Electrical Safety in South Africa

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amichael

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Hello All,

You may think that you have run into some hairy wiring practices. Checkout what passes for service wiring in suburban South Africa.

I came across this video this evening while scanning the net. It highlights the sad situations found in South Africa with respect to electrical wiring practices (from the pole to the user).

See:<http://www.leonardo-energy.org/electrical-safety-suburban-africa>

The root site, <http://www.leonardo-energy.org/> offers other items which may be of interest.

Best regards, Art, Product Safety Int'l
 
ericsherman37 said:
South Africa is one of the wealthier African countries. Imagine what it must be like in Zimbabwe or Liberia.
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The link is Senegal, not South Africa.
I have been to South Africa a few times (mostly to comission VSDs) and the standards of electrical installations that I saw there were actually very good.
 
And, for poor standards, this takes a bit of beating:

Indiacomms02.jpg
 
According to several documents I have read over the years, South Africa has state of the art electrical systems and standards. I believe they were one of the first countries to mandate the use of residual current devices such as GFCI's, AFCI's, etc.
 
I lived and worked 2 and a half years in SA. It was over 30 years ago and I gained a great deal of my IEC experience there - including "Zones." At the time, they were officially classified as an Industrialized Nation and had fairly rigorous residential and industrial safety practices - including GFCIs. I still have friends there and friends here that travel back. The almost unanimous report I get is the country has slipped a little, crime has surged, but actual building standards have generally kept up with the times.
 
The other day I came across a facebook group entitled "dodgy technicians" from the entertainments industries, and they have a couple of thousand photos about goodly chunk of which are electrical nightmares, some really quite scary.

Have a look here, no facebook membership required to view.
 
My boss earned his journeyman in South Africa (born and raised), and from the stories he's told, I agree with just about all the posts from above. Very intensive testing, training, and crime in the background.
 
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