Last week a solar plant in the Las Vegas area was damaged when a man rammed his car through the gates and then set it on fire. He’s now facing terror charges. This is only one in a recent string of attacks on the energy infrastructure. Let’s review what’s happened in the past three months.
Timeline of recent infrastructure attacks
- January 4, 2023: Police suspect Mohammed Mesmarian damaged a Las Vegas solar power plant. Part of the facility remains shut down. Police found an iPhone and laptops in the vehicle connected to Mesmarian. When caught by police, Mesmarian claimed he set his car on fire “for the future.” (source)
- Christmas Day, 2022: Four substations in Washington State were damaged. Suspects broke fences and caused fires, ultimately leading to approximately 14,000 people losing power on Christmas evening. (source) Two men, Matthew Greenwood and Jeremy Crahan from Puyallup, WA, were charged. They claimed that they wanted to cause power outages to make it easier for them to steal things. (source)
- December 7, 2022: Shots were fired out of the passenger side of a vehicle near the Wateree Hydro Station in South Carolina. The FBI is investigating; however, witnesses claim that the gunfire wasn’t directed at them or the power station or dam, but into nearby woods. (source)
- December 3, 2022: Gunfire in Moore County, North Carolina damaged two substations. The OP already did a detailed piece on this here. In short, multiple shots were fired at two substations, causing more than 30,000 people to lose power for a few days, and millions of dollars worth of damage. No one has been charged, and no groups have claimed responsibility. (source)
- Late November 2022: Puget Sound Energy in Washington State reported two incidents at substations. They have not been offering any more details because of an ongoing FBI investigation. (source) A Portland General Electric substation was also damaged, but like the damaged substations in Washington, details have not been forthcoming because of the FBI investigation. (source)
- 11/24/22 (Thanksgiving Day): A Clackamas County, Oregon substation was shot up and short outages ensued. (source) No one has been charged. (source)
- Mid-November 2022: Two substations near Woodland, WA two substations were damaged, causing brief outages. (source) No one has been charged. (source)
- November 11, 2022: Transformers in Maysville, North Carolina, were damaged, causing 12,000 people to lose power for about two hours. (source) No one has been charged.
This is a lot of attacks in a short span of time. And the above is a summary of what we know. There are still a lot of unknowns here.
Who’s behind it all?
Within the government, law enforcement communities, and mainstream media, there is a widespread assumption that these attacks are related to white supremacist groups. Several small groups of men with ties to white supremacist groups have been arrested in the past two years for plotting attacks similar to the ones that actually took place, especially the attack in North Carolina.
In the OP article, Mike discusses how the current theory regarding the Moore County substations is that it was some kind of protest about a drag show in town. It’s possible—but nothing has been proven, no one has been charged, no arrests have been made, and no one has claimed responsibility. Terrorists often claim responsibility; that’s usually the point, so they can make their message public.
Greenwood and Crahan, the men charged in the Christmas Day vandalism, have not been linked to any groups so far. And somehow, I doubt a man named Mohammed Mesmarian is a white supremacist, though I could be wrong.
Beyond the damage done, we don’t really know what’s going on here. We don’t know if the attacks are connected. We don’t know if the attacks are ideologically motivated or just part of the general uptick in crime.
A lot going on right now is unexplained. So far, no one has been charged with the fires at food processing facilities, either. Many of them were accidental, but not all. I guess the federal agencies have been too busy making sure no one is subjected to political incorrectness on Twitter to find out what’s going on with actual, physical destructive crime.
Crime, in general, seems to be increasing.
Then, of course, there is the amount of cybercrime.
We still don’t know whether or not the FAA system outage that caused an air traffic nightmare on Wednesday was deliberate or not But we do know that the Colonial Pipeline attack was hacked last year, disrupting fuel supplies along the eastern seaboard for a week.
My neighborhood has been affected a lot by increasing crime over the last three years, and while part of me wishes there was one boogeyman to blame for everything, right now it seems hard to pin these problems on any one thing. There doesn’t seem to be anything solid to react to.
