Computer Glitch Causes Major Power Outage

Event Year: 2007 Reliability: Confirmed
Country: United States
Industry Type: Power and Utilities
Description:

A computer glitch is being blamed for a massive power outage in the Phoenix area.  Between 80,000-100,000 Salt River Project customers were afffected.  The outage lasted for 20-30 minutes.  The Salt River Project has a system in place to shed load if it is unable to supply power.  That didn’t happen on the day of the outage.  There was a computer problem that thought it did and it triggered the widespread outage.

Impact:

Power outage to 80,000-100,000 customers for 20-30 minutes.