MARCH 16, 2015
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA
The Indianapolis Fire Department (IFD) says a blown
transformer may have caused an underground fire along Massachusetts Avenue
Monday night.
Fire shot up through vents on Mass. Ave. around 8:40 p.m.,
followed by smoke.
Indianapolis Power and Light (IPL) believes the
incident occurred in an underground vault which houses transformers.
A couple walking their dog tells FOX59 that the fire burnt
the whiskers off of their pet.
IPL provided the following statement to FOX59:
At 8:42 PM IPL received a report of a possible
underground network event in the 300 block of Massachusetts Avenue.
IPL crews are on-scene and have reported that a primary oil chamber
failed. The chamber is located within a vault. There was a report of a
flash and loud bang when the event occurred. The area has been secured and IPL
crews will continue to investigate the reason for the failure.
Portion of Mass Ave closed. IFD says preliminary
investigation indications underground transformer blew pic.twitter.com/VORDp7ZDv8
— Traffic Authority (@indy_traffic) March 17,
2015
Couple with dog says they were walking by when underground
transformer blew on Mass Ave. Whiskers on dog burnt off pic.twitter.com/7xFf6ElE5z
— FOX59 News (@FOX59) March 17, 2015
NOW: En route to believed underground transformer explosion
on Mass Ave. These folks getting checked out. 10P @FOX59 pic.twitter.com/f4joW3N1Kf
— Kendall Downing (@kendall_downing) March 17,
2015
Area on Mass Ave where flames shot up. Underground
transformer blew @FOX59 pic.twitter.com/4Etk55yBlA
— Kendall Downing (@kendall_downing) March 17,
2015
A large @IPLPower
truck here now. I'm told they have an underground crew that will go down and
investigate @FOX59 pic.twitter.com/orxxg6IK0F
— Kendall Downing (@kendall_downing) March 17,
2015
//------------------------------------------//
http://metroforensics.blogspot.com/2015/03/cable-short-circuiting-leads-to.html
CABLE SHORT CIRCUITING LEADS TO UNDERGROUND EXPLOSION, FIRE
IN LYNN, MASSACHUSETTS. EXPECT A
SIGNIFICANT INCREASE IN MANHOLE FIRES DUE TO THE AMOUNT OF SALTS USED TO MELT
THE ICE/SNOW THIS HARSH WINTER
MARCH 16, 2015
LYNN, MASSACHUSETTS
Officials said a short circuit in an underground vault
caused a minor explosion and a fire beneath the sidewalk on Union Street
Saturday evening, prompting some evacuations but no injuries.
“It was all contained underground,” Lynn District Fire Chief
Jack Barry said Sunday evening. “We were able to flood the vault with dry
chemical extinguisher and put it out pretty quickly. We were concerned that the
fire could spread in the vault into adjacent buildings.”
Police and firefighters received a report of a disturbance
at 7:07 p.m. Saturday in the area of 180 Union St. (almost opposite Burchstead
Place) and initially heard reports of an explosion causing injuries, Barry
said.
On arrival, firefighters reported finding nobody injured;
but two grates in the sidewalk about 25 feet apart were each spewing smoke.
Barry said that the city buried utilities underground
beneath Union Street and electrical wires can be accessed in periodic vaults
beneath the pavement. Vents at each end of the vault open into the sidewalk,
kind of like a subway grate.
Barry said firefighters evacuated a restaurant and a church
service out of concern that the fire could travel through the vault into the
adjacent buildings. But the fire did not spread, and firefighters left the
scene before 8 p.m.
National Grid Spokeswoman Darlene Masse said that one
utility workers believed the rain from earlier in the evening and day flooded
the vault and caused a connection to short-circuit. Approximately a 15
customers were without power for an hour while utility workers made repairs.
Manhole explosions typically increase during the winter,
when salt applied to roads to melt ice can fray cables that lie beneath the
city streets. After the insulation is
damaged, the cables then can short when flooded during storm events, causing
sparking fires, smoking incidents, and blasts due to the increased gas pressure
inside the vault. Several hundred pound
manhole covers can shoot in the air from that pressure built up. Expect a significant increase in manhole fires
due to the amount of salts used to melt the ice/snow this harsh winter. Already most areas in the northeast have seen
an increase in the number of incidents compared to previous years.