Are you prepared for grid-down scenarios?
All we can do, unless we work for law enforcement agencies, is be proactive in preparing for power outages. If you don’t have some kind of plan in place to be without electricity for an extended time, start thinking about it. Think about the biggest draws on your electrical system. Because most of my appliances are propane, my well is my biggest draw, which is why in the summertime I keep a large amount of water on hand. In the winter, when I’ve got snow on the ground, I worry less.
But plans will look different for everyone. It really depends on what most of your appliances use and your climate particulars. If you only have electric appliances, you need to think about backup generation. Solar happens to be popular in my part of the country but I don’t know how well it would work in places like New England or Minnesota. Start researching now.
Natural gas and propane are great, but understand how they’ll perform in outages. My furnace runs on propane but it still requires an electric spark to kick on, which means it doesn’t work in extended outages. Many newer appliances are like this, and you need to understand how yours work. If you can pay for it, the whole-house generators are a great option because they provide that spark to kick on your furnace.
Get to know your appliances; most of us grew up in a country where we could count on switches to turn things on, but that may be changing. Most of us can’t do much about the crime situation, but we can stay ahead of the curve in our ability to keep our households comfortable and functional.
Don’t be drawn into the propaganda.
And, for the sake of your peace of mind, watch your emotions in case you start slipping into the mindset of blaming one group of people or another. If you’re spending your emotional energy being angry at neo-Nazis, or Islamic terrorists, or whoever, that’s emotional energy not being spent engaging with your children or keeping things pleasant with your coworkers.
I would love it if federal law enforcement agencies found out what was going on and prosecuted these obnoxious vandals. I would also love it if we spent more money strengthening our grid security, but that’s just what I think.
What about you?
Who do you think is responsible for this uptick in attacks on the grid? Do you believe this is intentional and organized? Do you know of any other attacks not mentioned here? And how prepared are you for long-term outages? Let us know what you’re thinking in the comments section.
Additional resources:
- https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2022/10/31/a-proclamation-on-critical-infrastructure-security-and-resilience-month-2022/
- https://www.csis.org/programs/strategic-technologies-program/significant-cyber-incidents
About Marie Hawthorne
A lover of novels and cultivator of superb apple pie recipes, Marie spends her free time writing about the world around her.
But wait! There is more!
Yesterday a substation was shot in Randolph County, North Carolina.
No power outage.
The FBI is investigating.
The Christmas Day 2022 Washington State damaged substations were of note as the fire arms used were not some high tech, tacticool firearms.
The one bolt rifle was so old, it pre-dated serial numbers (1964).
The shotgun had a wood stock. It was also sawed off.
The point: For a few hundred bucks, they caused a power outage of some 14,000 people.
Low tech beats high tech nearly every time.
It’s been estimated that 5 million illegal immigrants have entered the United States since the current guy was installed. How difficult would it be for an adversary to embed thousands of troops in that number? Then we have home grown eco terrorists, antifa, and disgruntled roaming the country disrupting civilized life. Go with Amish technology as much as you can for your situation. Your Independence through self reliance will be worth it.
I’ll have to start another sheet of paper for this “conspiracy”.
What’s the time line between conspiracy and widely acknowledged fact these days? About 6 months, give or take… ?
Fact (widely acknowledged or not) does not happen. But some of them are quite lol moments.
Let me see if I can help you out. I didn’t say that facts happen. Facts are just facts, period. Here’s an example of a really long conspiracy that ended up proven to be fact. For thousands of years people believed Earth was flat. Anyone who suggested otherwise was spouting conspiracy. Eventually people began to widely accept the fact that Earth was round. See how that works?
Fact doesn’t happen? What are you talking about? That doesn’t even make sense.
That was directed to Selena, not Concerned Citizen. You’re 100% right, CC.
In light of what has been going on in the Ukraine/Russian war, if you were an antagonist to the US, wouldn’t you exploit a obvious weakness, i.e. open border?
