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| Image: Freepik |
400 dead in 96 hours: the first German district simulates a blackout
September 13, 2022
Germany's municipalities are getting serious - and are preparing for the concrete consequences of a widespread power blackout. The Hessian Rheingau-Taunus district is the first of 401 German districts and urban districts to have a specialist company in Berlin examine and simulate what threatens in the event of a blackout in order to be prepared for the increasingly likely eventuality.
According to this, 400 deaths could be expected within 96 hours. After 24 hours, livestock would die, substations would fail, and water tanks would run dry. Then there would be looting, fires and economic damage in the hundreds of millions. Unlike Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck, district fire inspector Christian Rossel currently considers the risk of a blackout to be much more likely than a lack of gas, which would not have such dramatic consequences, even if one also prepares for it.
In the event of a widespread power failure, however, nothing works anymore. Internet, landline telephony and heating systems would fail first, followed closely by mobile communications and digital radio. Gas stations would run out of petrol, electronic money and payment systems would fail, food could no longer be cooled. How long clinics, care facilities and water suppliers and disposal companies can last depends on their respective equipment. Rossel made it clear that the district could not ensure the power supply. Like Landsberg, he advises citizens to stock up on food and drinking water.
Emergency aid must be coordinated
somehow
The circle will ensure that administration and civil protection would work so that emergency aid can be coordinated. For this, the "equipment security" has to ensure electricity for servers and satellite-supported communication systems for the crisis management teams. The current emergency generator can run continuously for 16 hours. However, since the police, fire brigades and rescue workers would also need several 10,000 liters per day, negotiations are being held with heating oil suppliers.
All of these scenarios show a country that is on the brink of complete collapse in an emergency due to ideology-driven politics and decades of neglect of important infrastructure.
The danger of a widespread power failure has now become so threatening that Gerd Landsberg, the general manager of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities (DStGB) , has urged citizens to stock up on water and food supplies for 14 days. According to Landsberg, you should be aware that in the event of a power failure, no water will flow, you can't fill up and you can't charge your cell phone after two days. In addition, there is a risk of "load undersupply" due to the planned shutdown of the last three nuclear power plants ., so that in certain areas the entire electricity demand of Germany can no longer be covered. Then large electricity consumers such as industrial companies would have to be switched off voluntarily or by force.
Habeck's "heater impulse" becomes a
time bomb
He also fears hacker attacks and an overload of the power grid - not least because of the 650,000 fan heaters that were sold this year if the gas supply fails. Landsberg complains that Germany is "in no way" prepared for such a scenario. Although the federal government has recognized the danger, it is doing too little. The population also hardly follows the recommendations of the Federal Office for Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance (BBK). As recently as July , Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck toned : "The fact is: we currently have a gas problem, not an electricity problem." At the time, the statement was part of his propaganda strategy to prevent the continued operation of the three remaining German nuclear power plants.
Thus, Habeck had only pushed a large part of the 650,000 citizens to buy the fan heaters, of which DStGB chief Landsberg now fears that they will finish off the German power grid. The nationwide " Warning Day ", on which the functioning of the civil protection measures is to be tested by means of a test alarm, will take place this year on December 8th - although it is actually scheduled for the second Thursday in September every year.
At least civil protection should work
However, the last attempt two years ago, on September 10, 2020, failed miserably because not even the warning apps worked. In the event of an actual catastrophe, many citizens would not have been warned at all (like what happened three quarters of a year later in the Ahr Valley and in southern North Rhine-Westphalia during the flood of the century).
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