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Splitpair
Premium Member
join:2000-07-29
Cow Towne

2 recommendations

Splitpair

Premium Member

[General] Some Wilma Shots

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3phase xformer bank dropped and wiped out all below.

The result.
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On the ground.
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The other end.
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Lookin open about 600 feet out.
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What was now is down.
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In with the power sweet!
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CATV into BST
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Now thats ready access. ;-)
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Your DSL is on BP 12.
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Not easy to break these.
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Bet this made one heck of a light show.
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235 Kv lines
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Eh Bob I found something of yours.
From the trenches.

JohnQPublic6
Premium Member
join:2002-03-22
Xanadu

JohnQPublic6

Premium Member

Were those images taken in Broward County? Those concrete utility poles were snapped like that up here in Boynton as well. I wonder what kind of rating they have (if any) as far as wind load is concerned.

Thanks for the shots.

Robert
Premium Member
join:2001-08-25
Miami, FL

Robert to Splitpair

Premium Member

to Splitpair
FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.

mikes60
My Paradise
Premium Member
join:2001-07-31
Boynton Beach, FL

1 edit

mikes60

Premium Member

said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
And I'm sure you have all the proper documentation of their failure.

Besides what one woman "claimed" in a Sun-Sentinal article I aw today.

The picture of a concrete pole broken in half shows how powerful the winds actually were.

Robert
Premium Member
join:2001-08-25
Miami, FL

Robert

Premium Member

said by mikes60:
said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
And I'm sure you have all the proper documentation of their failure.

Besides what one woman "claimed" in a Sun-Sentinal article I aw today.

The picture of a concrete pole broken in half shows how powerful the winds actually were.
Well not a woman. But a man...

»www.sun-sentinel.com/new ··· news-col

If it's true, then my comment stands.

mikes60
My Paradise
Premium Member
join:2001-07-31
Boynton Beach, FL

1 edit

mikes60

Premium Member

said by Robert:
said by mikes60:
said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
And I'm sure you have all the proper documentation of their failure.

Besides what one woman "claimed" in a Sun-Sentinal article I aw today.

The picture of a concrete pole broken in half shows how powerful the winds actually were.
Well not a woman. But a man...

»www.sun-sentinel.com/new ··· news-col

If it's true, then my comment stands.
In your original comment, you failed to say, "if it's true"

I have one personal rule- never assume newspaper columnists and politicians are telling the story accurately. One has to sell papers, the other has to get re-elected.

Not exactly the best reason for unbiased comments.

By the way, here's the one from a woman:»www.sun-sentinel.com/new ··· eadlines

Robert
Premium Member
join:2001-08-25
Miami, FL

Robert

Premium Member

said by mikes60:
said by Robert:
said by mikes60:
said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
And I'm sure you have all the proper documentation of their failure.

Besides what one woman "claimed" in a Sun-Sentinal article I aw today.

The picture of a concrete pole broken in half shows how powerful the winds actually were.
Well not a woman. But a man...

»www.sun-sentinel.com/new ··· news-col

If it's true, then my comment stands.
In your original comment, you failed to say, "if it's true"

I have one personal rule- never assume newspaper columnists and politicians are telling the story accurately. One has to sell papers, the other has to get re-elected.

Not exactly the best reason for unbiased comments.

By the way, here's the one from a woman:»www.sun-sentinel.com/new ··· eadlines
Whether I said "if it's true" or not, means nothing.

Splitpair
Premium Member
join:2000-07-29
Cow Towne

Splitpair to mikes60

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to mikes60
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said by mikes60:

And I'm sure you have all the proper documentation of their failure.
No but I have seen it.
The picture of a concrete pole broken in half shows how powerful the winds actually were.
Not when it was pulled over by a defective wood pole supporting a transformer bank.

This is the base of a failed pole that was supporting 235 Kv transmission lines. Nice eh?

Wayne

lazsheriff
Laz
join:2005-01-03
Fort Lauderdale, FL

lazsheriff

Member

I first hand believe FPL has not inspected their wooden poles. My neighborhood is filled with old rotten wooden poles that always get knocked down and not necessarily in the strongest of winds.