In order to prove or disprove this “conspiracy” as you claim, would require a vetting of all those whom seek entry into the US. Something the Biden does not seem to be interested in.
So, we do not know if there may be other state actors coming across our open, southern border.
These attacks could be for personal gain as in the Christmas Eve, Washington attacks.
Or something more?
We will not know until real, hard evidence is established and confirmed.
At this point in time, I would not rule out anyone from far left environmentalists, to far right anti-drag queen shows, to Russian operatives.
Only a closed mind would rule them to be “conspiracy” theories.
INS can’t stop million dose lots of Fentanyl from crossing the border, how can they hope to prevent some of those Javelins from winding up near the runways of your local airport? Talk about short sighted policy making…
State sponsored “bad actors” in the news – Russian, North Korean, Chinese, Middle Eastern (oh yeah, I forget 9-11 was an inside job – none of them hiked thru Central America/Mexico to cross the border.
Terror watchlist arrests at the southern border soar under Biden
https://justthenews.com/government/security/terror-watchlist-arrests-soar-under-biden-southern-border
Not difficult at all…what do you think will happen when there are roughly 50 million military age male illegals in the country?
Kelvin Skye,
Are we under the impression that those 50 million military age male illegals would even sign up?
How about all those woke SJW? They do not strike me as the “Oorah!” lets go and attack the machine gun nest on the hill types.
More like, “I self identify as zi/zer/zy/xy&g. I have feelings about storming a beach. Do we really need to? What do the Russian’s feel? Maybe we could all just go to Starbucks and have a Lattee and talk about our feelings!”
Do like the Romans did – hire barbarians into the army. It worked for Rome, until they stiffed the soldiers outta their pay.
Of course it’s planned. Dang right wing Trumpers. Geesh.
Give me a break Jennifo. You are so easily led, like sheep being brought to the slaughter. Open up your eyes and see what’s really happening. People like you are frightening the informed population.
I am pretty sure Jennifo was being sarcastic.
Same here, pretty sure she was being sarcastic
Right! Sheeple don’t usually use the word dang.
Kathleen, you new here?! 😉 Sarcasm is my second language. I’m wide awake thank you.
People should be practicing how to live without power for extended amounts of time. Then it won’t be such a shock. Really feel sorry for those that depend on technology to navigate their daily lives, they’ll be going around in circles.
The FBI/CIA/DoD/FEMA was clearly behind all of these attacks. My guess would be the fbi. Why would a civilian attack them? There is only a motive for our government who is doing the bidding of Klaus Schwab.
So, are you ready to open up your Mutual Assistance Group to some guys you just met in the bar that talk about SHTF and the gubmit, who got big plans to make things happen? I know PJF and others talk about expanding your MAG, and have monthly meet ups to recruit suckas, er, like minded patriots to join them on the firing line. But who’s to say these strangers are not feds? Blowing up the local power transformer or natgas pipeline sounds dramatic and heroic, but Auntie Em needs to run that oxygen generator and would be in a fix if your new buddies went all wolverines, and left you holding the bag. Best to watch your six, especially around new acquaintances.
WTF does any of that mean?
Biden and his FBI CIA antifags are doing it.
It is NOT white supremist it is Muslim’s doing this! One has been arrested in Washington State and tied to other locations!
Which ones? The same ones who “blew up the wtc”?
Our grid being vulnerable has been discussed since the 90s. Nothing new, including the refusal to spend our tax dollars/equitably collect tax dollar to improve infrastructure. The so called “surplus” that greenspin said was “bad” for the US could have been spent on infrastructure instead of (selectively beneficial) tax cuts.
Maybe shutting down multiple generating facilities across the country wasn’t so brilliant either.
Concerned Citizen,
There is that.
Seems to me and common sense is to have a varied, multi-source energy production to ensure a stable and reliable generating facilities to make sure everyone has access to heat, cooling, and cooking.
Look at the situation Germany has gotten themselves into. They closed most of the coal and nuclear energy production for green energy while depending on cheap Russian oil and natural gas.
