The Internet During A Zombie Plague

[Brett]

How long would it last during a zombie plague? Forever? Whats your views on this?

[Graebel]

...until the servers and generators went down.

Of course, why are you looking at porn on the internet in the middle of a zombie outbreak?!?!:eek:

Pick up a shovel and get swinging.

[Brett]

...until the servers and generators went down.

Of course, why are you looking at porn on the internet in the middle of a zombie outbreak?!?!:eek:

Pick up a shovel and get swinging.

well, when would they go down? What if they were powered by the nuclear power as the Mall was?

who said anything about porn? If your sittin in a mall with nothing better to do, why not go to Pogo and play Wheel of Fortune or something? :P

[Graebel]

Entropy. It would just be a matter of time.

Discover had a thing about how quickly the nuclear power plants would go. I can't find the article but I think they had them all melting down within a year at the most. Unless Homer works there.:eek: D'oh!

[AcesandEights]

Try and use the search option or scan down a few pages, as I know this cam up in conversation not too long ago.

EDIT:

Okay, I got ****ed, because I couldn't fing the thread that I mentioned, so I did a google search, which also ****ed me off, as everything had to do with zombie viruses etc.

These were some of the pages that had replies on them of note:
http://www.chuckpalahniuk.net/community/showthread.php?t=12987
http://chuckpalahniuk.net/community/archive/index.php?t-12987.html

I tried doing a few google searches, otherwise, but there was a **** load of results and I couldn't plow through them all. Good luck.

[Danny]

well, when would they go down? What if they were powered by the nuclear power as the Mall was?

who said anything about porn? If your sittin in a mall with nothing better to do, why not go to Pogo and play Wheel of Fortune or something? :P

yeah just imagine, the worlds falling apart, but oh well, at least we ca still "pwn newbs" on world of warcraft:lol:

[OddDNA]

has the article that talks about how long power plants will work during a zombie outbreak...I dont have the link but Im sure you could search it.

[MapMan]

well, when would they go down? What if they were powered by the nuclear power as the Mall was?

who said anything about porn? If your sittin in a mall with nothing better to do, why not go to Pogo and play Wheel of Fortune or something? :P


Nuclear power plants would eventually meltdown. Then you would have bigger problems than zombies. In Tennessee we have quite a few hydro dams. If they weren't manned then we would have some serious flooding issues on top of the radiological crap in the air.

If I was in a mall I would probably spend my time stacking everything I could in front of every door. Never have understood why in the movies they don't clean out the stock rooms and stack crap in front of the doors.

[Zombie-A-GoGo]

If there was some sort of zombie outbreak, I don't think I would give two $hits about the internet going down.

[Philly_SWAT]

Hopefully, in the middle of a zombie outbreak where the world was going to hell in a handbasket, at some point it would have to become evident to those still alive that the situation was only going to get worse, and that a wise course of action would be to shut down all nuclear power plants. Yeah, that would suck for those still alive and in a place that had power provided by those plants, but long-term, a minor inconvenience compared to the eventual meltdown and the fallout that would be produced. It the situation ever improved, the plants could be brought back online.

As far as the internet, it would last as long as there were two people still connected. I am unsure how long regular power plants, like those which devive a lot of power due to flowing water, would continue to operate unmanned. Hopefully a long time.

[MapMan]

I would hope that someone would shut them down. My luck I would get a nutball running the show that would decide what the hell I am going to die anyway so why not take out a bunch of undead, or in a panic to get home everyone hauled ass and left it running. If they had supplies it would be an excellent place to stay.

[Eyebiter]

When the zombies take over, how long till the electricity fails?
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mzombiepower.html

"Bottom line? My guess is that within 4-6 hours there would be scattered blackouts and brownouts in numerous areas, within 12 hours much of the system would be unstable, and within 24 hours most portions of the United States and Canada, aside from a rare island of service in a rural area near a hydroelectric source, would be without power. Some installations served by wind farms and solar might continue, but they would be very small. By the end of a week, I'd be surprised if more than a few abandoned sites were still supplying power."


While the internet was designed to survive a nuclear war, much has changed with the advent of non-university or DOD traffic. Even with diesel backup generators, buildings will begin losing power within a few days of the Z epidemic start.

[Andy]

the internet depends on so many things to stay online, i think it would go down very quickly.

in order for the internet to work, you need:


your computer needs powering.
you need a working phoneline, even for DSL.. phonelines would be reserved for goverment and millitary use quite quickly.
you need a active and working ISP (internet service provider) to connect to.
this is done through undamaged phonelines and switches, so remember at this point, no powerlines, phone lines, switches or substations or even power stations can be damaged at all.
your ISP station needs power running to it and people working it.
the host of every site you are trying to connect to needs power going to its servers, they also need to be manned, working and undamaged.
if your trying to access a site hosted abroad, the signal needs to be relayed by a satelite.. this means a sender in your country and a receiver in the hosts country need, yup you guessed, power, they also need to be manned and working.


so i beleive the internet would be one of the first things to go down. phonelines would be reserved for goverment and military use, t stations would quickly become unmanned and then power would go down somewhere.

so quickly. i would i say it would happen in the first few days of a plague.

