It's not hard to believe at all, reading through the comments its noted that when the line tripped the whole town lost power.
So that line would of been up to 66kV, they are usually aluminium strands around a steel core. A tree being a good part water and with roots into the ground makes a good path to ground (ever wonder why lightning loves trees?). At those kids of voltages + the current available, there is enough potential to overcome the resistance of the tree to ground, and smoke it up real good!
And the comment about the line resetting is also correct, the first time it tripped after first big *flash*bang* it would of attempted to reset, hence the second *flash*bang* at which point the line would of stayed tripped.
I am a retired firefighter and I work in the electrical Industry...
Yes this happens - I have witnessed it personally several times.
Several Comments:
These appear to be local distribution primaries; the voltage can be 14,000 volts line-line or more.
The wires are not insulated. Primary distribution lines are seldom insulated. At these voltages there are not many insulators that can isolate this voltage and be even reasonably cost effective. Insulation also lowers the temperature rating of the wiring resulting in a lower current rating; this would require larger wire for the same current - thus, again, more cost. These are bare stranded wire insulated on glass or ceramic insulators.
If you watch carefully you can see the current working its way towards the ground. At first the tree presents enough impedance, (resistance), that the current flowing through the tree does not trip the protection devices. As the heat creates a carbonized path through the tree eventually the low impedance path reaches the ground and you have the flash from the extremely high current flow followed by the reclosure trip.
The protective safeties, (reclosure device), are designed to reconnect the circuit after a time-out period. If the short is still there it will trip again; this occurs at the end of the video. The reclosure device is designed to retry three times and then lock-out. After that they must be reset manually.
If this was faked then it was done very close to what a real event would look like.
The other thing not really presented by the video is that these events are really really loud. I have had co-workers get ruptured ear drums from being too close to a high energy event such as this.
@Ravlen: The part about the insulation protecting it from water is a bit suspect. There would have to be a path of water to ground and those ceramic insulators that the wire runs through are designed so that doesn't happen and even then there is still leakage. Getting an electric wire wet is fine as long as it doesn't create a path to ground. Furthermore, Im not even sure that all wires are insulated.
I actually work in this sector of the utility industry. What just happened was a tree coming into contact with a transmission line. What you saw was electricity attempting to find a path to ground, which is why the molten glow was heading down the trunk of the tree. Essentially, the high-resistance carbon in the tree is being turned into low-resistance graphite along this path to ground, and once that path reaches ground, you get an instant high-voltage fault, which is represented by the explosion. What you saw after the explosion was the system shutting down and attempting to re-energize, hence the second explosion. Typically, after a third try, the line remains dead. This is why you never ever ever go near downed lines or situations like these!
Oh, and as for the fire department helping out? They couldn't do anything if they wanted to. Had they messed with the tree, they probably would have been killed by 69,000+ volts. The utility has to shut the line down to make this situation safe, which won't likely happen over the phone. People call in so many non-emergencies regarding utility lines that it makes it impossible to determine what calls are actually critical and which ones are people exaggerating to get what they want.
After a day of swaying and arcing, the township got to work removing a rotten tree in my neighborhood last night. During the day, an officer was on watch to make sure no one went near the tree, until the Peco truck and tree service arrived.
They broke out the chainsaw at 1:30am. I guess noise ordinances don't count when you have a hardhat and a township contract.
@robo: I know, right. The chainsaw noise would have kept you awake, trust me.
I watched this video and my first thought was "Lucky". Had this happened up the street, the Fire Department. less than a block away, would have had the whole burnt tree felled in an hour.
There's no way a tree could have caught on fire and gone down in a blaze of glory from power lines alone. I smell a conspiracy here. Someone knew that the tree was going to rub against that power line, so they installed incendiary devices in there to ignite the tree when it brushed the wire. Wake up sheeple! Of course the incendiary devices will be hard to find, but if you look close and hard enough, you can find evidence. Just what do they have to gain from all these lies? Do they want to go to war on power lines now?
@Nathan Obbards: I don't know.... the lines there are at less 1K Volts.... thats a lot of heat coming off when the tree makes ground. Also how did they make a incendiary devices reignite every time the power reset? and 3rd to place a device for that is a lot of work for a little video. You have to find some way of getting it in the tree right where the lines would hit it. You would need a chary picker or something. I claim real.
