Mindsigh

Power failure

Posted by Jerry on February 18th, 2006 — Posted in Journal

It began on dusk with a bang – two bangs in fact – and all the lights went out and the computer was silent. We unplugged the computer and I checked the power board – nothing tripped out. By then we could hear our neighbours in the street and we went outside to join them. “Whatever it was took out at least two transformers” said one, pointing up the street and over the back fence. I hoped it wasn’t a car accident. We checked that someone had phoned the power company, and then decided to take a dusk stroll – there wasn’t much we could do inside. Our neighbours set about transferring their dinner preparations to the barbeque.

Just one street over we saw the problem – an unfortunate cockatoo. There are not many birds large enough to bridge between two power wires, but this one was.

Within half an hour the power company truck arrived and the young engineer set about isolating the power to that pole using a long extendable hook on a PVC plastic tube. A further half hour and the lights were back on to the cheers of the neighbours.

In the meantime we explored the old forest area – and noted the new growth of triangular plastic bags! On closer inspection it turned out that these were new trees planted to provide a shade corridor for the migration of wildlife. We knew then that it was not about to be infilled with houses. We also met another of our fire-affected neighbours and discussed the recovery process in the district.

Cheers
Jerry

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