[Philly_SWAT]

I dont know enough about power plant operations to know for sure, but it seems like many would still operate for a while with no one present. Does anyone here know for sure? IS there anyone here who either works at, or knows someone who works at, a power station? I kinda thought that they would pretty much self sufficient (other than ones running on caol, which obviously would have to be loaded up and stuff, so those would quit running when the coal ran out. But I dont think that just because there was a bunch of zombies were running around that physical power poles and phone lines would be damaged...I dont think zombies would have any interest, or much ability, to damage those. The only way those could get damaged is if the living did it on purpose, and I think we all would have more important things to do with our time if the dead walked the earth than to destroy some phone lines for our own amusement.

[Debbieangel]

I am sorry but I have to say it...WE here in this site would be here debating the heck out of it all ..like wow those zombies really do run! or Oh $hit it really was better to stay couped up at the mall. SOrry I had to be the smartarse! I know there is one in every crowd!:clown: :p

[Graebel]

I am sorry but I have to say it...WE here in this site would be here debating the heck out of it all ..like wow those zombies really do run! or Oh $hit it really was better to stay couped up at the mall. SOrry I had to be the smartarse! I know there is one in every crowd!:clown: :p

:lol: Yep. Once the windows and doors were boarded up, boredom would set in.:skull:

[Maitreya]

I dont know enough about power plant operations to know for sure, but it seems like many would still operate for a while with no one present. Does anyone here know for sure? IS there anyone here who either works at, or knows someone who works at, a power station? I kinda thought that they would pretty much self sufficient (other than ones running on caol, which obviously would have to be loaded up and stuff, so those would quit running when the coal ran out. But I dont think that just because there was a bunch of zombies were running around that physical power poles and phone lines would be damaged...I dont think zombies would have any interest, or much ability, to damage those. The only way those could get damaged is if the living did it on purpose, and I think we all would have more important things to do with our time if the dead walked the earth than to destroy some phone lines for our own amusement.

Well, according to the straight dope article every unmanned powerplant (nuclear, whatever) would be down within a few weeks... Therefore making Dawn '04 unlikely and Dawn '78 impossible (the power was up there for several months).

That article really killed my dreams on any post-apocalyptic event, I always liked the idea of holing up at someplace cool like a mall or something and still have the power. Oh well.

Yea, speaking of that, did they ever explain where they got power from in Day? I'm sure all plants were down by then... There were hardly enough people to run a plant, was there some sort of generator or something?

[Philly_SWAT]

Yea, speaking of that, did they ever explain where they got power from in Day? I'm sure all plants were down by then... There were hardly enough people to run a plant, was there some sort of generator or something?They never explained it. They never explained it in Land either.

[AcesandEights]

They never explained it in Land either.

Well, in Land they were in a reclaimed and fortified city, which brings different, more practical questions to bare, and--to me--is less troublesome than the idea of phantom electricity flowing down the line, but we at least GAR alluded to the power issue later: "The power's off in the mainland...and all the shopping malls are closed."

[Andy]

Well, according to the straight dope article every unmanned powerplant (nuclear, whatever) would be down within a few weeks... Therefore making Dawn '04 unlikely and Dawn '78 impossible (the power was up there for several months).



i beleive the mall had its own generators. peter and roger say something about it while their on the roof.

[MikePizzoff]

i beleive the mall had its own generators. peter and roger say something about it while their on the roof.

The mall was run off of nuclear power. Which is what Maitreya meant by the power being non-existant for the mall by the time the 4 arrived there. If it were un-operated for that long, it would just seize to work.

[AcesandEights]

i beleive the mall had its own generators. peter and roger say something about it while their on the roof.

And that's fine, but generators only last so long as they have fuel, and the time span for keeping something the size of a mall at half its power needs would eat up gallons of fuel at a horrific rate. Now, they did have access to fuel for a while (the trucks, the parking lot and whatever may have been stored on hand etc.), if they ran off of gas (petrol, diesel and even natural gas and other forms of fuel can run large generators, but I'd bank on gas or diesel) there'd be plenty of fuel in the short term.

But when I say generators eat up fuel quickly that is no joke, or hyperbole. Do a google search under generator + 'fuel consumption' and take ten minutes to sample the results and you'll see what I mean.

[Graebel]

When Riley calls the city during Land to tell them to turn off the electrified fences the guy on the phone says that no one is answering. Makes me believe/think that the city had its only power station which was obviously running.

[Adrenochrome]

When Riley calls the city during Land to tell them to turn off the electrified fences the guy on the phone says that no one is answering. Makes me believe/think that the city had its only power station which was obviously running.
Riley also had a personal satellite which allowed him to track the Dead Reckoning via GPS,......I'm assuming.....:D

[Graebel]

Riley also had a personal satellite which allowed him to track the Dead Reckoning via GPS,......I'm assuming.....:D

:lol: Yeah, how bout that. Maybe they'd stay up for a few years? ......but knowing NASA.

[AcesandEights]

Riley also had a personal satellite which allowed him to track the Dead Reckoning via GPS,......I'm assuming.....:D

I could do that with store bought GPS technology, the only question would be how long do the power sources of the satelites in question last and how is orbital stability maintained on them? It's really not a very big head scratcher depending on how long the average satelite net for these things stay up, he could easily have found GPS-based equipment that was still working off of a sat net that had been sent up before the zombie infestation, or before the zombie holocaust got so bad as to tear down society.