SIDE STEPPING ELECTROCUTION.

Shannon News, 23 March 1926, Page 2

SIDE STEPPING ELECTROCUTION.

POWER 7 BOARD ENGINEER'S SUG- ! GESTION 1 TO. FARMERS. At the March meeting of the Horowhenua Power -Board, held on Tuesday last; Mr W. E. Barber asked the Engineer's opinion as to an efficient : means of minimising the danger lo farmers and their stock, by the falling of live wires on to fences. Prior to the Engineer's reply, the chairman explained that if a break occurred in one of the lines controlled by this Board and the wire came down, that particular line was immediately thrown out and became, "dead." " Wherever there -was a risk of danger from a wire becoming disconnected from the .insulator, there was a guard to prevent its falling. Mr Barber: That means we are practically safe? The. Chairman: That is so. I don't think you will find this provision made in any other district. The greatest danger we have is the falling of a line on to a fence,, without breaking, but it seems to me that wherever there is a corner, or wherever the line could get over, a guard has been erected to catch'falling wires. In laying out this system we have done all we could. The Engineer: It is a good idea to "earth" fences anywhere near power lies. This can be done by connecting all the fencing wires together with a piece of wire,' right along the line, fastening the wire securely on to an old piece of piping and driving the latter well into the ground. This is quite good as a precautionary measure. The trouble with some of the lower-voltage systems elsewhere,, is that when the high tension wires fall on the fence wires there isn't sufficient voltage there' to force itself to earth, but with our 11,000 system there is sufficient 10 force its way to earth through the fencing post, and thereby operating a leakage coil. In the past, there has been some difficulty in finding a.sufficiently sensitive apparatus which would) operate at comparatively low-voltages immediately the live wires strike the fences, bur leakagecoils throw out the whole section immediately . a power line becomes "earthed/' Recently, a telephone wire in the vicinity of a power line, was broken, but although it fell right across the high-voltage wires the circuit breaker was actuated so quickly as to break the circuit before the telephone wire was burnt.