Explosion knocks out power again in PR (hotel, wedding)

[MissLoudmouth]

Parts Of N. Puerto Rico Lose Power After Substation Explosion « CBS New York

[WIHS2006]

Probably sabotage from UTIER (power company union) members looking to stop privatization. Only in Puerto Rico do they prize mediocrity.

Separatists are another possibility, I have a source who tells me that they have picked up alot of chatter from them in recent months.

[Hellion1999]

I told you they won't go away quietly. This is going to be worse than the Puerto Rican telephone company going private in the 90's. There is a lot more money in power service than a landline phone service.

I'm not against unions but some unions in P.R. have a long history of violence and domestic terrorism.

Remember the hotel fire/arson in Dupont Plaza Hotel in San Juan in 1986? It killed 98 lives and caused 140 injuries. Most of the victims were burned beyond recognition. The Hotel shut down for 9 years that many Puerto Ricans lost their jobs. The arson was started because of a labor dispute between the Union members and Hotel management. The sad thing is there were 3 smaller fires caused by the Union members 1 week before the big one.

[mr.magoo]

My wife had flown in to Luis Marin Airport on the afternoon of New Years Day with her family for a wedding and from the plane she could see that the Hotel was still smoldering.

So sad..3 jerks with an axe to grind against Hotel management caused the deaths of almost a hundred people, and as Hellion said, most died an excruciating death, burned to cinders...some crashed through plate glass windows trying to leap into the pool area.

Most died in the Casino area where Emergency doors were locked to prevent theft.

The leader of the three guys that started the fire claimed he 'only wanted to start a little fire.'

[MissLoudmouth]

Originally Posted by mr.magoo

Most died in the Casino area where Emergency doors were locked to prevent theft.

Wow. That one little sentence just says so much about PR.

And people ask me why I won't go down there.

[Hellion1999]

I was in High School when that happened.....We used to go to the beach right behind the hotel a lot because it was a nice spot and it had nice waves. We always met guests from the Hotel that crossed from the hotel pool area to the beach. The Hotel had a small gate from the pool area to the beach. It was always with security because we tried many times to get in to use the restrooms or get ice and the security was always tight, they wouldn't let in anybody from the outside in unless you were with a hotel guest (as it should be)....we tried sometimes, I think we were successful only once and we didn't get far before security came.


After that happened it was never the same and we stopped going. It's kinda hard to relax and have fun when a building next to you many people died in the worst possible death and you can see the damaged hotel with broken windows and burned walls that stood there empty for years. It's a good thing Marriot bought the property in 1995 and made a nice hotel but it's impossible not think about that tragic day when you are in that area.


Puerto Rico has a long history of violence and domestic terrorism when there is a dispute with the management and the union members. I have stories about that.

[hindsight2020]

Didn't I tell you guys like 6-9 months ago? Hellion stole my thunder above but I still say I called it, y'all can look up the post dates .

Joking aside, my only surprise was that it occurred so quickly. Frankly I was banking on the selloff announcement being made in the summer to coincide with a potential adjudication of the title III cases. But the amateur statehooder-in-name-only governor went and screwed the pooch by announcing it before the island even had the grid back to 100%. Roselló may have thought it was a cute thing to get that legacy feather in his cap because daddy was "gobernador", but he's way over his head now. This cat is my generational contemporary, and his pedigree in public governance strikes me as woefully unprepared for what he got himself into. My 12 years of military commission better qualify me to run that place, and I have zero civilian public office time mind you. AFAIC his father didn't give him very good mentorship in allowing him to run into that Little Big Horn he's got himself into.

So I phone my father last night and first thing out his mouth is...."you called it". This is just the beginning ladies and gentlemen. This isn't rinky dinky PRTC, and the *sabotage (*the fingerprint of Puerto Rican dissent during labor disputes) that came with that one will look like child's play compared to what can befall an island territory when it comes to more central governance assets as the electric grid and water distribution infrastructure.

If they don't secure the power generation by taking federal control and move in neutral workers in there I'm telling you it's gonna get ugly real fast. If I was governor I'd be immediately enacting title 32 activation of the National Guard and clamoring the federal government for assistance in taking over the functions of civilian operation of the power plants. This is an act of domestic terrorism and the lives of our families back in the island are yet again at stake. The game is chess here, it ain't checkers. You have to fight fire with fire when it comes to these matters.

But the Puerto Rican oligarchs have given the governor his marching orders. That's why all you hear is crickets. He isn't gonna do squat. And people will die for the sake of enough political expediency to allow the population to garner antagonism against the PREPA workers at the expense of a couple hundred bodies that will die as a result of violence or lack of sanitation due to going without electric for a year. Scorched Earth policy basically. In the end it will deem effective, but it is incredibly callous to collateral damage of the innocent civilian population. A disgraceful and cowardly political move on the part of the oligarchy down there. Nothing new I suppose.

For my part, my parents have the resources to get the hell out of Dodge. All they have to do is make the call and I'm down there in a day. I think the colonial treatment of that island has been a national disgrace for our Country, but I give these terrorists zero quarters when it comes to the manner in which they hold their supposed "compueblanos" hostage while they collect their despicable rent. It's time to rip the bandaid off that place. I'm pro organized labor, but these organizations are not unions, they're criminal syndicates and textbook racketeers. It's sad what has befallen my formative home, but I nor my family are going to be martyrs of a dynamic we did not author. Eff that place.

Additional data point from my father as of last night: Contractor electric work crane truck got shot up all to hell and disabled on the freeway, but the gringo driver was spared. News reports it as a random act of violence...and I have a timeshare to sell you all in Aleppo if you believe that. This is going to be another trend: scare the relatively commonplace "opportunistic re-constructionists" that come from out of state, in order to preserve the status quo of low work completion and inaction on the part of PREPA. It won't surprise me if they extend that treatment to local boricua contractors, but do end up killing the latter. If they kill a gringo it's game over, the optics will quickly erode into one of xenophobia against Puerto Ricans in CONUS, just like the '54 shootings yielded. Going backwards 70+ years. This isn't gonna end well folks.

[unPescador]

Has there been an official statement from PREPA or any gov’t source about the cause of the fire?

While sabotage is possible, power substation fires occur for many reasons, especially in an poorly maintained and over burdened electrical grid.

[MissLoudmouth]

Originally Posted by unPescador

Has there been an official statement from PREPA or any gov’t source about the cause of the fire?

While sabotage is possible, power substation fires occur for many reasons, especially in an poorly maintained and over burdened electrical grid.

Puerto Rico generates power from fuel (gasoline). So it's likely someone set the gas on fire--by accident or by real.

[jabz1964]

Originally Posted by unPescador

Has there been an official statement from PREPA or any gov’t source about the cause of the fire?

While sabotage is possible, power substation fires occur for many reasons, especially in an poorly maintained and over burdened electrical grid.

I was on the phone with my sister just as this outage happened. The power came back about an hour or two after (at least in the area where she lives). Since then I have communicated with several family members to ask about the cause, and if sabotage was involved. They all indicated it was a technical issue, as far as the local authorities have informed. Of course parts of the island remain without power, as power grid repairs continue.