//-----------------------------------------//
THERE ARE OVER 2,000 MANHOLE FIRES/EXPLOSIONS EACH YEAR IN
NYC. UNDERGROUND CABLES BECOME FRAYED
FROM SNOW/ICE MELTING CHEMICALS, AGING, CORROSIVE CHEMICALS, OVERLOAD OR RATS
BITING THEM
Snow/ice melting compounds in melting snow has wreaked havoc
on the New York City's underground utility system, sparking nearly 600 manhole
explosions, fires and other incidents since Sunday, Con Ed officials said. The city averages about 2,100 a year. In November, two people were hurt after an
explosion in midtown. Last month, a
71-year-old Park Slope man was injured when a manhole cover flew off and hit
him in the head. And last night, three
firefighters in Brooklyn were injured when more than a dozen manholes
exploded across the borough.
Manhole fires, like those in Park Slope and others reported
overnight, are often triggered by salt that leaks into the underground
electrical system and corrodes wires, which then ignite, officials said.
"A lot of times after it snows and the snow melts, salt
that is put down onto the sidewalk leaks into our system and can cause fires
when it hits our equipment," Con Ed spokesman Alfonso Quiroz said.
"What it does is it eats away the insulation that
prevents the different cables from touching each other," said FDNY
Battalion Chief Thomas Schmitt. "Once that's gone, you get this
effect."
The flaming wiring can then release the dangerous gas, which
can leak into neighboring buildings as it builds up pressure below the manhole,
causing it to explode.
A cast-iron manhole cover can weigh between 85 and 300
pounds (35 to 136 kg), and explosions have propelled these massive discs
anywhere from 1 foot to 50 feet (0.3 to 15 m) into the air. The real problem
with these explosions (aside from the risk of injury) is the loss of power in
the aftermath.
In most cases, these are the events that lead to an
explosion:
Underground cables become frayed from aging, corrosive
chemicals, overload or rats biting them. These cables carry on the order of 13,000
volts of electricity.
These electrical wires heat up the paper, lead and rubber
insulation.
The insulation smolders and catches on fire, releasing
gases.
The pressure from the gas builds up inside the manhole.
The electrical wires arc like a bolt of lightning and ignite
the gases, causing a powerful explosion.
Depending on the amount of gas-pressure built up inside the
manhole, the cover may flip over or be launched several feet in the air. Often,
there may not be an explosion, just a lot of smoke or fire.
Some power companies are in the process of replacing solid
manhole covers with slotted manhole covers. These new covers allow the gas to
be released less violently, and also give an early warning to possible
explosions.
Con Ed was still investigating what caused the Monday
explosion, but Quiroz said salt was likely to blame.
"We don’t know [for sure], but considering the weather
Monday that is very likely what it was," he said.
Manhole explosions typically increase during the winter,
when salt applied to roads to melt ice can fray cables that lie beneath the
city streets. After the insulation is
damaged, the cables then can short, causing sparking fires, smoking incidents,
and blasts due to the increased gas pressure inside the vault. Several hundred pound manhole covers can
shoot in the air from that pressure built up.
The electric utility company (Con Ed in this case) would
basically have to replace sections of its underground wire infrastructure every
few years to keep them from happening, a totally impossible project considering
the traffic congestion issues, costs and thousands of miles of cables. In 2014, ConEd started working on implementing
a $1.3 billion electrical modernization project that will hopefully decrease
the number of incidents.
//-----------------------------------//
THE MANHOLE FIRE/EXPLOSION INCIDENTS ARE EXPECTED TO
INCREASE DURING THE SNOW MELTING PERIOD
NEW YORK, NY (Reuters)
Salvatore Grillo was walking his Labrador retriever near
Brooklyn's Prospect Park on a cold morning in February when he heard what
sounded like a muffled explosion.
Minutes later, emergency responders were hovering over the
71-year-old as he lay unconscious on the ground. Police said an underground
blast had blown a cast-iron manhole cover skyward and the heavy metallic disk
came crashing down on his head.
While the seriousness of Grillo's injury is unusual, manhole
"events" have become all too common in the country's largest
metropolis. In the snowy first week of February, Consolidated Edison Inc, the
local utility, tallied about 600 "smokers," fires and occasional
explosions involving manholes, part of a seasonal surge that plagues New York
every winter.
