Pick-up vs Pole - Wappingers (Dutchess) - Transformer Explosion

[Guest Photounit]

The New Hackensack FD, Town of Wappinger/TransCare Ambulance, and the New York Sate Police responded to a pick-up into a telephone pole on Cedar Hill Rd on the rainy evening of June 21,2009....... The male driver was out of the vehicle and being attended to by TC Medic's upon my arrival..... The PU had broken the pole it hit at its base and there was a very small fire at the top of the pole..... Central Hudson was requested to the scene to secure the power so the vehicle could be safely removed..... It was a relatively minor/routine incident but the electrical part made for a few photo opp's......

The white pick-up where it came to rest...... I didn't take any better photo's of the vehicle because it was a nothing incident and I also couldn't because of the electrical hazard......

Things were pretty quiet until the top of the pole began to "boil"

Then the pole started to flame and spark.......

Firefighters watched as Central Hudson did their thing....

Central Hudson crews arrived and tried to take a look and see if there was an easy fix to the arcing...... It appeared the when the pole was hit and it shifted, the primary tap wire contacted the pole and that was what was causing the problem....

CH decided that there was no easy fix and they better cut the power.....

Things quieted down again right after the Central Hudson lineman retreated to cut the power......

And then less that two minutes after the Central Hudson Lineman had come down from his boom...... This happened........

Bang!!!!!!!!

[Guest]

Nice fireworks LOL Cool picts

[TAPSJ 30]

That is awesome. Should have brought some marshmellows. Great shots Bill.

Thomas

[tdc202 0]

Nice shots Bill

[JetPhoto 626]

Nice catch Bill

[jack10562 414]

A reminder to responders on these jobs:

Treat any utility pole involved in an accident as if it were energized, because it could be, even without any visible burning.

The pole may be wood, but it can conduct high voltage electricity pretty good, especially when wet.

That's why they use insulators for attaching power cables.

This particular incident looks more like a primary cable tap burnout rather than transformer "explosion"...You can see the wire feed touching the pole.

Still, pretty impressive what high voltage electricity can do!

Nice pics, Bill.

[Guest Photounit]

A reminder to responders on these jobs:

Treat any utility pole involved in an accident as if it were energized, because it could be, even without any visible burning.

The pole may be wood, but it can conduct high voltage electricity pretty good, especially when wet.

That's why they use insulators for attaching power cables.

This particular incident looks more like a primary cable tap burnout rather than transformer "explosion"...You can see the wire feed touching the pole.

Still, pretty impressive what high voltage electricity can do!

Nice pics, Bill.

Jack,

I was going to touch on that but I didn't..... I have some other tips that I was going to share but again I didn't - Maybe later...... I wrote that the pole was boiling and that's because it was..... The current was boiling the moisture within the pole as it was carrying the current through the pole to the ground........... Also, I didn't label this as a transformer explosion because it wasn't...... Somebody changed it - Moderator? AFAIK it was tap wire blowing apart which was supplying the power to the transformer..... I also hate it when FD's are dispatched for transformer explosions...... 99.9% of the time what was heard by John Q. Public is the fuse popping which is protecting the transformers....... I have only seen two transformers actually on fire in my years as a FF and this wasn't one of them.....

Edited July 23, 2009 by Photounit

[Guest ffjay376]

nice pics that has to be my faverat tip of utility pole call