A couple of tropical storms ago a wooden pole on my lawn fell onto my driveway, not during the winds but about 4 days later causing my block to go without power for 2 days and me without power for about 2 weeks. The replacement pole looks it was picked up on the street on the way here.

I agree that politicians and newspapers aren't always credible but CEO's aren't any better.

Splitpair
Premium Member
join:2000-07-29
Cow Towne

Splitpair to mikes60

Premium Member

to mikes60

Poles 101

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A failed defective pole that was supporting a transformer.
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How a good pole should fail when over stressed.
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More like a tornado than a hurricane
Todays lesson.
bogey7806
join:2004-03-19
Here

bogey7806

Member

I have a picture of what's left of a CO out in Lake Catherine, La. It's completely gone except for the support beams.

I have some pics of the storm damage in the New Orleans area but haven't gotten around to uploading them.

Mizzat
Will post for thumbs
Premium Member
join:2003-05-03
Atlanta, GA

Mizzat to Splitpair

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to Splitpair

Re: [General] Some Wilma Shots

said by Splitpair:

From the trenches.
Nice, wayne. I bet they gave you about 2 hours of tech time to fix it, eh? I knew those untangling skills would come in handy when I grew up!

joako
Premium Member
join:2000-09-07
/dev/null

joako to Splitpair

Premium Member

to Splitpair
All I know is that the only time in the past few years that my phone service has gone down was about 3 years ago when a crew dug up a wire. Bellsouth fixed it within a few hours the same day.

Every time a hurricane passes through here we are wtihout power. Between coral way and bird road east of SW 57 ave there is a massive power problem, their power goes out even with a heavy thunderstorm, our power isnt as bad because they restore it quickly, only because the same mains feeds a hospital.
Zoder
join:2002-04-16
Miami, FL

1 edit

Zoder

Member

I agree with Wayne. Not enough maintenance is being done by FPL.

Did anyone else read the Miami Herald today? There was a front page article about FPL seeking a 16% fuel charge increase. »www.miami.com/mld/miamih ··· 7471.htm

It sounds like the PSC chairman is in FPLs pocket.
quote:
Technically, the fuel-increase surcharge is not a ''rate increase'' -- a point that PSC Chairman Braulio Baez emphasized Monday, saying that the improper use of rate-related terms is a ''pet peeve'' of his. Baez helped lead the charge in July to tack a $1.68 monthly surcharge on FPL customers' bills to help pay for storm damage last year. That charge, to last through February 2008, includes $34 million to reimburse FPL for ''lost revenue'' -- money it lost out on because it wasn't providing electricity to blacked-out homes after storms.
What the h**l is that? Maybe if corporate paid to keep their plant in better condition customers wouldn't have been without power for so long.
quote:
The group is also protesting FPL's decision to use $25 million in fuel-recovery money to repair steam-generator pipes for one of its nuclear generators in Port St. Lucie.

''It doesn't make sense. What they're basically asking for is a tune-up, and they're claiming it should be paid with gas money,'' Twomey said. ``They should pay this out of their base rates, not take even more from the consumer's pockets. People are paying enough already.''
FPL's Swank said the pipe-fixing expense is fuel-related because, if left unfixed, the nuclear plant will become less efficient, forcing the company to buy more power on the open market.
This goes along with their philosophy of plant maintenance. Why have the repair cut into our profits when we can get the PSC to add a surcharge to customers?
quote:
Baez said he wasn't sure if the PSC would consider another such fee, pegged to Hurricane Wilma's damage. ''I don't know what to foresee,'' he said.
How much do we want to bet there will be?

Michail
Premium Member
join:2000-08-02
Boynton Beach, FL

Michail to Splitpair

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to Splitpair
Up here I've noticed most of the polls that came down were north/south runs. I was thinking the added force across the lines helped bring them down.
Zoder
join:2002-04-16
Miami, FL

Zoder to mikes60

Member

to mikes60
said by mikes60:

By the way, here's the one from a woman:»www.sun-sentinel.com/new ··· eadlines
Forget the woman. What about the other person in that article who said that a tree has been growing out of a pole and they've been reporting it for 3 years? Or the contractors FP&L hired to remove the downed polls that said they were some of the most rotten polls they have ever seen? There were several more examples, but you get the point.

