Grid Attack Last Year Same Day as Marathon

Share this page

I heard about this last December when it was in Foreign Policy

You have to register to get the article, so I'll cut and paste.


'Military-Style' Raid on California Power Station Spooks U.S.
BY Shane Harris
DECEMBER 27, 2013 - 01:50 PM

When U.S. officials warn about "attacks" on electric power facilities these days, the first thing that comes to mind is probably a computer hacker trying to shut the lights off in a city with malware. But a more traditional attack on a power station in California has U.S. officials puzzled and worried about the physical security of the the electrical grid--from attackers who come in with guns blazing.

Around 1:00 AM on April 16, at least one individual (possibly two) entered two different manholes at the PG&E Metcalf power substation, southeast of San Jose, and cut fiber cables in the area around the substation. That knocked out some local 911 services, landline service to the substation, and cell phone service in the area, a senior U.S. intelligence official told Foreign Policy. The intruder(s) then fired more than 100 rounds from what two officials described as a high-powered rifle at several transformers in the facility. Ten transformers were damaged in one area of the facility, and three transformer banks -- or groups of transformers -- were hit in another, according to a PG&E spokesman.

Cooling oil then leaked from a transformer bank, causing the transformers to overheat and shut down. State regulators urged customers in the area to conserve energy over the following days, but there was no long-term damage reported at the facility and there were no major power outages. There were no injuries reported. That was the good news. The bad news is that officials don't know who the shooter(s) were, and most importantly, whether further attacks are planned.

"Initially, the attack was being treated as vandalism and handled by local law enforcement," the senior intelligence official said. "However, investigators have been quoted in the press expressing opinions that there are indications that the timing of the attacks and target selection indicate a higher level of planning and sophistication."

The FBI has taken over the case. There appears to have been some initial concern, or at least interest, in the fact that the shooting happened one day after the Boston Marathon bombing. But the FBI has no evidence that the attack is related to terrorism, and it appears to be an isolated incident, said Peter Lee, a spokesman for the FBI field office in San Francisco, which is leading the investigation. Lee said the FBI has "a couple of leads we're still following up on," which he wouldn't discuss in detail. There has not been any published motive or intent for the attack, the intelligence official said, and no one has claimed credit.

Local investigators seemed to hit a dead end in June, so they released surveillance footage of the shooting. But that apparently produced no new information. The FBI says there have been no tips from the public about who the shooter might be and what he was doing there.

The incident might have stayed a local news story, but this month, Rep. Henry Waxman, the California Democrat and ranking member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, mentioned it at a hearing on regulatory issues. "It is clear that the electric grid is not adequately protected from physical or cyber attacks," Waxman said. He called the shooting at the the San Jose facility "an unprecedented and sophisticated attack on an electric grid substation with military-style weapons. Communications were disrupted. The attack inflicted substantial damage. It took weeks to replace the damaged parts. Under slightly different conditions, there could have been serious power outages or worse."

The U.S. official said the incident "did not involve a cyber attack," but that's about all investigators seem to know right now. AT&T, which operates the phone network that was affected, has offered a $250,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrator or perpetrators.

"These were not amateurs taking potshots," Mark Johnson, a former vice president for transmission operations at PG&E, said last month at a conference on grid security held in Philadelphia. "My personal view is that this was a dress rehearsal" for future attacks.

At the very least, the attack points to an arguably overlooked physical threat to power facilities at a time when much of the U.S. intelligence community, Congress, and the electrical power industry is focused on the risk of cyber attacks. There has never been a confirmed power outage caused by a cyber attack in the United States. But the Obama administration has sought to promulgate cyber security standards that power facilities could use to minimize the risk of one.

At least one senior official thinks the government is focusing too heavily on cyber attacks. Jon Wellinghoff, the chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, said last month that an attack by intruders with guns and rifles could be just as devastating as a cyber attack.

A shooter "could get 200 yards away with a .22 rifle and take the whole thing out," Wellinghoff said last month at a conference sponsored by Bloomberg. His proposed defense: A metal sheet that would block the transformer from view. "If you can't see through the fence, you can't figure out where to shoot anymore," Wellinghoff said. Price tag? A "couple hundred bucks." A lot cheaper than the billions the administration has spent in the past four years beefing up cyber security of critical infrastructure in the United States and on government computer networks.

"There are ways that a very few number of actors with very rudimentary equipment could take down large portions of our grid," Wellinghoff said. "I don't think we have the level of physical security we need."
Click to expand...
 
