• Oso_Rojo [he/him, they/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Right? What would a “burglar” be stealing from a power station they couldn’t get more easily somewhere else?

      • Tankiedesantski [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        Gonna guess that a power substation has a shit ton of copper in it, but on the other hand it's probably not light-weight wiring you can just strip out in a few minutes before someone notices a fucking power substation has gone dark.

        • Bloobish [comrade/them]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Not to mention fucking ripping stuff out of a substation sounds dangerous as fuck and something most peeps would say "fuck that we going to the nice downtown parking areas to steal some catalytic converters"

          • Multihedra [he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            I have a shithead prof who gives me the impression people do try to steal the copper and absolutely do get electrocuted

            What’s kinda crazy is that copper is only 4x the price of aluminum; I thought the difference was more significant. I guess substations are one of the few places you’d fine noteworthy quantities of either, but… yeah grim stuff

              • Multihedra [he/him]
                ·
                2 years ago

                Yeah I don’t think it’s super common (has probably happened a handful of times in the decade he’s been at the utility is my guess), but definitely not completely made up

    • D61 [any]
      ·
      2 years ago

      “terrorists”

      Gonna have to side with CNN on this one, throwing out the "T" word without having some solid leads is just going to wind up with innocent people getting messed up.

      • coeliacmccarthy [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        It's not that they should call them terrorists, it's that they aren't doing so. It's a real deviation from typical behavior and it has real implications.

        • D61 [any]
          ·
          2 years ago

          I mean... isn't this what it should be? Instead of jumping to the worst of conclusions first and later, in small print, quietly saying "Oh shit, we were completely wrong with that initial inflammatory headline with zero corroborating facts."

          • coeliacmccarthy [he/him]
            ·
            edit-2
            2 years ago

            I'm not thinking in terms of "should," i'm thinking in terms of "how seriously do they worry about people losing their shit about this"

            • D61 [any]
              ·
              2 years ago

              Given the racism in the USA, it seems like a pretty good thing to be worried about.