4 HN users recommended this documentary4 months2022–2026score 4.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026
Recommended whenever outages and cascading failures come up, as a classic on interdependent systems.
The first episode of James Burke's Connections series, 'The Trigger Effect', explores how modern society depends on interlinked technological systems and how quickly it breaks down when they fail, starting with a power blackout.
“You may enjoy the first episode of James Burke's Connections ("The Trigger Effect"), if you've not seen it.” (HN, 2023)
The "Trigger Effect" episode ( [this video] ) that set off Connections:I was one of the finest hours ever produced for television. It influenced my family and I in the years to come. Hope for the best, while preparing for the worst. It begins at South Tower of the World Trade Center, and as Burke enters an express elevator (Car 6 or 7 if you must know) he says in effect, "Do I worry about ascending to the top in a steel box? Of course I don't! We take going up in the world like that for granted." When the elevator goes dark he says. "We expect this to happen sometimes so what do we do? We strike a light and look around in the dark for an emergency button to push and is we find one, we press it." In this discussion of single takes, note what the temperature of the butane lighter must have been by the time he finishes his speech. Ouch! Also interesting to note in the realm of happenstance: the airliner portrayed in trouble over darkened New York was flight 911.
Classic Burke episode opening in the World Trade Center elevator
This resonates very much with the Connections[0] series by James Burke. It's an old series, but well worth the watch. Back then it already discussed what would happen if the grid would collapse, and how everything is interconnected. Now with the internet it has gotten even worse. I think the questions asked back then in the series are still very relevant and maybe even more so nowadays. [0] [this video]
Burke series on grid collapse and interconnected systems
This might be a good time for folks to go back and watch the first episode of James Burke's Connections: The Trigger Effect [this video] Interconnected systems can fail spectacularly in unforeseen ways. Strange that something so obvious is so often dismissed or overlooked.
[this video] Connections , episode 1, "The Trigger Effect". TL;DW shit gets very, very dicey in a matter of days if the power goes out—and most of our ways of recovering with any speed rely on power so if it goes out for most or all of the world at once, that's extremely bad . If it hit the wrong time of year, I could easily see a global power outage killing millions in the very first day. Loss of air conditioning and heating could push it into the millions all on their own.
Episode on how society breaks down within days of power loss
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