Yeah, as someone who works in the power generation industry, this is very disturbing.

We have some huge and many large substations around here. And we have some large plants too. I wont mention specifics. I know that at the time, we were told to be "very viligant" against intruders and possible attacks. We thought it was caution because of Boston. We were not told why until this went public a few days ago.

Our infrastructure is largely unmanned and unguarded aside from the generation plants. Even here, we are manned, but not generally guarded (there are exceptions, again, no specifics). If those people had just known a little more about how the substation and the transformers worked, it would have been a very dark night in the silicon valley. Possibly beyond.

I used to work for a different power plant. Every Earth Day, Greenpeace would target us. Due to several factors we never caught them. But they were pros. Took us down every time, and in different ways. Hung their flag, and were gone in seconds. Dangerous as hell, risked their lives and ours, but very effective.

I don't think this had anything to do with them, tho. Clearly organized, but not as effective.
 
IMO There probably terror cells in this country ready to take out the whole grid. If this were to happen it would be the biggest
catastrophe in world history. it would be permanently ruined the United States economy... more people would die than every war combined... I heard reports it could take up to five years get electricity back up and running..... I believe the federal government already know this and are planning for the worse.... unfortunately we have too many people in office that are ignorant and they are sitting on their hands doing nothing. We are that frog in lukewarm water having no clue how dangerous this is. we are the type of country where we have to be thrown boiling water to realize when were in danger....
Posted via Mobile Device
 
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbe...ecurity-its-time-for-a-national-conversation/

There's an article in Forbes magazine here's an excerpt...

The Denver Post, on February 15th, ran an Associated Press article entitled Homeland Security aims to buy 1.6b rounds of ammo, so far to little notice. It confirmed that the Department of Homeland Security has issued an open purchase order for 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition. As reported elsewhere, some of this purchase order is for hollow-point rounds, forbidden by international law for use in war, along with a frightening amount specialized for snipers. Also reported elsewhere, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was expending less than 6 million rounds a month. Therefore 1.6 billion rounds would be enough to sustain a hot war for 20+ years. In America.

Add to this perplexing outré purchase of ammo, DHS now is showing off its acquisition of heavily armored personnel carriers, repatriated from the Iraqi and Afghani theaters of operation. As observed by “paramilblogger” Ken Jorgustin last September:
 
imapig said:
There's an article in Forbes magazine here's an excerpt...
The Denver Post, on February 15th, ran an Associated Press article entitled Homeland Security aims to buy 1.6b rounds of ammo, so far to little notice. It confirmed that the Department of Homeland Security has issued an open purchase order for 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition. As reported elsewhere, some of this purchase order is for hollow-point rounds, forbidden by international law for use in war, along with a frightening amount specialized for snipers. Also reported elsewhere, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was expending less than 6 million rounds a month. Therefore 1.6 billion rounds would be enough to sustain a hot war for 20+ years. In America.

Add to this perplexing outré purchase of ammo, DHS now is showing off its acquisition of heavily armored personnel carriers, repatriated from the Iraqi and Afghani theaters of operation. As observed by “paramilblogger” Ken Jorgustin last September:
Click to expand...
If this does not wake anybody up I don't know what will....
 
Basically there going to do what Y2k was supposed to do. Millions of people will panic & riot. If they can't post stuff on Twitter & FB.
 
king of kings said:
Basically there going to do what Y2k was supposed to do. Millions of people will panic & riot. If they can't post stuff on Twitter & FB.
Click to expand...

King we would be much better prepared for a disaster than just sit on our hands and do nothing...
Posted via Mobile Device
 
y2k was a joke by the way... having a giant solar flare or a massive EMP event are very possible... When? who? The Gvt will be the first to know, and normal everyday citizens will be the last to know...
Posted via Mobile Device
 
imapig said:
IMO There probably terror cells in this country ready to take out the whole grid. If this were to happen it would be the biggest catastrophe in world history. it would be permanently ruined the United States economy... more people would die than every war combined... I heard reports it could take up to five years get electricity back up and running..... I believe the federal government already know this and are planning for the worse.... unfortunately we have too many people in office that are ignorant and they are sitting on their hands doing nothing. We are that frog in lukewarm water having no clue how dangerous this is. we are the type of country where we have to be thrown boiling water to realize when were in danger.... Posted via Mobile Device
Click to expand...

Not sure where you read that, but "taking out the whole grid" that would last 5 years isn't all that easy.

The system is designed to trip to avoid catastrophic damage.

Remember a few years ago when most of the Northeast went off line?

