licensed radio stations.

Commissioner Loevinger. Some of the stations tha t did not have 

auxiliary power are putting it in. This is really all tha t is involved 

by and large. If you have power you can continue to operate.

Mr. Rooney. The FAA is assisting local airports in installing generators. Does the FCC conemplate helping any of the radio stations?

Commissioner Loevinger. No, sir. We have no money for this purpose.

Mr. Rooney. It is a matter of dollars and cents ?

Commissioner Loevinger. Strictly a matter of dollars and cents.

Mr. Rooney. I have no further questions. Thank you.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Mr. Commissioner, with regard to the auxiliary power which Mr. Rooney was talking about, rumors have been 

spread around tha t the FCC plans to make as a requirement for gran ting licenses in the future and for renewals, tha t the station or licensee 

make a showing of adequate auxiliary power to stay on the air du ring 

emergencies.

Would you address yourself to that topic?

Commissioner Loevinger. No, sir; we have not made it a requirement. So far as I know it has not been proposed tha t we should do 

so.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Of course this would cause alarm, as you can 

well understand, among some of the smaller stations.

Commissioner Loevinger. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. It is very easy to see how a large station with 

a large income would be wanting not only to serve the public but to 

keep its facilities open for its own profit reason, tha t it may very well 

make a capital investment to make auxiliary power available to them. 

In these discussions has there been any thought given as to the showing by the licensee of the auxiliary power facilities of the local power 

company that is serving the station ?

Commissioner Loevinger. I am sorry, I don’t quite understand tha t 

question, Mr. Rogers.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Say you had a station applying for a license 

or a man applying for a license in a small market. Do you make him 

in his application show what his power facilities are; tha t is, what 

local power company is serving him and what auxiliary power the 

local power company has in the event of an emergency ?

Commissioner Loevinger. My impression is tha t we have not inquired into this. I think tha t we will begin to inquire into this as a 

matter of information.

Let me add to this, Air. Rogers. It is not necessary and perhaps is 

not desirable tha t all stations stay on the air in every emergency. In 

fact, one of the things that, was noticeable was tha t throughou t the 

area affected by this blackout there was excellent radio reception during the blackout simply because of the fact th at some of the stations 

were off the air and that this resulted in less interference and therefore 

the stations th at were on the air were heard better.
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 123

Pa rt of the emergency broadcast system which is implemented by 

national defense emergency authorization to specific stations is the 

calculation of which station should stay on the air in an emergency.

It is neither necessary nor desirable t ha t all stations be on the air. 

Rather it is important to have stations spaced both geographically and 

in the spectrum so tha t we can get the maximum effect out of the broadcast ing tha t does take place.

There is room during peacetime operations for a large number of 

relatively small local stations tha t would not necessarily be required 

to be on the air in an emergency.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. As I understand this you have pursued this 

policy for some time of designating some certain stations that the FCC 

can say to all other licensees, “Get off the air because we have an emergency,” and the emergency stations you designate know who they are 

and that, they are supposed to stay on the air.

Commissioner Loevinger. Yes, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. One man came to me and talked to me about 

this particular situation. ITe seemed to be a little bit mixed up about 

it because he did not realize that this was in effect now; he had some 

fears, he had heard that this was going to be done, and tha t it was 

done and that if it was done these stations would use this for advertising purposes and say, “Listen always to my station because I am the 

emergency station and if anybody stays on the air I have to stay on 

the air.”

Now the FCC would not allow that sort of thing.

Commissioner L oevinger. We have been conscious of that danger. 

Steps are taken to provide—to avoid exploitation of it. Everything 

possible has been and is being done to avoid commercial exploitation 

of these emergency arrangements. As you say, they are in effect now 

and there is a very large number, Mr. Miller tells me there are in the 

neighborhood of 2,000 or more NDEA's now outstanding.

We have not had reports of their use in this fashion.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. I would presume that these 2,000 reach every 

area in the United States.

Commissioner Loevinger. Virtually every area. There are some 

areas th at do not get p rimary ground service, that are dependent upon 

sky wave. This is true even as to normal broadcasting.

By and large these are areas bet ween the Rocky Mountains and the 

Mississippi where there is a lot of open space.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now your referred to the wire communications and I thin k that they did a tremendous job. The reports that 

you have and the information you have both from the A.T. & T. and 

the groups and the Western Union was th at the communications did 

stay on continuously.

Commissioner Loevinger. By and large. The major outage was 

with respect to overseas communications, particularly Western Union 

had some difficulty which is, I think, quite understandable.

Western Union had its major headquarters in downtown New York. 

Western Union had taken steps to have power available from two 

separate power stations or substations of Consolidated Edison. Also 

they had both alternating and direct current power available and 

means for converting from one to the other so that any power failure
124 NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

th at could be an tic ipa ted could be co mpensated f or by sw itc hin g to the 

othe r source o f power.

