Cleveland
An electric company in Ohio could have prevented the blackout that enveloped the Northeast last year by shutting off power around Cleveland, a panel of investigators reported this week. For an hour before the blackout, a series of northern Ohio transmission lines became overburdened and shut down, causing the area to suck power from nearby utilities. FirstEnergy Corp., which serves Cleveland, could have contained the problem by cutting the city’s lights, investigators said. Instead, the crisis spread to Michigan, Ontario, and New York. A FirstEnergy spokesman questioned the findings, saying that blacking out Cleveland “may or may not” have worked.
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