@JackMatt: I can get 30 Blaze of Glory Truthers who are scientists to say you are wrong, and they found evidence of burned aluminum, which could only have come from incendiary devices.
this was in my hometown...it cut the power off for the whole town....the fire department doesn't respond to claims like this unless there is fire present...the person who called it in didn't report fire...so it just got passed onto the power company...who didn't do anything until after the fact because the person who called it in didn't give all of the necessary details...
i have to call shenanigans... theres no way the tree would suddenly stop being on fire only to spark up like a christmas tree in an instant.... awesome though :)
@Lego Addict: When the flame stopped the first time the circuit was shut down. The system is designed to send a test charge down the line after several seconds to see if the line is clear to re-start. That accounts for the second blaze.
Your shenanigans is invalid.
@Homerjay is utterly alone.: Ahhh, someone else who knows that if the power doesn't come back on after 15 seconds it's probably going to be out for a while as it didn't clear the foul.
@Homerjay is utterly alone.: the tree would not just stop being on fire though... which the video clearly shows. I must stand firm on my declaration of shenanigans.
@PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: : You may be on to something. I'll bet they erected a 50' wide fan just out of frame to blow the tree into the power lines. That clearly makes more sense.
10/26/09
But the structural engineer in me just threw up a little. #villamodagalleriesframehotel
10/09/09
So that line would of been up to 66kV, they are usually aluminium strands around a steel core. A tree being a good part water and with roots into the ground makes a good path to ground (ever wonder why lightning loves trees?). At those kids of voltages + the current available, there is enough potential to overcome the resistance of the tree to ground, and smoke it up real good!
And the comment about the line resetting is also correct, the first time it tripped after first big *flash*bang* it would of attempted to reset, hence the second *flash*bang* at which point the line would of stayed tripped.
Looked and sounded pretty real to me! Great vid!!
10/09/09
Yes this happens - I have witnessed it personally several times.
Several Comments:
These appear to be local distribution primaries; the voltage can be 14,000 volts line-line or more.
The wires are not insulated. Primary distribution lines are seldom insulated. At these voltages there are not many insulators that can isolate this voltage and be even reasonably cost effective. Insulation also lowers the temperature rating of the wiring resulting in a lower current rating; this would require larger wire for the same current - thus, again, more cost. These are bare stranded wire insulated on glass or ceramic insulators.
If you watch carefully you can see the current working its way towards the ground. At first the tree presents enough impedance, (resistance), that the current flowing through the tree does not trip the protection devices. As the heat creates a carbonized path through the tree eventually the low impedance path reaches the ground and you have the flash from the extremely high current flow followed by the reclosure trip.
The protective safeties, (reclosure device), are designed to reconnect the circuit after a time-out period. If the short is still there it will trip again; this occurs at the end of the video. The reclosure device is designed to retry three times and then lock-out. After that they must be reset manually.
If this was faked then it was done very close to what a real event would look like.
The other thing not really presented by the video is that these events are really really loud. I have had co-workers get ruptured ear drums from being too close to a high energy event such as this.
Anyway - my 2 cents.......
10/09/09
Look at the photo here, on the left you can just make out the power pole, going up into the trees.
[www.timmelfabrics.com]
I've never heard of any fires in Halifax resulting from this.
The tree in that video is much taller than the line, why didn't it go up in flames all the previous times it was windy?
Lastly, power lines are INSULATED! If it wasn't insulated, it would short out every time it rained. This video has clearly been faked in some way.
10/09/09
10/08/09
Oh, and as for the fire department helping out? They couldn't do anything if they wanted to. Had they messed with the tree, they probably would have been killed by 69,000+ volts. The utility has to shut the line down to make this situation safe, which won't likely happen over the phone. People call in so many non-emergencies regarding utility lines that it makes it impossible to determine what calls are actually critical and which ones are people exaggerating to get what they want.
10/08/09
They broke out the chainsaw at 1:30am. I guess noise ordinances don't count when you have a hardhat and a township contract.
10/08/09
10/09/09
I watched this video and my first thought was "Lucky". Had this happened up the street, the Fire Department. less than a block away, would have had the whole burnt tree felled in an hour.
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11/14/09
look familiar
#electrocution
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Your shenanigans is invalid.
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10/08/09
So sad, the tree must've been jealous of the phone pole.