In o ver 20 years th ey nev er ha d a power f ailure o f b oth sources and 

they ha d been advised by a Conso lidated Ed iso n stu dy t hat the re was 

no practic al possibility of s uch a power failur e. In fac t, however, of 

course it di d occur.

Th ey did go off the a ir from th is office. Some of the overseas commu nic ations were interru pted . By and lar ge, com municatio ns within 

th e coun try were rou ted throug h othe r offices, were ha nd led at places 

where power was available .

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Now it w as the n—was the same th in g tr ue of 

the A.T. & T. fa cility ?

Com mission er L oevinger. A.T . & T. I think pr etty well continu ed, 

even wi th th ei r overseas services.

Mr. R ogers of Texas. Th ey h ad th eir own au xilia ry pow er ?

Com mission er L oevinger. Th ey h ad th ei r own a ux iliary power.

Mr. Rogers of Texa s. Now the overload situatio n t hat you were ta lk ­

in g about in th is emergency, th at could pro bably be describ ed as a 

teenag e proble m on a la rge scale.

Com missioner Loevinger. Believe me, I und ersta nd w ha t you m ean. 

I h ave teenagers.

. M r. R ogers of Texa s. W ha t steps are being tak en bv the com municatio ns commission with rega rd to th is sort of situatio n in an emergency?

Com mission er L oevinger. I guess, to be c andid , I have t o admi t th at 

we hav e no t done an ythi ng about it. I don’t rea lly quite know wha t 

there is to be done other th an ask the broa dcast ers to ask th e p ublic not

to use the teleph one unless it is necessary.

Mr. R ogers of T exas . Ar e th e telep hone fac ilities more or less ge ared

to th e avera ge use or are they gea red to h ighe r use in or de r to absorb?

Com mission er Loevinger. Th ey a re geared to normal pea ks hut this 

kind of th in g exceeded all nor mal peaks. I ju st d on’t kno w how you 

can co nstru ct a system th at will take care of rea lly abn orm al peaks

because if y ou do it is sim ply too lar ge to be economical.

Mr. R ogers of Texas . Now this poses anoth er question in the general

area of wh at Mr. Roon ey was ta lk in g abo ut, th at the FA A is un de rta ki ng to help finance some of th e fac ilitie s with rega rd to airports.

I will ask you if any thou gh t ha s been given by the Fe de ral Com ­

mu nic ations Commission to. say. sub sidizing these different rad io and 

TV station s t o make it possible fo r th em to h ave a ux iliary power.

I thi nk von r a nsw er was th at you did no t ha ve money fo r tha t. Ha s 

anv th ou gh t been giv en to th at ?

Com mis sioner Loevinger. As T say. there is some money ava ilab le 

from the Dep artm ent, of Defense fo r a numb er of r ad io s tation s. By 

and la rg e th is has been distr ibuted . I t has been distr ibuted with a 

notion of maintaining the most effective emergency broadc astin g system fo r m ili ta ry use bu t the same fac ilities arc of course availabl e for 

pea cetime emergencies.

Th e FC C its elf is no t a dis bu rsi ng agency and has no such monev. 

T hav e rea l doubt th at ou r experience with th is emergency would 

ju stify us in ask ing Con gress fo r addit ion al money fo r this purpose.

So fa r as the tele pho ne system is concerned we m igh t ask A .T. & T. 

to subsidize the FC C. I don’t th in k it would wo rk the other way 

around .
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 125

Mr. R ogers of Texas. I have had several letters on this subject on 

the very issue. In a number of them people make suggestions about 

these things. Of course they b ring up matters that I think the American public is thinking about. One of those seems to be th at they feel 

probably the Federal Government should get in the role of making it 

possible for, we will say, local power companies to have a grant of some 

kind to provide auxiliary power for emergencies so that the cost of 

maintaining auxiliary power in a certain area will not be immediately 

dumped back on the user of tha t particular facility in tha t area. 

Speaking of electric power, the same thin g would be true of the communications facilities, especially the wire communications facilities, 

that if additional power was required auxiliary power could get into 

a load factor like we were talking about a minute ago, that it would be 

quite a heavy imposition upon the average payer of the telephone bill 

to maintain this.

It would not be used except in an emergency.

Commissioner Loevinger. This was not a power problem, Mr. 

Rogers. This was a systems problem. The overloading of the lines 

was not because of an inadequacy of power to handle this but simply 

because there were not enough telephone lines to handle all the calls 

that, the people at the peak were try ing to make.

What you are talking about is not auxiliary power but constructing 

another telephone system. This is not an economical and practical 

thing.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. There would be the same problem in communications as would be present in power because the telephone companies would have to put in more of a system in order to absorb this 

additional impact.