That was due to one incident where a tree branch caused a short and the issue cascaded.

How long did it take to bring everything back on line?

A couple few days.

So just how are terrorists supposed to cripple the grid to such an extent that it takes years to fix?

IMHO, there are only two plausible ways to do it: EMP or a massive attack at hundreds, if not thousands, of locations.

I don't consider either plausible.
 
imapig said:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2013/03/11/1-6-billion-rounds-of-ammo-for-homeland-security-its-time-for-a-national-conversation/ There's an article in Forbes magazine here's an excerpt... The Denver Post, on February 15th, ran an Associated Press article entitled Homeland Security aims to buy 1.6b rounds of ammo, so far to little notice. It confirmed that the Department of Homeland Security has issued an open purchase order for 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition. As reported elsewhere, some of this purchase order is for hollow-point rounds, forbidden by international law for use in war, along with a frightening amount specialized for snipers. Also reported elsewhere, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was expending less than 6 million rounds a month. Therefore 1.6 billion rounds would be enough to sustain a hot war for 20+ years. In America. Add to this perplexing outré purchase of ammo, DHS now is showing off its acquisition of heavily armored personnel carriers, repatriated from the Iraqi and Afghani theaters of operation. As observed by “paramilblogger” Ken Jorgustin last September:
Click to expand...

IIRC, the Baron mentioned this ammo purchase six months to a year ago in one of his typical "the end is neigh" posts.

Picture me unconcerned.
 
O_P_T said:
Not sure where you read that, but "taking out the whole grid" that would last 5 years isn't all that easy.

The system is designed to trip to avoid catastrophic damage.

Remember a few years ago when most of the Northeast went off line?

That was due to one incident where a tree branch caused a short and the issue cascaded.

How long did it take to bring everything back on line?

A couple few days.

So just how are terrorists supposed to cripple the grid to such an extent that it takes years to fix?

IMHO, there are only two plausible ways to do it: EMP or a massive attack at hundreds, if not thousands, of locations.

I don't consider either plausible.
Click to expand...
A simple tree branch took out the northeast....
Posted via Mobile Device
 
imapig said:
y2k was a joke by the way... having a giant solar flare or a massive EMP event are very possible... When? who? The Gvt will be the first to know, and normal everyday citizens will be the last to know... Posted via Mobile Device
Click to expand...

Do you know why Y2K was a joke?

The entire premise was flawed.

Supposedly, financial software was all based on years that only used two digits and so couldn't tell the difference between 2000 and 1900.

Of course, this ignored two basic facts.

First, much of that financial software didn't use the actual year but the time from "time zero". That zero was arbitrarily set by the programers, presumably the year the software was first written.

After all, what matters in most financial calculations is the relative time, not absolute.

Second, most financial software would run projections out for some number of future years. So that software would have already calculated past 2000 for the 5 odd years it projected.

Y2K in reality, was nothing but a marketing ploy to sell new PC's and software.
 
imapig said:
A simple tree branch took out the northeast.... Posted via Mobile Device
Click to expand...

For how long?

Why did it take out so many?

Because the system is designed to trip to protect itself.

If you think that outage supports the idea that the entire grid could be knocked out for years, then you don't understand what happened then, or what risk the system faces.
 
O_P_T said:
For how long?

Why did it take out so many?

Because the system is designed to trip to protect itself.

If you think that outage supports the idea that the entire grid could be knocked out for years, then you don't understand what happened then, or what risk the system faces.
Click to expand...
how about a massive solar flare?
Posted via Mobile Device
 
O_P_T said:
Do you know why Y2K was a joke?

The entire premise was flawed.

Supposedly, financial software was all based on years that only used two digits and so couldn't tell the difference between 2000 and 1900.

Of course, this ignored two basic facts.

First, much of that financial software didn't use the actual year but the time from "time zero". That zero was arbitrarily set by the programers, presumably the year the software was first written.

After all, what matters in most financial calculations is the relative time, not absolute.

Second, most financial software would run projections out for some number of future years. So that software would have already calculated past 2000 for the 5 odd years it projected.

Y2K in reality, was nothing but a marketing ploy to sell new PC's and software.
Click to expand...
I agree...
Posted via Mobile Device
 
imapig said:
how about a massive solar flare? Posted via Mobile Device
Click to expand...

If you want to talk about hypothetical natural disasters, there are a host we could discuss.

Asteroid/comet impact
Gamma ray burst
Pandemic

To name just a few.

I thought this thread was about a terrorist threat?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top