Trump warned them, rightfully, of their dependency on Russian energy.
And look where they are now.
Yes, redundancy is critical when your goal is electrification of everything. I think it’s difficult for folks to recognize that out of roughly 10,000 years of modern humanity, our lifestyle is but a blip in time. One good solar flare and the people will be living like it’s 1823.
Concerned Citizen,
That is a brilliant point!
Looking at the population bloom, it did not occur until we could exploit the energy of fossil fuels.
Mankind has always gone from a lesser energy dense fuel to a higher one. Wood to coal. Coal to oil. Oil to natural gas. Natural gas to nuclear.
Now, the Biden admin, and the WEF wants us to go from a higher (i.e. nuclear or natural gas or oil) to a lower one.
And yet still try to maintain our current lifestyle.
Not possible!
Ask that twit, AOC. Would she be willing to give up her gas stove for a much smaller electric one?
How about her smartphone?
Her streaming and zoom services?
Ask her to go back to a 1850s lifestyle?
Would she?
Of course not!
I’ve found that there are many different numbers out there, as far as how many generating/substation/transformers would need to be damaged to cause a cascading effect that would take down the whole grid. I’ve heard as few as nine, but general consensus seems to be 18-25 major ones to cause this.
Given, none of these seem to have been the “major” transformers that would take down the grid, but we all know that every one damaged is one more weakening of the entire system. And, probably 12-18 months for repair/replacement.
Each one that is taken down or damaged is one less that is available if a major event were to happen. Coincidence?
Who knows? I can easily go down the Conspiracy Rabbit Hole, but I’m a paranoid Auld Fart.
We can run for a bit without power. Our gas is propane, so it’s self contained. Lots of candles, lanterns and oil lamps (as well as flashlights). Even though we’ve forced air furnace, the old passive through wall heater is still in place in the basement. It doesn’t require electricity.
Biggest concern, is the fridge and freezer. While we’ve a small generator, it’s not big enough to run both.
Right now it’s 19° F here, so any perishables could be moved out to the garage or kept in the basement stairwell.
Biggest concern is an outage in the summer. Then we’re going to be stretched to keep perishables cold enough.
Don’t worry about your ‘perishables’ in the summer. You’ll go through those before you know it. The meat can be jerked in the sunshine if you have a lot or quickly cooked and canned. Better use of your generator fuel is the occassionally start your water pump to flush toilets and other necessary sanitation.
I believe there are many reasons for these attacks on our grid and systems. Years ago, I spoke with fire dept. PPL. Who told me they believed many of our forest fires were jihadi silent attacks. All these anarch groups are being brought in just to add to the chaos. Some groups are controllable, and some are not. I have heard that prison inmates have been and are being trained to step in and work w/police actions when developments are right for them. This includes jihadis and cartels. Our defund police groups have succeeded in forcing out the good cops and now are hiring in mental defectives for our control. Back in 2011 I heard reports that UN armies were on standby in MX and Canada boarders and had been there for over a decade back then. How many more are there now? We all went nuts when they wanted to arm IRS agents. But everyone missed it when they armed our forest service workers and all the good ones refused and left service. Our fire Dept. can’t fight forest fires bc they have been closing down and destroying all the logging roads the fire teams have relied on to get into the back woods. Our traitors have turned over all our national forests to the control of the UN. PPL who thinks they can run to the forests for safety will be sadly disappointed. The vax is also purging our military of good men and making the rest ineffective defense. Police, IRS, and Forestry are all now private Gov. armies on our soil just like Homeland Security. Law means nothing to devils and justify all these actions from law under layers of state of emergency unconstitutional rules and regs. As a care person for DHS, when CV 19 regs first hit us, I devoured their ready website of info. I printed out a standing document giving me permission to travel. This has not been activated here in Oregon. I have found they are not always so smart at hiding things. It was deep in the website and I am sure most never read it or printed out their permission by name. Everything is limited reporting so they can say it wasn’t hidden. The extent and real investigation is left to us if we really want to know. Have brain will reason! They (?) are frustrated with Russa’s restraint in escalating the Ukraine war. They really want the war to come home to us. There are different sides to the cabal. 