Thread by @A_Wilkins_

Hello, I’m here in Moore County where the attack on substations happened and we don’t have power. It’s obviously an upsetting and disturbing criminal act.

Here’s a list of impacts on the community I’m aware of so far, beyond losing power:

Cell phone signal has been heavily disrupted and some providers, such as Verizon, are completely down in some parts of the county.

Many rural residents get water from wells, and the pumps are down. We will slowly lose water pressure until we lose water altogether so are using reserve water we set aside for essentials and filling up buckets of water from the pond to fill toilet reservoirs to flush them.

Local pharmacies are moving critical meds to people’s homes with generators and refrigerator space.

Police are being called in from across the state to help manage intersections, and I assume to assist with normal emergency services in general while power is out.

Projected problems: spoiling of food in grocery stores, restaurants, and most critically people’s homes. Looting has already happened at a local Walmart. Schools will probably be canceled tomorrow.

Cell network being down means it took two hours to send this.

Anyway, give me a call, news people at @washingtonpost or wherever, if you want to hear how this is affecting people.

Hearing a lot of speculation about motives and why this happened - just want to caution folks that there’s nothing that points to a clear motive, and follow-on consequences/happening (such as looting) shouldn’t be conflated with motives.

Anyway, making some coffee (with non-pond water) and happy to answer Qs as I can. Internet is very limited and happening through my parents’ AT&T cellular hotspot.

Normally, it’s quiet at my parents’ small farm (something I look forward to when I visit) but you can hear generators running in the distance around us.

We’re firing up one at our place now, just cleaning off a little corrosion on the grounding rod for the generator.

To give you a sense of the info blackout that coincides with this sort of power blackout, people here are slowly learning what is happening - internet has been very disrupted across the country.

Folks texting about us being on national news - you likely know more than we do.

Something important: local news is so important in times like this. The team at @ThePilotNews is doing incredible work. Stay tuned to them and their website. Working under very odd circumstances to cover this.

We have liftoff.

And we have water.

Thankfully, no one here is reliant on refrigerated medicines or powered medical equipment. We’re so fortunate to have access to a generator and to have had a supply of water ready while we got the well up and going.

Not everyone is so lucky.

It’s one thing when we’re stressed like this due to natural disasters (climate change included), it’s another when it’s caused by a crime like this. I hope they catch whoever did this and throw the boom at them.

Have heard that at least one pawn/gun shop was successfully broken into last night shortly after the attack on the substations.

Extremely disturbing - though I hope it’s a sick coincidence, it feels like an unlikely one.

We’re now expecting the county to be declared a disaster area and grocery stores are distributing food - glad it isn’t going to waste.

Still no power, and it’s starting to get a little colder here. Expected to dip below 40 tonight. Again, we’re fortunate on this front - we have a fireplace, plenty of wood to use, and good bedding for the night. Thinking about people who will struggle to heat their home tonight.

County wide curfew in effect starting at 9pm.

Duke now saying power may not be restored until Thursday, due to the complex nature of repairs. Oof.

Things that aren’t helpful at this press conference: this state senator jumping in front of a microphone to offer boilerplate praise for law enforcement during a press conference intended to inform the public about this crisis. What a waste of time.

Everyone else has offered updates on emergency centers, timelines for repairs, scope of damage, breadth of investigation, etc. Pretty informative (except for that guy).

Very concerning that the county may be without power for several more days.

I guess I’m Mr. Wilkins now: nytimes.com/2022/12/04/us/…

Glad the NYT is talking about the local impacts in their story. While law enforcement hunts for the perpetrators and the utility company repairs the grid, this outage will drag on

Please keep those who aren’t equipped to weather this outage - whether it’s staying warm, keeping meds cool or med equipment running, keeping food from spoiling, and many other things - in your thoughts and prayers.

Signing off from this thread for the night, and probably going forward, because I think I’ve said my piece and don’t have anything new to add. Will share anything new/interesting if it comes up, but thanks for following today.

Stay warm and safe.

Hey folks, wanted to provide a few quick notes.

First of all, seeing some confusion/misunderstanding about the Sheriff’s use of the phrase “word of prayer.” That’s a southernism, in this context, for a good talking to. Not literally praying with or for someone.

Second, I appreciate the attention this thread has gotten but will be doing my best to amplify other voices as I can going forward. There are folks having a much, much harder time than my family and I encourage us to think about and listen to them.

Lastly, thanks to all of the producers, researchers, reporters, and technicians that have been working on this ongoing, troubling story. I appreciated the opportunity to speak to some of you all and remain grateful for the role of the press during these times. Stay safe and warm.

Fun update: parents decided to try the hot water (which isn’t hooked up to the generator, so hasn’t been powered since Saturday night) for a shower and lo and behold, there was a little bit of hot water left for a warm shower.

It’s the little things.