February 19, 2026
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7:25Now PlayingJames Burke considers just how dependent 20th century humans are on technology, and how ill-equipped we are when it fails.
The New York City blackouts of 1977 gave us a rare opportunity to witness what can happen when technology fails on a massive scale in a modern day city, and James uses this as a starting point for a thought experiment. If you lived in a modern, technologically advanced city, what would you do if techology suudenly failed? To what extent has the technology you rely on everyday become a trap? How far would you have to go to survive?
Clip taken from Connections: The Trigger Effect, originally broadcast on BBC One, 17 October, 1978.
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