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Teddy Boom
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join:2007-01-29
Toronto, ON

Teddy Boom

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Power fluctuations

Last night there were brown outs across Ontario. Anybody know the score? What happened? Timing is interesting given the recent talk of a sell off of Hydro One.

LazMan
Premium Member
join:2003-03-26
Beverly Hills, CA

LazMan

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There is a fair bit of solar flare activity right now... It's been known to cause issues with the electric grid.

There was also some decent wind last night - so double whammy for outages.

HiVolt
Premium Member
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON

HiVolt to Teddy Boom

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to Teddy Boom
Here's the explanation.
quote:
»www.theglobeandmail.com/ ··· 3493393/

The mystery of the flickering lights that affected residents across Ontario has been solved.

According to Hydro One, contact between two transmission lines caused the flicker Monday night that prompted confusion across the province.

Residents from areas including Toronto, Ottawa, Waterloo and Richmond Hill took to social media Monday night to report the flickering, which occurred at 9:26 p.m. At the time, Hydro One had no explanation for the occurrence.

They confirmed Tuesday afternoon that an insulator, which holds transmission lines off transmission towers, broke.

This caused a transmission line to fall to the ground, hitting another transmission line along the way, causing the flicker.
btech805
join:2013-08-01
Canada

btech805 to Teddy Boom

Member

to Teddy Boom
Only had a flicker at my place, turns out an insulator brole somewhere in the GTA and two high voltage lines touched each other momentarily causing the "flicker" at 930 pm across the province.

Have also heard NASA reported high magnetic activity last night and that could have caused the rolling black outs.

Teddy Boom
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join:2007-01-29
Toronto, ON

Teddy Boom to HiVolt

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to HiVolt
Thanks HiVolt!
said by HiVolt:

This caused a transmission line to fall to the ground, hitting another transmission line along the way, causing the flicker.

Haha, I bet it was a lot more than a flicker for anybody standing nearby!

Bender2000
Bite My Shiny Metal Ass
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join:2002-05-06
J7W 8E4

Bender2000 to Teddy Boom

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to Teddy Boom
It's the testing of the nanos...end of the world is coming!

Yes, too much Revolution...
decx
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join:2002-06-07
Vancouver, BC

decx to Teddy Boom

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Yep, the same incident tripped my UPS in TO last night. It's spot on the reported time. So it's not solar activity, though that explanation would be a whole lot more interesting.

Teddy Boom
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Toronto, ON

Teddy Boom

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From the linked article:
Meanwhile, thousands in the Greater Toronto Area were hit with unrelated power outages Monday evening and Tuesday morning.
And how are they so sure it was unrelated? I mean, I actually caught the second (or possibly third) power dip on a voltmeter, and the line was down about 10V. That kind of thing has got to wreak some havoc on downstream equipment.

HiVolt
Premium Member
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON

HiVolt

Premium Member

It wasn't unrelated... That brownout caused a lot of blown transformers and hydro pole fires. I was listening to Toronto Fire on the scanner yesterday evening, and they had a lot of calls like that. Not to mention false alarms and elevator rescues. All from a little 5 second event.

Literally started coming over the air minutes after it happened.

Gone
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join:2011-01-24
Fort Erie, ON

Gone to decx

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to decx
said by decx:

Yep, the same incident tripped my UPS in TO last night. It's spot on the reported time. So it's not solar activity, though that explanation would be a whole lot more interesting.

Didn't trip my UPS but it was enough to make all the LEDs in my home - which is literally every light in my home - behave badly for a few seconds.

HiVolt
Premium Member
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON

HiVolt

Premium Member

My SmartUPS'es went into AVR Boost mode for 5 seconds (Brownout) then power failed for about 5 seconds. Then it came back to normal.

koira
Hey Siri Walk Me
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join:2004-02-16

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Wondered what that was caused by. We had a couple short brownouts here last night around that time, lights dimmed tv and satellite box went off. I though it was arcing due to a little rain on salty insulators Southwest mississauga.

Teddy Boom
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Toronto, ON

Teddy Boom to HiVolt

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What kind of efficiency do you get with the UPS? Like, presumably that's a Line Interactive design? Running all my equipment through a line transformer seems wasteful to me.. Of course it is easy for me to say that, because I'm lucky enough to have extremely stable power here.

FaxCap
join:2002-05-25
Surrey, BC

FaxCap to Teddy Boom

Member

to Teddy Boom
Being a lifelong shortwave radio type guy it screws reception totally then magically
hours later you hear station you rarely hear. So a double edged sword for me.

FaxCap

koira
Hey Siri Walk Me
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join:2004-02-16

koira to Teddy Boom

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Potential continues for aurora overnight march 17th
»www.washingtonpost.com/b ··· -photos/
peterboro (banned)
Avatars are for posers
join:2006-11-03
Peterborough, ON

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I lost my internets (Start) around that time.
PX Eliezer1
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join:2013-03-10
Zubrowka USA

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said by LazMan:

There is a fair bit of solar flare activity right now... It's been known to cause issues with the electric grid.

