Lights Out

Scenario: This scenario is based on actual events which took place in Lancaster in December 2015. Over the first weekend in December Storm Desmond brought unprecedented flooding to North Lancashire and Cumbria including to parts of central Lancaster. At 10.45pm on Saturday night electricity supplies to 61,000 properties in the city were cut. A flood at an electricity substation resulted in a blackout over the entire city and life for more than 100,000 people reverted to the pre-electronics era. 75 large diesel generators were required to restore supplies and these were brought into the city and connected over the next few days. By Friday, after nearly a week, the situation was back to normal.

Imagine that you are affected by widespread and potentially long term loss of power affecting your entire community and the surrounding areas. The power company has been unable to guarantee early reconnection and severe weather conditions continue to make the situation difficult.

Suggested duration: 90 mins +

Suggested format: Split into 3 groups for parts 1 and 3, each group to consider one of the suggested areas
Group feed back
Whole group discussion for Part 2