Fire In The Wire.............

[fourandsixpants]

Four Corners  ABC MON 28th Oct 2013  http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/stories/2013/10/28/3876333.htm

'Fire In The Wire'

.....man made 'lightning' from power lines, fuses, clashing conductors/powerlines, birds on lines, falling branches on lines.....causes bush fires

From Black Sat on Feb 7th in 2009, 161 deaths of the total 173 were attributed to power lines.

Apart from maintenance - of power lines, poles, fuses, attaching spreaders betwn lines (to stop both conductors and lines from touching or 'clashing' during high winds) and eliminating low voltage conductors, clear trees and branches and undergrowth it has been discussed that power be turned off to certain high risk areas at times to prevent these horrendous fires.

South Australia has recently identified and adopted turning off power as good practice if req'd.

.....why don't other States recognise and adopt same - turn off power? If not, why not?

Or is there a better way?

[debra9275]

I watched that last night too. Turning off seems a good idea to me. The old SEC did lots of research on it before electricity was provatized

[cq_tech]

I can see the point, but a lot of rural homes use mains power to operate pumps and switching off the mains could leave these people virtually defenceless in the event of fire.

[***super_nova***]

Turning power off sounds good, just imagine how much would be saved in power bill, which normally soars on such days.  Every day of  high fire danger there would be no airconditioning, no refrigeration  and all the food would go off, people who need power for their business/employment could not work, no traffic lights, no trains.  Early this year we had here in Victoria almost uninterrupted several weeks heat wave.  If the power was off, the state would have stopped. 

[***super_nova***]

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@cq_tech wrote:
I can see the point, but a lot of rural homes use mains power to operate pumps and switching off the mains could leave these people virtually defenceless in the event of fire.

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In most cases when there is a bushfire the power goes off anyway; the recommendation is to have petrol driven pumps for fighting fires. 

But another thing of being without power is  that people would also have to rely on battery powered gadgets to keep in touch and informed; and batteries do not last all that long.