Venezuela’s electric power company ran out of excuses again this week and decided to go back to creative ideas and blame an opossum for the latest blackout in Ciudad Guayana. The excuse goes even beyond the opossum by saying that people have been leaving garbage behind, which attracts animals, which then manage to eat a cable, cutting off all power to sections about half the size of a city like Ciudad Guayana.
Of course, nobody explains why there is no clean up to remove the garbage, or measures to prevent people from throwing garbage near the power plant or transformers. But more importantly, how can a system be designed such that a single opossum can short-circuit half a city?
Just asking.
