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“Unparalleled Challenge” – Inside America’s First Locked-Down Major City, “Everything’s Out Of Our Control”
“Unparalleled Challenge” – Inside America’s First Locked-Down Major City, “Everything’s Out Of Our Control”
The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the US has more than doubled in the last several days. California Governor Gavin Newsom has issued a state-wide “stay at home” order amid the virus outbreak – the strongest and most restrictive measure passed by a governor yet.
On Tuesday, there were about 5,700 confirmed cases in the US. But by Thursday the number exploded to 11,500. Now, on Friday morning, confirmed cases stand at 14,000.
The announcement comes after San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area issued ‘shelter in place’ orders after a surge of deaths and confirmations in the state. As of Friday morning, there are 18 virus-related deaths.
Several days into one of the most extreme lockdowns, Bay Area residents have been forced to stay at home, only allowed to leave for essential travel, such as shopping for groceries, medications, fuel, caring for others, and exercise.
NBC News spoke with one resident, Trish Tracey, who had to shutter her restaurant on Tuesday in the Mission district. She laid off her entire kitchen staff of 17 employees and has tried to renegotiate her lease.
“Everything is out of our control,” Tracey said.
The uncertainty of where the city is in the pandemic curve has left everyone confused. Strict social distancing rules have been enforced to slowdown infections to prevent local hospitals from becoming overburden with virus patients.
“The goal is to get up and running again and put all my employees back to work,” Tracey said. “I wish I could say with certainty that would happen, and I’m very determined, and I lasted five years because of that, but everything is on pretty shaky ground right now.”
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San Francisco Declares State Of Emergency Over Covid-19; Germany Confirms 18th Case: Live Updates
San Francisco Declares State Of Emergency Over Covid-19; Germany Confirms 18th Case: Live Updates
Summary:
- WHO warns the rest of the world “is not ready for the virus to spread…”
- CDC warns Americans “should prepare for possible community spread” of virus.
- San Francisco Mayor declares state of emergency
- Later, CDC says pandemic not a question of it, but when
- Germany confirms 2nd case on Tuesday, brings total to 17
- Italy cases spike to 322; deaths hit 10
- Japan’s Shiseido tesll 8k employees to work from home
- Kudlow tries to jawbone markets higher
- HHS Sec. Azar warns US lacks stockpiles of masks
- Italy Hotel in Lockdown After First Coronavirus Case in Liguria
- Algeria confirms 1st case
- First case in Switzerland
- Kuwait halts all flights to Singapore and Japan
- Iran confirms 95 cases, 15 deaths
- First case in Austria
- First case in Spain
- Iran Deputy Health Minister infected with Covid-19
* * *
Update (1750ET): Following reports just a few hours ago claiming Germany had reported its first case of the virus, Europe’s largest economy has just reported its second case, according to domestic media reports.
The first patient was reportedly a 25-year-old German who recently traveled to Milan. Patient No. 2 was confirmed near Germany’s border with the Netherlands. The man is in critical condition.
This brings Germany’s total cases to 18.
Germany’s neighbors Austria and Switzerland confirmed their first cases on Tuesday as the virus spread through Central Europe.
Over in Japan, Shiseido told 8,000 employees, roughly 30% of the personal-care company’s workforce, to telecommute in keeping with the Japanese government’s push for private employers to keep their workers out of offices and public places. Japanese companies started this more than a week ago, and have since expanded the number of employees affected.
* * *
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“This Did Not Go Well” – PG&E’s Rolling Blackout Sparked Chaos In Bay Area
“This Did Not Go Well” – PG&E’s Rolling Blackout Sparked Chaos In Bay Area
Pacific Gas and Electric’s (PG&E) historic blackout plunging hundreds of thousands of customers into darkness last week was a massive communication breakdown that sparked criticism over the two-day blackout that was designed to avoid wildfires, reported The New York Times.
PG&E officials said over the weekend that most of the power had been restored to everyone except for 2,500 customers across several Bay Area counties and promised to fix communication channels with customers.
“We’ll get better in the next month and better in the next year,” PG&E CEO Bill Johnson said Saturday.
“Communication to customers, coordination with state agencies, website availability, call center staff, that’s where you will see short-term improvements.”
Last Wednesday, PG&E triggered rolling blackouts for nearly 735,000 homes and or businesses in the San Francisco Bay Area amid the threat of strong winds and dry conditions that would’ve damaged transmission wires and sparked dangerous wildfires, similar to what was seen last year. Most of the residents were restored by Friday afternoon, but 99.5% of its customers saw full power by Saturday.
PG&E Blackouts Spread Across Northern California
The shutdown caused widespread confusion about the planned power outage, and according to some experts, billions of dollars in economic losses were sustained by local businesses during the two-day blackout.
PG&E’s website and communication network that relayed essential data about the blackouts crashed, leaving many without details about what was happening.
“There were definitely missteps,” said Elizaveta Malashenko, a spokesperson for the state Public Utilities Commission who was in the PG&E control center. “It’s pretty much safe in saying, this did not go well.”
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PG&E Outage Leaves 60,000 People Without Power In San Francisco
PG&E Outage Leaves 60,000 People Without Power In San Francisco
Embattled utility PG&E reported a service interruption on Friday that cut power to 22,000 customers – about 60,000 people – in San Francisco and stranded riders on the city’s Muni rail service.