LightSpan
Premium Member
join:2004-02-18
Lexington, KY

LightSpan to Robert

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to Robert
I have seen it first hand,all the poles i used to have to climb(one of the few who did:D).Shell rot was terrible on most of the poles.Most of the pole's look okay but are rotten below the ground,as in the pics Splitpair showed.Before i used to climb i would take my long straight blade screw and jab the pole below ground level,and if it went all the way down to the handle thats bad,but i use to climb it anyway cause you couldnt get a ladder to it,or a bucket truck.Remember those days in the ranches Wanye:D.
RJ44
join:2001-10-19
Nashville, TN

RJ44

Member

said by LightSpan:

Before i used to climb i would take my long straight blade screw and jab the pole below ground level,and if it went all the way down to the handle thats bad,but i use to climb it anyway cause you couldnt get a ladder to it,or a bucket truck.
::shaking my head:: Bad move, very bad. I always took the safety motto very literally, ain't nothing getting me up a rotten pole on hooks, sorry. There's always some other way to get the job done that doesn't involve you ending up in the ER.
TipRing2
join:2001-10-22
New Orleans, LA

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Member

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Car on roof
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Cell site
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Kitchen
I also have some pics from Katrina. All are from around my parent's house in St. Bernard parish. They had 10 ft. of water in the house. The kitchen chairs floated up and got tangled up in the light fixture.

I remember back in my "rookie" days I was replacing a drop from a pole in someone's back yard. I was on my hooks and ready to cut the old drop. I thought the pole was leaning toward the house. It turns out the the drop was pulling the pole towards the house. When I cut it I went on the wildest ride of my life. It went from a 7 to 10 degree lean towards the house to a 7 - 10 degree lean away from the house. The only reason it didn't go all the way down was the power drop.
bogey7806
join:2004-03-19
Here

bogey7806

Member

Everyone's done some variant of that. Usually involving a mid-span clamp though.

I couldn't stomach working in St. Bernard after Katrina. The smell was just too awful in some places. The dust and such burned up my sinuses.

FLECOM
Bay Networks Freak
Premium Member
join:2003-03-03
Miami, FL

2 edits

FLECOM to Splitpair

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to Splitpair
man if you want to talk about light shows with power lines, during wilma about 3 miles of the 500kv lines that brings power from port st lucy to the rest of south florida got hit by a tornado... thats what took out all of dade county at around 6~6:30am that monday morning...

of course all of bellsouth's T1's died shortly after and everyone was having hissyfits at the EOC because of it...

especially the fire department guys since they do all their rip-and-runs (dispatches) over their T1's and their radio system is linked via T1's... every time a T1 would cycle their crappy motorola voters would freak out and they would have multiple sites transmitting at the same time which makes horrible intermod and sounds terrible to boot

oh boy much angry phone calls to bellsouth too cause of all these RT's lead to the "sorry there is no commercial power in that area" response, and these are to fire stations?!

well that takes away one of the VoIP is less reliable in case of an emergency excuse... as long as my RT had power i had dsl... when i lost phone, i lost dsl

although cable is just a joke, i had just gotten it back a few days earlier from katrina

also for whoever said that FPL corporate should do something about it...

FPL is the STRANGEST company ever... FPL corporate has very little to do with FPL distribution, which has little to do with FPL generation... the company is very segmented... and in response the constant threat of de-regulation for the past 15 years they have a $0/yr preventitive maintenance budget...

but then again most utilities are like this... i just panic when i see people stacking debries next to cross connects and RT's... i can just see the bulldozer coming to clear it all out and taking the crossconnect/rt with it, which ive seen happen!

also bellsouth got a few generators stolen down in south dade which isnt very cool imho but whatever there are crappy people in the world

although FPL has been pretty quick about restoring power, i agree with everyone that a lot of the outages could have been prevented... but thats for later review...

bellsouth came out pretty good also, hopefully all these hurricanes will just encourage more underground utilities...

lordfly
join:2000-10-12
Homestead, FL

lordfly to Splitpair

Member

to Splitpair
I partially believe the old pole theory, but I saw plenty of new poles snapped. I had a 30 foot palm tree that snapped in half. Remember that the wind speed increases the higher you go up. What we saw at ground level is not what the poles saw.

