11 November 2011

Speaking of power outages... (in Kaleen)

| Deref
Join the conversation
20

Last night (Thu 10th), I think around 8.30ish, the power to my house went off for maybe ten seconds. It was too quick for me to check to see whether other people in the street were affected, but I think it’s unlikely to have just been my place.

Lots of things can cause power outages, but I’m damned if I can think what might cause one for such a brief time. Does anyone have any clues?

I’m in Kaleen.

Join the conversation

20
All Comments
  • All Comments
  • Website Comments
LatestOldest

Stevian said :

Chop71 said :

Classified said :

I live in Queanbeyan and our power never goes out. Never ever. Ever.

…..except when you flood

An argument devoid of facts.

no but I caught a couple of fish ……. thanks for jumping in my boat

Chop71 said :

Classified said :

I live in Queanbeyan and our power never goes out. Never ever. Ever.

…..except when you flood

An argument devoid of facts.

Chop71 said :

Classified said :

I live in Queanbeyan and our power never goes out. Never ever. Ever.

…..except when you flood

Um, it didn’t go out when we flooded? At least, my street didn’t. They probably turned power off to a couple of lower lying streets, but the majority of flooding was in parks and carparks, so few homes were impacted.

Classified said :

I live in Queanbeyan and our power never goes out. Never ever. Ever.

…..except when you flood

lobster said :

I blame the Gillard government…

Or teenaged public school kids…

and Cyclists…

And people with those green on white number plates…

And Mully…
Or the Gillard government.

…and plastic bags

thetoecutter said :

Can anyone provide details on what the aeroplane was that flew over Canberra this afternoon (13/11/11), it was huge a 747 I think? Could it have been one of Obamas pre visit cargo planes??? Cheers.

747’s come in a variety of sizes, but the variations are pretty small so there’s not much discernible difference between the small, medium and large version.. I’m pretty sure a US C-17 Globemaster flew in with POTUS’s car, guns and ammo recently , so that’s most likely what you saw. The RAAF flys these things as well.

I live in Queanbeyan and our power never goes out. Never ever. Ever.

thetoecutter7:25 pm 13 Nov 11

Can anyone provide details on what the aeroplane was that flew over Canberra this afternoon (13/11/11), it was huge a 747 I think? Could it have been one of Obamas pre visit cargo planes??? Cheers.

ThatUniStudent1:01 pm 12 Nov 11

It takes about that long for the possum/bird that was connecting the 2 cables to go from mostly liquid to mostly non conducting ash / free falling ash.
Also time travelling Delorians only need 55 gigawatts of power for 10 seconds to make their next time jump.

Russ said :

That kind of fault is related to a short in the local high-voltage distribution lines (ie. 11/22 kV as opposed to the 240v that gets fed into your house). It trips a circuit breaker at the sub-station called a “recloser” which will re-connect the circuit after 6-10 seconds – it’ll usually try this about 3 times and then give up if it’s still tripping. As mentioned, it does this in case it’s a temporary fault caused, for example, by a falling tree branch that only briefly shorts the lines.

🙂 thanks Russ.

Thanks for info on 10-15 second blips – but does this also apply to the ones I get quite often of 5 seconds or less? Just enough to trip the digital displays, lights and appliances? I have given up using digital time displays on things like the microwave because of these – CBF resetting them all the time.

That kind of fault is related to a short in the local high-voltage distribution lines (ie. 11/22 kV as opposed to the 240v that gets fed into your house). It trips a circuit breaker at the sub-station called a “recloser” which will re-connect the circuit after 6-10 seconds – it’ll usually try this about 3 times and then give up if it’s still tripping. As mentioned, it does this in case it’s a temporary fault caused, for example, by a falling tree branch that only briefly shorts the lines.

screaming banshee said :

The distribution systems are designed to self clear faults under certain conditions, so suppose a short develops that trips the protection the system will automatically switch on again at least once 10-15 seconds later to see if the fault has cleared. Sound like this is what happened.

We must be on a nearby branch as we got two blips, one that turned off our stereo and a second about 10 secs later also.

Thanks – that sounds like it. I can’t remember it having happened before last night, but it seems it’s not too unusual.

And yeah – UPSs are teh roxorz. (LOL – how outdated that seems now.)

I blame the Gillard government…

Or teenaged public school kids…

and Cyclists…

And people with those green on white number plates…

And Mully…
Or the Gillard government.

screaming banshee5:31 pm 11 Nov 11

The distribution systems are designed to self clear faults under certain conditions, so suppose a short develops that trips the protection the system will automatically switch on again at least once 10-15 seconds later to see if the fault has cleared. Sound like this is what happened.

We must be on a nearby branch as we got two blips, one that turned off our stereo and a second about 10 secs later also.

No idea what caused it but it hit us to and the street lights.

Jivrashia said :

Was quite peeved off when it happened while I was playing a game online.

UPS FTW

I regularly get little outages like that here in Watson. I only notice because it switches my tv off and it doesn’t automatically come back on. Sometimes it’s so brief that other appliances barely seem to notice it.

*shrug*

Some years ago there were three blackouts in one night. I’m in Lyneham.
When the power goes out my alarm system makes a dying scream, so I knew that that was the case.

I’m not sure if it is related to the development around Bruce and Crace, but it is a regular occurrence.

Was quite peeved off when it happened while I was playing a game online.

Holden Caulfield3:33 pm 11 Nov 11

Kids.

Daily Digest

Want the best Canberra news delivered daily? Every day we package the most popular Riotact stories and send them straight to your inbox. Sign-up now for trusted local news that will never be behind a paywall.

By submitting your email address you are agreeing to Region Group's terms and conditions and privacy policy.