Doesn't this get under your skin??

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jason

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Faulty Wiring Causes South Macon Fire

January 25, 2009 ? 6:48 pm

Macon-Bibb fire investigators say faulty wiring set a south Macon house on fire Sunday morning.
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Captain Tom Musselwhite with the Macon-Bibb Fire Department said they got a call to the home on Mutual Avenue around 8:30.

He says someone set up the wiring to bypass the electrical meter and sparked the blaze.

Musselwhite says it's not all that uncommon for people to try and illegally "jump the meter" to steal electrical service.

"They remove the meter, or if there's not a meter there they jump out the box. Now, this happens quite often and they're lucky. They're very lucky for the simple reason that that's deadly. Electricity that doesn't have a fuse or a breaker on it that's going to break if you come in contact with it. That's certain death," he says.

Captain Musselwhite says the owner of the house had asked the person living there to leave but hadn't finished filing eviction papers.

No one was home when the fire started, but two dogs in the house were killed.
 
jason said:
Faulty Wiring Causes South Macon Fire

January 25, 2009 • 6:48 pm

Macon-Bibb fire investigators say faulty wiring set a south Macon house on fire Sunday morning.
Advertisement
Quantcast

Captain Tom Musselwhite with the Macon-Bibb Fire Department said they got a call to the home on Mutual Avenue around 8:30.

He says someone set up the wiring to bypass the electrical meter and sparked the blaze.

Musselwhite says it's not all that uncommon for people to try and illegally "jump the meter" to steal electrical service.

"They remove the meter, or if there's not a meter there they jump out the box. Now, this happens quite often and they're lucky. They're very lucky for the simple reason that that's deadly. Electricity that doesn't have a fuse or a breaker on it that's going to break if you come in contact with it. That's certain death," he says.

Captain Musselwhite says the owner of the house had asked the person living there to leave but hadn't finished filing eviction papers.

No one was home when the fire started, but two dogs in the house were killed.
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RE the persons who jumped the meter, see my signature line. :D
 
crazyboy said:
Just because they jumped the meter doesn't mean that there isn't any fuse or circuit breaker protection.
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In many places it would. Everything before the main OCP would be unprotected by any breaker or fuse - and most often the metering is before the main. While there may be fuses on the utility side, they may be on the other side of the transformer, or sized for multiple transformers, and offer little if any protection for any SE conductors at any premises.
 
e57 said:
In many places it would. Everything before the main OCP would be unprotected by any breaker or fuse - and most often the metering is before the main. While there may be fuses on the utility side, they may be on the other side of the transformer, or sized for multiple transformers, and offer little if any protection for any SE conductors at any premises.
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exactly. i doubt that any hack dumb enough to jump over/illegally bypass a meter can would be smart enough to add ocp.
 
OK, so someone jumped the meter. Just for the sake of discussion, let us say that that was bad.

Now, what started the fire? :-?

 
charlie b said:
OK, so someone jumped the meter. Just for the sake of discussion, let us say that that was bad.

Now, what started the fire? :-?
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They ususally just take a large size wire, strip it and stuck it in-between the blades. It sill give you a 'connection' but if you start loading it up it will overheat and start the fire. The other obvious method if they jumper it with a #12 and load it to 50-60A. The house wiring could be in perfect order of course.
 
weressl said:
They ususally just take a large size wire, strip it and stuck it in-between the blades. It sill give you a 'connection' but if you start loading it up it will overheat and start the fire. The other obvious method if they jumper it with a #12 and load it to 50-60A. The house wiring could be in perfect order of course.
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As an example of how a jumpered meter can start a house fire, take a look at THIS VIDEO of a meter that caught fire on a brick structure.

I'm willing to bet such an incident on a wood building would start a fire quite nicely.
 
jason said:
So you agree this fire was caused by faulty wiring? My guess is that the wiring was fine. I don't consider a fork or nail "faulty wiring".
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So, bottom line, you don't really know?

What gets under my skin? People who make too many assumptions and then get worked up over it. I had a coworker like that once, that attitude is what cost him his job. Blowing things out of proportion......
 
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Electricity that doesn't have a fuse or a breaker on it that's going to break if you come in contact with it. That's certain death,"
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To avoid certain death, always carry a large hammer so you can break the fuse or breaker should you come in contact with it.
 
e57 said:
In many places it would. Everything before the main OCP would be unprotected by any breaker or fuse - and most often the metering is before the main. While there may be fuses on the utility side, they may be on the other side of the transformer, or sized for multiple transformers, and offer little if any protection for any SE conductors at any premises.
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I agree with that. But who's to say that they didn't place jumpers between the incoming and outgoing service wires in the meter pan, therefore continuing the power through the meter pan into the panel without needing the meter? Am I just crazy?
 
jason said:
Musselwhite says it's not all that uncommon for people to try and illegally "jump the meter" to steal electrical service.

"They remove the meter, or if there's not a meter there they jump out the box. Now, this happens quite often and they're lucky. They're very lucky for the simple reason that that's deadly. Electricity that doesn't have a fuse or a breaker on it that's going to break if you come in contact with it. That's certain death," he says.

quote]

Sounds lie a nominee for the Darwin Awards...
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