AFAIK the solar flare activity was both severe and a surprise.

Maxx2006
join:2013-02-02
Guelph, ON

Maxx2006 to Teddy Boom

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And I just thought my glasses were dirty. Saw some flickering for about 10 minutes around that time.

horsey
@eastlink.ca

horsey to PX Eliezer1

Anon

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yea

»www.youtube.com/watch?v= ··· HMPuHK_Y

Thane_Bitter
Inquire within
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join:2005-01-20

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There are better designs, but at the time power was cheap and this setup worked. Having all that iron was also integral to the charge system as well it also helped smooth out the power when you have small sags and spikes. The newer stuff is all solid state.

nitzguy
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join:2002-07-11
Sudbury, ON

nitzguy to Teddy Boom

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Even all the way up here in Sudbury?

Seems co-incidental that an insulator caused a flicker? ....Even off Hydro One's Grid?

I'm more inclined to believe the solar flare idea vs. a broken insulator...but I guess anything is possible....

My non-CFL incandescent light flickered a few times, no issues with my electronics, but I have gone off UPS mode since the battery had failed and...well things had been pretty good here up to this point, maybe time to get one back.

Teddy Boom
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Toronto, ON

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I'm used to CBC radio breaking up whenever there is a bit of a brown out.
said by FaxCap:

then magically hours later you hear station you rarely hear.

Interesting, I wonder what causes that..

linicx
Caveat Emptor
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join:2002-12-03
United State

linicx

Premium Member

A brown out is when your power level in your house drops a little, but does not go out totally. I have always been told it is not good for your computer. If this is true I would have a UPS on it.As a side note, when I upgraded the power supply to my house from 100 to 200 I stopped having brownouts 7 years ago. Maybe it is just coincidence. I am not an electrician.

If radio station "A" goes off air, it is not unusual to hear another stronger station. I live near the middle of the US. Late one night I was in my car with the dog fooling with the radio. I pulled in a radio signal from a place in Canada called Yellow Jacket or Yellow Knife. I really en\oyed it until the signal dropped. I never found it again.

Black Box
join:2002-12-21

Black Box

Member

said by linicx:

I pulled in a radio signal from a place in Canada called Yellow Jacket or Yellow Knife. I really en\oyed it until the signal dropped. I never found it again.

That was likely a ionospheric skywave. Notoriously unreliable at that distance.

Thane_Bitter
Inquire within
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join:2005-01-20

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Yellowknife its the capital of the North West Territories. »en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ye ··· lowknife
The wiki article under the subheading 'media' lists the radio stations and their call letters if you happen to have heard them during the broadcast.
Thane_Bitter

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It think its more of a CBC thing (ie being cheap), reception from their local transmitter (located in London, which does the radio stations CBC1 and CBCtwo) is a bit low, and for some reason the CRTC approved a grating adult christian station on a frequency that practically overlaps CBCtwo.

Tune in to 95.9 FM and see if you hear anything, its a local station out of London which for some reason has a ridiculously high power transmitter, you really don't need a radio to hear it, just a badly made amplifier and speaker system, the signal is so strong it tends to leak into things.
MaynardKrebs
We did it. We heaved Steve. Yipee.
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join:2009-06-17

MaynardKrebs to Teddy Boom

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UPS'es here kicked in several times over the past few weeks.

linicx
Caveat Emptor
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join:2002-12-03
United State

linicx to Thane_Bitter

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Thanks for the link!

I freely admit, although I am embarrassed, I am clueless and know very little about Canada. I visited in the past, watched the tv shows streaming live when I had the big dish, and I listened to radio from Canada. I still occasionally watch CBN, and I watch most of the Canadian repair shows like 'Holmes on Homes'. But... unless NWT is somewhere near Alaska I am in deep trouble.

I still struggle with the concept of a Province as some of our states physical divisions are still very confusing to non-residents. Here is an example: When does a Parish not function like a County? When it is in Maryland (according to a cousin who lives there).

Gone
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join:2011-01-24
Fort Erie, ON

Gone

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I still get a kick out of Carter Lake, Iowa.

LazMan
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join:2003-03-26
Beverly Hills, CA

LazMan to linicx

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to linicx
said by linicx:

Thanks for the link!

I freely admit, although I am embarrassed, I am clueless and know very little about Canada. I visited in the past, watched the tv shows streaming live when I had the big dish, and I listened to radio from Canada. I still occasionally watch CBN, and I watch most of the Canadian repair shows like 'Holmes on Homes'. But... unless NWT is somewhere near Alaska I am in deep trouble.

At their closest point (at the shore of the Beaufort Sea) it's about 150 miles from Alaska to NWT... Only thing between them is the Yukon.