Somebody would have to pay fo r that and it would be the telephone 

user. Because of the public utility regulations it would just simply 

fall back on him. Do you feel, Judge, the facilities at the present 

time, based on how they measured up in the Northeast blackout and 

what we know about them now, are sufficient to meet the emergencies 

that might occur similar to this one?

Commissioner Loevinger. Substantially, yes. I think tha t this is 

not to say tha t everything was perfect. However I think what is required is reasonable and well within the financial capabilities of the 

carriers themselves.

In other words, the kind of thing that may be necessary will be 

duplicate and essentially redundant lines to specific crucial points. I 

see no point in having a lot of redundant capacity for ordinary dormitory neighborhoods let us say, just because people might even get 

panicky in an emergency.

You would want it to a few points like airports, military installations, and places of tha t sort. This I thin k is within the capacity 

of the companies and the systems and I thin k that these things are 

being done and are by and large being taken care of.

We made an examination, for example, of the situation of the m ilitary installations, Norad, SAC, and these places. Some circuits 

were lost but by and large—not by and large—just without qualification these headquarters had communications available to them, it is 

my understanding, a t all times.
126 NORTHEA ST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65

They were never cut off from adequate communications. There 

were some anomalies and some defects discovered in the military 

emergency communications and these are being worked on.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Steps are being taken according to the Deputy 

Director who was here yesterday, Air. Thomas Rogers, to correct any 

of the deficiencies which showed up which he told the committee were 

at a minimum actually.

Commissioner Loevinger. Yes.

Air. Rogers of Texas. And they were not vital deficiencies, but I 

gathered they were to be expected in any area where you have any 

human element involved ?

Commissioner Loevinger. I agree with their judgment. From the 

information we have they are not majo r and they are subject to correction. I don’t believe tha t any additional program of subsidy is 

necessary to handle them.

Air. R ogers of Texas. Now you spoke of the use of radio signals as 

opposed to the TV signals in an emergency of this kind. I thin k this 

was very well proven by the emergency tha t was created by the 

blackout.

There are a great number, of course, of transistor radios that made 

it possible for people to know and understand this problem where 

otherwise they would again have been completely cut off from communications.

Now the transistor radios of course were the link because you don’t 

have transistor television sets that are widespread.

I know there are quite a few of them. But in your explanation 

of the broadcasting ot the television programs, itself, did you say that 

unless you do get the picture tha t the requirement on all the components is so great tha t it could very well cause them to deteriorate 

quickly?

Commissioner Loevinger. No. The way television sets are now 

constructed you cannot receive the audio or sound signal without the 

visual or picture carrier being transmitted by the TV broadcast station also.

Wh at one or more stations have done is to put a special kind of 

modulation on, in effect, a substitute for the visual signal. This results in a picture th at is all black; instead of a picture you get a black 

tube. But because you are feeding maximum power into the visual 

pa rt of the circuitry, this in tur n wears the whole apparatu s out much 

faster tha n normal use would do.

Consequently it is not regarded as very good practice except for 

emergency use.

Air. Rogers of Texas. But you can get the visual without the audio.

Commissioner Loevinger. I am not sure. I am advised no.

Air. Rogers of Texas. When the audio goes off the sign comes on, 

“Trouble with the audio, just bear with us.”

But I have never seen one where the picture went off and th e sound 

said, “We have had trouble with the picture, wait for i t to get back 

on.”

Is tha t the way it works ?

Commissioner Loevinger. My engineers say tha t both carrier signals have to be present all the time but you may not get modulation of
NORTHEAST POWER FAILURE— NOVEMBER 9, 10 , 19 65 127

the audio, for example. You may not get any sound but you are 

getting something from the station.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Judge, does the Commission intend to make 

any recommendations with regard to any of the communications facilities or operations in this country as a result of what you have found 

out from the blackout?

Commissioner L oevinger. So far as I know now, Mr. Rogers, it is 

not necessary for us to recommend anything to Congress. 1 believe 

tha t a remedy of all the problems lies well within the capability of the 

carriers and the present authority of the Commission.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. And you think tha t they are all quite well 

known ?

Commissioner Loevinger. I won't go so far as to say they are all 

well known but those that are not known are under study.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Mr. Rooney has called my attention to a question here. When this apparatus wears out, what we were talking 

about a minute ago, is t ha t the apparatus of the broadcaster or the 

receiver ?

Commissioner Loevinger. I thin k it is the transmission apparatus.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Do you have any more questions, Mr. Rooney ?

Mr. Rooney. No.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Thank you very much, Judge.

It was very kind of you to come up. We may call on you later.

Commissioner Loevinger. I will be available at any time, sir.

Mr. Rogers of Texas. Th at concludes the testimony this morning. 

The subcommittee will adjourn subject to call of the Chair.

(Whereupon, at 1:45 p.m., the subcommittee adjourned, subject to 

call.)

o