One reporter said problems with PG&E Substation A had likely caused the outage, which started just before 8 am PT. The utility is hoping to have power restored by 10:30. By 9:50 PT, power had been restored to some 7,000 customers, leaving 15,000 still without power.
DEVELOPING: PG&E power outage in SF impacting some 22K customers (appx 60K people). Utility officials on scene say it’s related to problems at Substation A near the Dogpatch neighborhood. Electricity out for traffic lights and Muni subway. Power should be restored @ 10:30.
Muni service was impacted in both directions.
UPDATE:
Power outage has impacted #MuniMetro rail service in the subway in both directions. We are organizing bus shuttles as quickly as possible to support svc b/t West Portal & Downtown. https://twitter.com/sfmta_muni/status/1175066231872733184 …✔https://c/status/1175065718083088389
Here’s what the outage map looked like at its peak, with southeastern San Francisco the most heavily impacted:
PG&E is advising drivers to use extra caution and to treat traffic lights as four-way stops.
The utility said the cause of the outage is still under investigation.
The Importance Of Knowing
At Peak Prosperity, we strive to help people advance in three key areas: Knowing, Doing and Being.
Doing and Being are the resilience-building steps we recommend. Helping folks develop their own personal action plans in these areas is the main focus of the seminars we run.
But Knowing? That’s the essential first part to master. Without sufficient understanding and insight to guide you, any action you take is merely groping in the dark.
That’s why Chris and I spend the majority of our time info-scouting: following the data and analyzing where macro trends are likely to head next given the latest developments.
We dedicate so much time and energy to this because it’s not the domino that’s falling today that matters. What’s much more important is: Which dominoes will fall tomorrow as a result?
And make no mistake, the pace of falling dominoes is accelerating. From the geo-politically destabilizing regime change in Saudi Arabia, to the ending of the central bank liquidity bubble, to the largest species extinction wave in millennia, to the bursting retirement dreams of the Baby Boomer generation, to the fast-worsening net energy predicament — change is afoot. The relative calm of the false ‘recovery’ that the world’s central planners engineered in response to the Great Financial Crisis has reached its terminus.
Now, more than ever in recent years, understanding where events are headed next is critical to preserving your wealth and well-being.
Being keenly aware of this, Chris and I have been working for months on solving the question: How can we better arm people with the insights and answers they need to take informed action in their lives?
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Total Chaos: Cyber Attack Fears As MULTIPLE CITIES HIT With Simultaneous Power Grid Failures: Shockwave Of Delays In San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York
Total Chaos: Cyber Attack Fears As MULTIPLE CITIES HIT With Simultaneous Power Grid Failures: Shockwave Of Delays In San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York
The U.S. power grid appears to have been hit with multiple power outages affecting San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles.
Officials report that business, traffic and day-to-day life has come to a standstill in San Francisco, reportedly the worst hit of the three major cities currently experiencing outages.
Power companies in all three regions have yet to elaborate on the cause, though a fire at a substation was the original reason given by San Francisco officials.
A series of subsequent power outages in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York City left commuters stranded and traffic backed up on Friday morning. Although the outages occurred around the same time, there is as of yet no evidence that they were connected by anything more than coincidence.
The first outage occurred at around 7:20 a.m. in New York, when the power went down at the 7th Avenue and 53rd Street subway station, which sent a shockwave of significant delays out from the hub and into the rest of the subway system. By 11:30 a.m. the city’s MTA confirmed that generators were running again in the station, although the New York subways were set to run delayed into the afternoon.
Later in the morning, power outages were reported in Los Angeles International Airport, as well as in several other areas around the city.
Via : Inverse
The San Francisco Fire Department was responding to more than 100 calls for service in the Financial District and beyond, including 20 elevators with people stuck inside, but reported no immediate injuries. Everywhere, sirens blared as engines maneuvered along streets jammed with traffic.
Traffic lights were out at scores of intersections, and cars were backing up on downtown streets as drivers grew frustrated and honked at each other.
Via: SF Gate
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Wolf Richter: The Economy Is Cracking Under Too Much Debt
Wolf Richter: The Economy Is Cracking Under Too Much Debt
Wolf Richter joins the podcast this week to discuss the deterioration of the global macro situation, and how he is seeing growing signs of recession breaking out across the economy:
I think that was one of the biggest mistakes the central banks made during the financial crisis: They stopped the debt from blowing up. So we never had a cleansing.
In a recession, normally companies de-leverage. They go through bankruptcy, they shed their debts, and you have this big wave of debt restructuring. This is painful for bondholders and banks, but it clears out the crap that is clogging up the pipeline. And so these companies reemerge or get bought out and the debt just disappears. The same with consumers: they unload their debts through various methods, and so when the recovery starts, you are not suffocating under this huge load of debt.
That has not happened in the United States, particularly, but in other countries, too. That debt never got fully blown out. And then the recovery started with 0% interest rates and monetary stimulus, which only encouraged companies and individuals and governments to take on even more debt. So now we’re burdened with such an enormous amount of debt that I think it is very hard to even breathe for the economy. A lot of people out there are worried about this, which is why you hear now voices saying we need a serious reflation. They need to come up with a lot of inflation to wipe out that debt. And of course, that will be a fiasco for our economy because if you have any uptick inflation without an equivalent uptick in wages — which we have not been getting — then you will destroy the consumer. And so this is not a great solution either.
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