Re: BBN (GTE) Suffers another major power problem.

[Christopher Masto <chris () netmonger net>]

On Fri, Aug 08, 1997 at 08:59:44AM -0500, Phil Howard wrote:
> > It's my understanding that BBN had emergency generator backup, but that it was
> > insufficient to cover this outage.  I'm pretty sure I saw that in one of 
> > their ticket emails last night, although it's not in the official ticket 
> > history.
>
> It's my understanding that a battery supply that lasts long enough to get
> the emergency generator running, along with a fuel contractor to keep the
> generator topped off, can last over rather long outages.

The question is, what gets power?  Assuming you're the size of BBN, it
becomes.. er.. "physically impractical" to power everything with a
generator.  I know when I was at RPI, though they had a room full of
batteries (3-5 minutes of power), and a huge generator, it was only
enough to power the telephone system and mainframe.  In fact, it
couldn't handle the water cooler for the mainframe.  But the point is,
even though (I hope) BBN isn't using a power-hungry mainframe, enough
routers, switches, NOC workstations, etc. will eventually add up to
more kilowatts than you can supply yourself.  A decision has to be
made as to what stays on and what doesn't.
-- 
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