I am 50/50 when it comes to burying utility lines. The big issue there is floods/excessive rain, which happens a lot down here in S. Florida.
ackman
join:2000-10-04
Atlanta, GA

ackman to Robert

Member

to Robert
said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
That's the most ridiculous and uninformed statement I've ever read. I experienced Hurricane Andrew back in 1992, and all of our healthy and good condition power poles snapped like toothpicks in my neighborhood's back yards with the winds that hit us in Cutler Ridge, just north of Homestead. Bear in mind that the wires being held up by these poles are extremely heavy, so there's not much chance that they would stand up too long under a 100mph wind onslaught. I have to give props to the boys from Georgia Power, who came down to help with reconstruction. They had our new poles up and electricity turned on just 3 weeks after the storm. It was absolutely amazing and we were grateful for their efforts.
Zoder
join:2002-04-16
Miami, FL

Zoder

Member

Andrew was a Cat 5 in South Dade. They are saying Wilma's sustained winds barely hit Cat 2. That's a huge difference. The poles are supposed to be able to withstand 118+ sustained winds according to FP&L.

Robert
Premium Member
join:2001-08-25
Miami, FL

Robert to ackman

Premium Member

to ackman
said by ackman:
said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
That's the most ridiculous and uninformed statement I've ever read. I experienced Hurricane Andrew back in 1992, and all of our healthy and good condition power poles snapped like toothpicks in my neighborhood's back yards with the winds that hit us in Cutler Ridge, just north of Homestead. Bear in mind that the wires being held up by these poles are extremely heavy, so there's not much chance that they would stand up too long under a 100mph wind onslaught. I have to give props to the boys from Georgia Power, who came down to help with reconstruction. They had our new poles up and electricity turned on just 3 weeks after the storm. It was absolutely amazing and we were grateful for their efforts.
Andrew: Cat5
Wilma: Cat1-2

Nuff said.
ackman
join:2000-10-04
Atlanta, GA

ackman

Member

said by Robert:

said by ackman:
said by Robert:

FPL's failure to properly maintain their wood poles have caused many residents to be without power. I hope they get slammed with some hefty fees.
That's the most ridiculous and uninformed statement I've ever read. I experienced Hurricane Andrew back in 1992, and all of our healthy and good condition power poles snapped like toothpicks in my neighborhood's back yards with the winds that hit us in Cutler Ridge, just north of Homestead. Bear in mind that the wires being held up by these poles are extremely heavy, so there's not much chance that they would stand up too long under a 100mph wind onslaught. I have to give props to the boys from Georgia Power, who came down to help with reconstruction. They had our new poles up and electricity turned on just 3 weeks after the storm. It was absolutely amazing and we were grateful for their efforts.
Andrew: Cat5
Wilma: Cat1-2

Nuff said.
Um, "Hurricane"... nuff said.

Splitpair
Premium Member
join:2000-07-29
Cow Towne

Splitpair

Premium Member

said by ackman:

Um, "Hurricane"... nuff said.
Na I was involved in Andrew and the damage was what one would expect from that intense of a storm. With Wilma the damage was IMHO way beyond what should have happened. In my area many poles failed as does our power in 40 mph winds way before the storm was actually here.

Wayne

Robert
Premium Member
join:2001-08-25
Miami, FL

Robert

Premium Member

said by Splitpair:
said by ackman:

Um, "Hurricane"... nuff said.
Na I was involved in Andrew and the damage was what one would expect from that intense of a storm. With Wilma the damage was IMHO way beyond what should have happened. In my area many poles failed as does our power in 40 mph winds way before the storm was actually here.

Wayne
Kinda of OT but, in the areas that BellSouth has their lines above ground, do they use the same poles with FPL?

Splitpair
Premium Member
join:2000-07-29
Cow Towne

Splitpair

Premium Member

said by Robert:

Kinda of OT but, in the areas that BellSouth has their lines above ground, do they use the same poles with FPL?
Yes.

Wayne

Robert
Premium Member
join:2001-08-25
Miami, FL

Robert

Premium Member

said by Splitpair:
said by Robert:

Kinda of OT but, in the areas that BellSouth has their lines above ground, do they use the same poles with FPL?
Yes.

Wayne
So then if you have to do service work on the line, do you have to call FPL out there just incase something goes wrong?