Industry: Providing Blackout Lights

For manufacturers of auxiliary power generators, the effect of last month's blackout in the Northeast has been a surge of orders. While utility executives have been explaining their failure in Federal Power Commission hearings, the equipment salesmen have been busy answering inquiries and filling orders. They are likely to become still busier as a result of last week's blackout in western Texas, New Mexico, and northern Mexico (see THE NATION).

Even before the blackouts, sales of stand-by generators to utilities had been rising—but gradually. Now, says Admiral Albert G. Mumma, executive vice president of Worthington Corp., a producer of...