It was New Yr’s Eve, 1999, and anxiousness over potential Y2K doomsday eventualities about to be unleashed within the new yr was actual.
Something counting on automation — from {the electrical} grid to site visitors lights, even your VCR — was vulnerable to failing, warned some consultants. Banking programs may go haywire. And planes may fall from the sky, predicted others.
The truth is, a member of British Columbia’s Motion 2000 squad, charged with troubleshooting the issue on the provincial degree, gave this dire warning in a 1999 CBC interview.
Laptop programmers saving reminiscence area did not anticipate what may occur when the yr wanted to be exressed in 4 digits.
“If you are going to take air journey, then I might get on a airplane not less than per week or two earlier than the change within the millennium, and I might schedule my return date not less than per week or two previous the change within the millennium,” he suggested. “That is primarily because of the unknown site visitors management standing in a whole lot of international international locations.”
The concern was attributable to the so-called millennium bug, stated to lurk deep in digital gadgets and pc software program of the day, an unseen bogeyman poised to assault the second the clock struck midnight and the calendar flipped to the yr 2000.
A CBC Vancouver TV report set to ominous music described the millennium bug this manner:
“Up till lately, computer systems had been programmed to learn the yr utilizing two digits: 97, 98, or 99. The priority is that when the yr 2000 comes round, computer systems will go bonkers when [they] learn the final two years as 00 and confuse it as 1900.”
After all, computer systems didn’t go bonkers, and no planes fell out of the sky. There was no cascading pc community failure and emergency responders on standby for the disaster that may transpire principally had a quiet evening.
Y2K got here and went, a giant nothing-burger that left those that had stocked up on canned beans, propane canisters and batteries simply in case, with a house filled with canned beans, propane canisters and batteries.
Anxious about dire Y2K predictions, Vancouverites replenish forward of Jan. 1, 2000
As a CBC headline put it on Jan. 3, 2000, Y2K A-OK in Canada.
It was OK in the remainder of the world as effectively. And in the long run, no main issues had been reported.
And for that, Y2K alarmists deserve some credit score for highlighting the issue early, prompting governments, establishments and companies to deal with the problem earlier than the yr 2000 arrived.
The truth is, months earlier than then-prime minister Jean Chrétien had already reassured Canadians that efforts to stamp out the millennium bug had been effectively on monitor.
“Getting our nation prepared for the Yr 2000 is critical enterprise,” stated Chrétien. “It should, and it’ll stay a nationwide precedence to make sure that Canada makes a protected and affluent passage into the brand new century.”
Because it seems, Canada did slide into the brand new century with out a drawback. And like many issues, 1 / 4 century later, Y2K panic appears quaint, if not a little bit humorous trying again now.
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