At approximately 5:00pm on Wednesday the power went out and is currently still out.
This is the first time in a couple months that Yellowknife has experienced a City wide power outage. Unfortunately it is right during the 5 o’clock drive home, which makes it all that much slower.
Ironically I don’t think many people will read this until after the power has come back on. I am using my iPhone for Internet to my Laptop to write this.
Update 5:50: At about 5:50pm the power has been restored in the Finlayson Area but not yet for downtown, oldtown and Niven. As we all know the Power Corp turns the power to the city back on section or grids at a time. It seems that with all the practice Yellowknifers get dealing with outages, things went smoothly. There have been not traffic problems reported as of yet.
Update 6:30: Power was restored to the Downtown core but at the same time went out again the Finlayson area. Still now power in Old Town or Niven.
Update 7:30: Power has been returned to Old Town, Niven area and Finlayson again. Reports are it is flickering but it seems the whole city may have power again.
Check out this video I shot while walk around in the outage, am sorry about the audio. Pictures below that.
If you have a new cell phone on the new Bell HSPA (3G) network, an iPhone you may be dealing with lose of signal. Bell is currently aware of the issue and it is once again a nation wide issue, not just Yellowknife. They were aware of the problem as of 1pm today.
They suggest to be patient and try connecting your iPhone to iTunes and make sure everything is up to date.
This is not the first issue with the iPhones on this new network for Bell. Only hours after the new network and iPhones launched many users experienced problems with the network GPS. The GPS was not able to accurately figure out where the phone was located and would generally redirect it to our of territory. This was also a problem as the phone would think it needed to call long distance when phoning a local number. Needless to say some customers where not happy about that one.
Not all users are experiencing the signal issue today but many are. Now although the best thing to do is just be patient, Bell actually encourages it users to call in a report the problem as it help elevate the issue up the list. Data Support number is 1-877-328-2123.
The past few days they have been talking about banning cell phones while driving in the legislator, ironically at the same time I was speaking with some people down in California about that exact thing. In California it is already banned and fines are handed out if you are caught holding your cell phone while driving. So we were discussing a new feature in Ford, Lincoln and Mercury vehicles called Sync. It is powered by Microsoft and is a hands free solution to well, almost everything, but the point is not about what it can do. The point more or less is there are solutions if cell phone use is banned.
I can see both sides but I have to say I lean more on the side of banning it, especially in Yellowknife. Before you jump on my back just hear me out and then you can definitely have your say in the comment section. Over the last 2 weeks alone I have encountered 2 situations of driver while on the cell phone. The first, I just could not believe. I was on my way home on a Friday afternoon down Franklin just passing the Aven Manor when a driver came up beside me going the same direction. When I glanced over, I couldn’t believe what I saw, this person was steering with what I assume to be their leg because it definitely wasn’t there hands. Both their hands were occupied with “other” things. One hand holding a cell phone and the other a cigarette. The other incident was with a commercial van driver nearly cutting into my truck because they were, you guessed it, not paying attention while on their cell phone.
There are many solutions nowadays for hand free cell phone use, whether it is built in your vehicle or just a bluetooth headset. I guess another question would be determining if the problem is using your hands while on the phone or just being on the phone with someone.
What are your thoughts on this topic? For or against?
