Chapter 346: Cut the electric wires with a kitchen knife!
Busan, although it is famous all over the world because of a zombie movie, it is actually the second largest city in South Korea after Seoul.
It has a permanent population of about 3.5 million and an annual GDP of US$78 billion, ranking among the top 80 modern cities in the world.
The mechanical industry here is well developed, and shipbuilding and tire production rank first in South Korea. Even the only stock exchange in South Korea is located in this city.
For a city in such a developed country, after entering the information age of the 21st century, electricity is the lifeblood of the entire city.
With two-thirds of the electricity produced by the Kori Nuclear Power Plant being cut off by Chen Jue, the first thing to have problems was Busan’s public transportation system!
Since it was daytime and there were many white-collar workers commuting to work, the four subway lines running underground suddenly lost power and tripped.
The lights flashed for a moment, and the carriage fell into darkness. Some of the timid ones had already screamed.
If you don’t know, you might think that zombies really appeared!
"Ashiba!"
"Why is there a power outage?"
"What the hell! Are all the taxes we pay every year just wasted? Even the infrastructure can have problems! Shit!"
The passengers in the carriage were cursing and some even picked up the phone to make complaints.
The conductor in the front of the train was also in a panic and hurriedly picked up the microphone to calm the passengers in the carriage.
Fortunately, each subway car has its own backup power supply, and the lights in the car can be turned on again within a few tens of seconds after a power outage.
However, the electricity to drive the subway was obviously not enough, because two-thirds of it was absorbed by Chen Jue. At this time, the power supply voltage fluctuated, and the subway could only be seen lying on the track.
"Call the management center! Call the management center!"
"This is the No. 4 train on Metro Line 3. Our car suddenly lost power and is currently stuck in the tunnel. We need engineers to troubleshoot the problem. Please send someone to rescue us as soon as possible!" The conductor began to inquire about the situation from the higher management department.
But at this moment, the management center of Busan Metro was also in chaos.
Due to unstable voltage, four subway lines were paralyzed. Except for one lucky subway train that entered the station normally, the remaining dozen or so subway trains were all trapped in the tunnel.
The most important thing was that as the current became stronger and weaker, several control devices in the subway management center were burned and short-circuited, emitting burnt green smoke.
No matter how much the trapped train crew members called out, the person in charge of the management center could not give much good guidance at this time. He could only issue a notice asking them to stay on standby and wait for the power supply system to be restored.
…
At the same time, in the South Korean Stock Exchange, the stock and futures screens that were originally conducting high-frequency trading and continuously scrolling various values suddenly flashed.
Several server groups set up deep underground in the exchange experienced varying degrees of downtime due to unstable voltage.
The stock investors in South Korea who were originally fighting in the financial market suddenly found that their stock accounts were stuck!
Immediately afterwards, an emergency notice about a power outage at the stock exchange, which resulted in trading interruptions, began to bombard the news along with text messages and news.
For the financial market of South Korea, a developed country, tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars worth of stocks, futures, funds and foreign exchange are traded every second.
As the Busan Stock Exchange suffered a power outage without warning, the entire South Korean financial market was like something that sneezed in broad daylight, and the entire market shook three times!
By the time the backup power supply was restarted, panic spread and a large amount of paper assets were sold at low prices.
The KOSPI index plummeted that day, causing a circuit breaker and causing foreign exchange rates to soar along with the unusual inflation.
Even if the stock investors logged into their accounts again, they all took a deep breath while holding their phones. It was like arriving at a prairie in the middle of summer, with nothing but green in sight and a chill in their hearts.
Some people who had borrowed money at high interest rates and used leverage had already stood on the rooftop of the Busan Financial Building, cursing the power company and taking a leap of faith with their eyes closed.
In just a few minutes, stock investors across the entire Republic of China watched helplessly as more than half of the assets in their accounts evaporated due to a power outage, as if they were on a bungee jump that only goes down but never goes up.
From public transportation facilities to financial trading markets to Busan Port, which ranks sixth in the world in annual throughput, all were affected by the power outage.
Factories suffered large-scale power outages and stopped production, causing a power shortage in people's homes. Even the light bulbs in broad daylight were dim, as if there was a seizure of electricity.
Internet hot searches and TV news are all frantically reporting on the impact of this large-scale power outage, and the economic losses have reached an immeasurable level!
All the blame was directed at several large power companies, especially the South Korean state-owned enterprise called "Electricity Commune", which had its gate covered with shit.
Such a large-scale circuit failure has never happened in the entire history of South Korea.
Even the president, who had just taken office, called to urgently inquire about the specific circumstances of the power outage.
Therefore, half an hour after the power outage broke out, engineers from the power company began to urgently and massively check all power supply systems in Busan.
From thermal power plants to wind power, solar power, tidal power, etc., they have tried them all, and finally set their sights on the Guli Nuclear Power Plant.
If it were an ordinary power plant, it would be fine. If problems arose, they could be corrected promptly and power supply could be restored soon.
But when the word "nuclear" was mentioned, the engineers of the power commune began to feel weak in the legs, black in the eyes, and they almost died on the spot!
In addition, South Korean paparazzi and journalists have good connections, and after identifying the problem, several tabloids have posted the name of the Kori Nuclear Power Plant on the Internet.
This time, it's more than just stirring up a hornet's nest!
Once this trending search came out, more than 50 million citizens in South Korea were almost scared to death!
Because of the precedent of the Fukushima nuclear power plant next door, if there is a problem with the largest nuclear power plant, the Kori nuclear power plant, the entire coastal area of South Korea will collapse and be paralyzed.
After all, the land area of South Korea is so small that if a nuclear leak occurs, we won’t know where to escape.
Therefore, after the urging calls from departments at all levels reached the control center of the Guli Nuclear Power Plant, the entire nuclear power plant responded with the highest level red alert.
From the heavy water reactor to the uranium-235 raw material used for power generation, the entire plant was inspected dozens of times inside and out. After finding that no major safety accidents had occurred, the engineers from the power commune who rushed to the scene by helicopter breathed a sigh of relief.
An older engineer was sweating profusely and said to his colleagues in fear: "The Republic of China almost came to an end today!"
…
After ruling out the cause within the nuclear power plant, the engineers from the electric power company spent more than half an hour, using several advanced monitoring systems, to narrow the scope and eventually pinpointed the circuit fault to the transmission line in the underground pipeline.
After a group of staff members in work clothes and holding various advanced instruments dug up the underground hole that Chen Jue had dug out before, everyone was dumbfounded!
"Ashiba!"
"It was actually man-made sabotage!"
"Who is it?"
"Who the hell did this?"
Originally they thought it was just a simple case of aging lines, which led to unstable voltage and power leakage.
Unexpectedly, after digging the hole in the ground, a shiny kitchen knife was found stuck on the power cable.
Countless visible electric sparks were splashing out from the place where the kitchen knife was cutting. Chen Jue, who should have been happily touching the wires here, had already disappeared without a trace in the cave.
