<div dir="ltr">Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription.<br><br>What if America Went Completely Dark?<br><br>The power grid relies on thousands of aging, hand-built transformers. If enough fail, the blackout could last years.<br><br><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/18/magazine/national-blackout-power-electricity-outage.html?unlocked_article_code=1.6VA.0hLp.gIVk1dwYkKAH&smid=em-share">https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/18/magazine/national-blackout-power-electricity-outage.html?unlocked_article_code=1.6VA.0hLp.gIVk1dwYkKAH&smid=em-share</a></div>