A Day With A Lineman #2 ~ Pole Fire
It doesn’t happen too often but sometimes insulators just fail. The electricity will bleed over and make contact with the pole. Then overtime the electricity will find a ground source and start arcing. Then before you know it, the pole has been put on fire. The flames make their way down the cracks of the pole and in the bolt holes. Then finally the electricity finds a good enough ground to completely ground out and cause a fault. Often times resulting in some sort of explosion.
Welcome to Another Episode of...
I find it funny how just a few years back I was at this exact pole changing out this transformer during a voltage conversion. Converting from 7,200 volts to 14,400 volts - Raise the voltage, lower the Amps. Anyway that’s enough electrical theory talk and to be honest it has been a long time since I have even thought about Ohm’s Law.
Things have been pretty quiet as of late when it comes to outages and accidents. Which is a good thing but doesn’t really give me any material to share with you Hive junkies. Then on Sunday morning I received a call that the top of a pole burn off and wire is laying across the road.
Due to the “Stay Healthy Stay Home” initiative in Washington State my Bucket Truck is now parked at my house. This not only helps response time but saves me a little $$ on fuel costs driving back and forth to the shop :wink:wink. Upon arrival I noticed that indeed the wire wasn’t “laying” across the road but the wire was sagged down pretty good. Then looking to my right I saw this....
Well that sure is nice. The pole top is hanging on the street light service wire. The Phase wire is still connected to the pole top and the pole is burning around the bolts that hold the transformer on the pole.
First thing I need to do disconnect this tap from the mainline. Then head up the road to the circuit breaker and re-energize the rest of the people who were out of power. Now there is only one person without power instead of 20-30.
I need to find a way to get up to this pole and put the fire out. A couple other Lineman are on their way but I would like to have this fire put out before they get here. The wind was blowing about 10 mph, so it was fanning that flame pretty good. The pole sits up on a pretty steep hill so access is pretty limited.
The homeowner gave me permission to attempt to drive my bucket truck up this grassy hill to the pole. We had a decent amount of rain the night before so I wasn’t too confident my 17,500 pound bucket truck could get up to the pole. After 2 tries I called it quits and tried a different route around the house and through the field. I warned him I might leave some decent marks in the grass and he said it was no big deal, the grass will grow back.
That didn’t work out too well either. Things were just slimy enough that I couldn’t quite make it to the top. Just as I thought “Oh Ya!!! I got this!!!.... the tires began slipping and momentum lost.... dead in the water. I tried several times from different angles with no luck. Well it looks like I am gonna have to climb this and put the fire out with my 1 liter water bottle I have in the cab of my truck. Since “Fire Season” is over, I don’t have my Indian Can on my truck anymore, but I do have a 5 gallon water jug for drinking water...
Just as I was pulled up to the pole and got out two other Lineman showed up. I gave them a quick tailboard on what was happening, where the line was open and grounded.
Now let’s get this straight. I am not “old” by any means. These two guys are just younger than me is all. Here, how about this... I have a few more years in the Hooks than these boys do :winkwink So while my Boy Cheeze-it is slapping his tools on I am preparing our homemade fire extinguisher... a 2 liter plastic bottle with a hole poked in the lid. The hole makes it so when you squeeze the bottle you can shoot water in the cracks and holes in the pole. This will make sure that the pole won’t ignite again. I have had burnt poles on a trailer that we thought were out, then ignite as I was driving down the road.
While Cheeze-it is putting the fire out I began making a new pole top. I told them to grab an old crossarm from their shop before they left for a reason. It is going to be a temporary pole top until things dry out or we bring an excavator in to change out the pole. It took them a little bit to understand what I had in mind but soon enough they caught on. Being involve in big storms when there are several million people out of power, you learn how to “Make it Happen” in order to get those lights back on ASAP
Drill a few holes, bolt the cutout (Basically a fuse holder) bracket to the crossarm, add an eye bolt to what will be the top, and a couple holes in the pole and this new top is ready to be installed.
Here is what we think was the cause of the pole fire. The porcelain cutout must have developed a crack in it over time. The electricity began leaking through it to the metal bracket and to the pole. Then it finally got to a ground source and faulted. Then it blew apart and started the pole on fire.
There we go, a new pole top installed, new cutout, and the wire pulled up and sagged, this pole should last another 20 years. That is just an ongoing Lineman joke that comes out whenever we build something Redneck style. All jokes aside, I think it turned out really nice and the customers power was back on only 4 hours after I received the call and plus I had to drive 45 minutes to get there...
Not bad at all
Thanks for stopping by and checking out another Episode of A Day With A Lineman. Sometimes you gotta get a little creative in order to get those lights turned back on. At least there wasn’t a huge mess to clean up...
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jlsplatts to the rescue! Nice work mate. Interesting you guys still use wooden poles...All of ours are concrete between two steel lengths, sort of like railway tracks.
I hope you're all doing well out there...Staying safe.
The "lower" voltage lines are typically wood, all the way to 70,000 volts. Even some 115 and 230kv lines are constructed of wood poles. H structures we call them. Typically above 70kv they are made of a single steel pole or a lattice tower. In some fire prone areas we have steel poles. They aren't too fun to climb I can tell you that. Lol
Is it because the wood insulated the power from the ground or simply that the wood is readily available as a material?
Wood poles are defiantly easy to set and drill holes it to attach arms and various pieces of equipment to I can tell you that. There is always an insulator between the wire and the structure so I don’t believe they chose wood because of its insulating properties. Even though back in the day Lineman used to use wooden sticks with different attachments on the ends to work energized wires. Now we have these fancy foam-filled fiberglass reinforced sticks that can insulate 100,000 volts per foot while wet.
Ah ok, I didn't think of the ease and flexibility of the wooden poles as far as adding attachments. Makes a lot of sense. Lighter to transport I guess also. Can you imagine being that bloke who tested that fibreglass pole for the first time? Lol.
I remember when the company I used to work for wanted all their transmission poles to be steel. Anything over 60kv. They got the steel poles made and said here install this.... uhhh okay... “how do you want this attached to it? How about this? What about that?”
“Well ummm we never thought about that.”
Don’t worry us Lineman will make it happen. Lol. That company is a Huge company and very particular about what materials were used and how things were built. But they would often throw stuff in our laps and basically say “you figure it out. We just want it done with this or this way”
I often think of the lattice towers that are built in the mountains on the hillsides. They were built back in the 40’s and 50’s. They didn’t use the helicopters and stuff like I did. Those Lineman were Men... REAL MEN!! Meanwhile this is how I used to get to work...
Just hook up and take a ride to your tower. Then the helicopter would bring all your tools and materials.
Dang that is quite the scene with the top of the pole hanging out and the rest of the pole on fire! Not your typical day in the office. Crazy.
I run across some crazy stuff from time to time. Especially when a big snow storm comes through and tears trees and Powerlines down. Poles on top of people's cars. Transformers hanging in the air by a wire the size of a pencil. I have seen a couple times where the top 6 feet of a pole burnt off, tipped over with 3 phases on it and didn't cause an outage. You just look at it and go... "Hmmm that's neat". Lol
Just another reason why I love my job. The scenery always changes.
Cheers
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