Manholes are entry points to a labyrinth of electric cables,
many of them aged and decaying, that snake underneath the city streets. In
winter melting snow mixed with de-icing salt can seep through, causing frayed
low-voltage cables to fail. That can trigger fires, smoke and explosions that
can send manhole covers flying.
"These incidents are yet another example of New York
City's outdated infrastructure. It's well-known that saltwater and exposed
electrical wires are a dangerous combination," said New York's Public
Advocate Letitia James. "If we want a safer city, we must do more to
address this issue."
Cables have an expected lifetime of about 40 years, but in
Manhattan, 5 percent of low-voltage distribution cables were installed before
1930, according to a 2014 analysis. In addition, overheating and even gnawing
rats can hasten the deterioration. It is the oldest electrical system in the
nation.
"Everything that’s electrical has a certain limit, a
certain lifetime," said William Black, a professor emeritus of mechanical
engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
In any single year, New York has 2,100 manhole incidents a
year, or nearly six of them every day, Con Ed estimates.
The problem is so much larger in New York than elsewhere in
part because the city has the country's largest underground electrical system,
with its 98,000 miles (157,716 km) of cable and 264,000 manholes and service
boxes.
To be sure, most manhole incidents are relatively harmless
"smokers," but about 10 percent in the first week of February were
more dangerous.
Mario Tama/GettyFirefighters gather at the scene of an
underground blaze following an explosion near Eighth Avenue and 38th Street.
Earlier this month, a smoking manhole exploded in Brooklyn,
sending a worker scrambling for safety in an incident caught on video. On the
same day, a parked Mazda was torched after a manhole beneath it started
spouting fire.
"Con Ed has a rather difficult situation because if you
proceed to dig underneath the street you’ll see how congested it is,"
Black said.
The problem is attracting attention. Donovan Richards, chair
of the New York City Council's Environmental Protection Committee, is
considering legislation to push Con Ed to spend more on modernizing its
underground infrastructure.
In 2014, Con Ed invested $1.3 billion in modernizing its
electrical infrastructure, including the installation of nearly 1,600 miles
(2,575 km) of underground electric cable. But that is just a fraction of the
tens of thousands of miles in the system.
Manhole events "take a considerable amount of time and
resources," said Con Ed spokesman Allan Drury. "But our emphasis is
on public safety and we are always looking for new technologies and methods to
improve our system."
For instance, the utility has been installing vented covers
that allow for trapped combustible gases to dissipate more easily.
Con Ed has teamed with the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and Columbia University to develop a tool that predicts manhole
incidents through statistical modeling, taking into account factors such cable
age and failure history.
But Cynthia Rudin, associate professor of statistics at MIT
who worked on the project, warns against focusing too much energy and money on
replacing cables.
"It is not a reasonable scenario to think of replacing
the whole distribution network every few years or so," Rudin said.
//-----------------------------------------//
3 FIREFIGHTERS INJURED IN UNDERGROUND SERVICE BOX EXPLOSION
IN BROOKLYN
FRIDAY, MARCH 06, 2015
BROOKLYN, N.Y. (WABC) --
Three firefighters were injured when an underground service
box exploded in Brooklyn Thursday night.
They were responding to a fire in an underground service box at 1285 Broadway in Bushwick Thursday night. Broadway remained closed in the area between Greene and Gates Friday morning.
One of the firefighters was hit by the cover to the service box. He was taken Kings County Hospital with a police escort. Two others sustained minor injuries.
None of the injuries are considered non-life threatening.
One hundred people lost power. An emergency Con Edison crew was on the scene.
Salty runoff from the street seeping into the ground electrical wiring ignited the explosion. Several manholes in the area have been smoking and the fire started beneath one.
They were responding to a fire in an underground service box at 1285 Broadway in Bushwick Thursday night. Broadway remained closed in the area between Greene and Gates Friday morning.
One of the firefighters was hit by the cover to the service box. He was taken Kings County Hospital with a police escort. Two others sustained minor injuries.
None of the injuries are considered non-life threatening.
One hundred people lost power. An emergency Con Edison crew was on the scene.
Salty runoff from the street seeping into the ground electrical wiring ignited the explosion. Several manholes in the area have been smoking and the fire started beneath one.