Thoughts Apache's Snipers Coordinated an Attack on the Power Grid, but Why?

[serpa6]

Last April, unknown attackers shot up 17 transformers at a California substation in what the then-chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Jon Wellinghoff called "the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred" in this country.

Though news reports about the incident at the Metcalf transmission facility came out in April, The Wall Street Journal just pieced together the larger story of the attack together from regulatory filings and outside reporting.

Various power-grid facilities are vandalized or damaged regularly, but the details of this particular attack are startling.

Before the attackers opened fire on the transformers, fiber optic lines running nearby were cut.

Whoever executed the maneuver knew where to shoot the transformers. They aimed at the oil-cooling systems, causing them to leak oil and eventually overheat. By the time that happened, the attackers were long gone.

Wellinghoff toured the site with Navy Seals, according to the Journal, and they were convinced that it was a professional job. Several people in the Journal story join Wellinghoff in talking up the physical (not cyber) threats to the grid's stability.

Despite the great reporting in the WSJ story, the central question remains unresolved: Why did this attack occur? What did they want?

There are something like 1,500 substations just in the regional utility PG&E's network. Why this one? What makes Metcalf special? It's not especially remote. In fact, there is a housing development less than 500 feet away. (And how did those people not hear 100 rounds being fired?)

The Metcalf facility sends power into San Jose/Silicon Valley. But it sounds as though the grid operators were able to route power around the damage in the grid fairly easily.

Without being too Pynchonian about the whole thing, I find myself asking: What would an attack like this allow someone to do somewhere else? What else was going on in the wee hours of April 16, 2013?

[serpa6]

one of my thoughts was What it this was a practice for something really big Like a major city take out the power grid and its cable fiber optic network and attack it and overthrow it War has come to our home turf Why where the seals there?
Where was the FBI they bring it seals I think they where brought in because somewhere in the world something like this happened and they where checking of signatures of know terrorist organzation

[BrendenF11]

Our infrastructure is the weakest point in our country. This attack highlights that, plus it's done on the cheap if they fire 100 rounds costing 30 bucks for the ammo and some change for the fuel to drive there. I found it strange that there was little to no reporting on this attack in the MSM, perhaps at the request of the government would be my guess. I could certainly see this as a "walk" phase operation, before the next which could be a run and a massive hit on a community. I think the major cities powergrids are to large and spread apart to be attacked in this manner though.


I do NOT like that the seals were there. Our governments own DHS army should have sufficed. From bridges, power grid, transportation routes (rail ways, interstates) we are to vast of a nation to defend it all.