1 side wants to destroy the USA and the other doesn’t. It’s infighting. Promises made and not kept. No honor among thieves. Some families are being hit hard that thought they were protected. And I believe this is our big hope that all this infighting will cause the chaos in their operations so we can act. I believe all these cyber-attacks are testing runs looking for inroads by our small groups of patriots throughout the countries. The control is system based and we need them totally blind. Meaning our best hope is to completely take down their eyes and control. And with right reasoning we should prepare for the worst so we can stand to rebuild the world when the dust settles. Our Lady of Fatima told us that God would use Russa to chastise the world. The war will not stay in Europe. Our country has done a lot of evil thought out the globe. We have it coming. They are struggling to maintain the optics of normalcy to the public. Some agendas have proven to effective, and others are being blocked. Their timelines have been disrupted before, but the big culling was a fiasco for them. The virus was a big dud. And the vax was working to quick on some. Conspiracies are being proven with hard facts. But the over whelming # of them coming out is to over the top for some to even believe or keep their sanity. So if you only believe a few you will not prep accordingly for survival. I have all levels of belief in my family. Even with the facts, those who are understanding there is a communist takeover almost complete in this country, can’t see the whole picture. All these names are obfuscation and steppingstones to the final outcome. It was reported that the elite believe they have a remedy for radiation pollution remediation. I believe that is a lie from the pit of hell, but they believe it. This is why they think their bomb shelters will save them. If you don’t believe in God, you will just curl up in a corner. Our Lady’s star sign from the book of revelations was seen in our skies for the first time in human history in 2017. This is tied to Gods calendar. We are expected to be found fighting when Christ returns, and we will not fight the last battle alone. But you cannot even stand if you don’t prep properly and for those you love who can’t believe the worst. Never lose hope and never quit fighting. And pray for our hackers. The sooner their system comes down the more of us will make this out alive. Our forefathers knew how to survive, and we can to. Get books bc online will be history for a time to come. PPL are buying gold now. But the bible tells us in the end times only the worms can eat gold. So pay attention. No amount of gold will buy you food or bullets. Prep. GWG
Mitigating our dependence of a degrading power grid is one of my priorities, pared with keeping us well fed. Not easy, but I will do what it takes.
The Russians have a practice called ” Gray Terror” where they sabotage an enemies infrastructure prior to an overt attack. We may be witnessing that. OL Sniffy Joe is doing his best to light off WWIII so that his ” father” can get his ” New World Order ” Satanic Global Government
I am a business printing broker and one of my main vendors was down for almost a month, supposedly due to a ransomware attack on their data.
Crime? I think you mean lawlessness and it starts with GODvernment.
I believe that we definitely need more GOD in all our everyday lives. The government involvement DEFINITELY needs to be less. I also agree with EJ…….We’ll definitely see more hacking disruptions!!
One of the most laughable lines in recent history: “The FBI is investigating.” And what a better way to spend Christmas Day than shooting at power transformers to just to “steal things.” It’s hard for me to believe that someone would shoot-out their own neighborhood transformers just to go home and sit in the dark. (They certainly couldn’t watch the Big Game on TV.)
One common denominator to look at could be antifa groups. The oldest and one of the largest antifa groups is from Portland, Oregon (note the attacks around the Oregon and Washington area). Another large group of antifa is the Redneck Revolt in North Carolina, which is an offshoot of the Puget Sound John Brown Gun Club. These are low tech attacks that use minimal resources which are commonly available.
Perhaps these are just not-so-organized distractions, but someone is watching closely to police response and infrastructure protection (none). I think more an wider power outages are in our future.
NOT a coincidence. False Flag operations at best. We the People are under attack by the .001% Psychopathic Elite. They are in progress of reducing the population by 93%. The mRNA injections are the means they have been waiting for, and are now promoting with everything they can muster.
More like jihadis rehearsing, or some of the 30 million invaders here illegally.