High Voltage Electrical Rooms

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dema

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In regard to the missing college freshman at Purdue - I have done work that caused me to go into various high voltage vaults in the area - not that one, thank God, and I find the situation scary. One vault had no light switch near the door to the outside, the door automatically would swing close and there were high voltage stabs 5-7 feet off the ground starting 6' or so from the door. I don't know what happened to the freshman - but I know that I have told an employee who is also my daughter 'stay away from those transformers because if you're near them and you trip, you die.'

Why is this legal? I was talking to my father - also an engineer. He said that he is amazed that OSHA doesn't require guards around the stabs and a night light in the room. I think both are excellent ideas. I tend to be the absentminded professor type and I get my rear end out of those spaces just as fast as I possibly can and I make sure my awareness stays fully on while I am there. I'm a design engineer.

What about getting the code changed to have all bus bars at least protected by guards or some other second line of protection? Has there been a drive to do this in the past? What happened?
 
Dema,
I was talking to my father - also an engineer. He said that he is amazed that OSHA doesn't require guards
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OSHA in the NFPA-70E does require the employee to wear the appropriate Personal Protective Equipment. Your Dad might want to brush up on that, since it may directly affect him. This has been in play since 2002. Said a different way - If you go down into the Vault without any PPE, OSHA fines to the Employeer are now $130,000 to $196,000.
I am sorry to hear about the student at Purdue.
Just my $.02
 
All the gear requirements in the world wouldn't have saved this kid. They just announced that it is Wade Steffey and it was an accident. You can't dress the whole world in protective gear. He probably found the wrong door and stumbled into some bare stabs. Yes, the door should have been locked - but that is one level of protection. ONE. One strike and your dead. Or you've caused someone else's death. A broken lock, the wrong lock, carelessness - I'm sure they will find out. How would you like to be emotionally guilty of man slaughter because somebody distracted you as you were locking the door and you didn't finish the job?


I'm glad that I was never in that room.
 
Last edited:
Officials: Body Found Is That Of Missing Purdue Student

Last Edited: Tuesday, 20 Mar 2007, 10:35 AM EDT
Created: Tuesday, 20 Mar 2007, 10:35 AM EDT

(Credit: MyFox) By The Associated Press


WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. -- A body found inside a dormitory's locked, high-voltage utility room has been identified as a 19-year-old Purdue University student who vanished more than two months ago, a university official said Tuesday.

The Tippecanoe County coroner said the body found Monday by a college maintenance worker investigating reports of a "pinging" or "popping" sound is that of Wade Steffey, a freshman from Bloomington, Ind., who disappeared Jan. 13 after leaving a fraternity party.

Norberg said Steffey had been fatally shocked when he entered the utility room in an apparent attempt to enter Owen Hall to retrieve his coat. It appeared he tripped and fell onto a power transformer.

"He is believed to have died instantly," she said.

Officials conducted numerous searches of the Purdue campus for Steffey, but university spokeswoman Jeanne Norberg said the searchers somehow missed the utility room at Owen Hall, where someone matching Steffey's description was seen the night he disappeared.

Around noon Monday -- the day classes resumed after a weeklong spring break -- Norberg said a worker investigating the noises unlocked a door leading to the utility room and found the body slumped over a piece of machinery.

Power to Owen Hall -- a coed residence hall that houses about 700 students -- had to be shut off to retrieve the body.

Steffey was reported missing after friends returned from the school's three-day break for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday and could not find him.

His parents were alerted to the body's discovery and arrived at Purdue on Monday.
 
I have been chastised, in private, for posting before I was fully informed.

The point is that I am informed as to actual common practice in dealing with these High Voltage vaults and have been grossly uncomfortable with it for some time. This is how I 'jumped' to the correct conclusion before all the information hit the press. Even if it had been a dumped body and not an accidental electrocution, the danger of the environment does not change.

As it is, the kid did die due to the dangerous situation.

College kids steal signs. You can say, 'they shouldn't do that' until you are blue in the face and it won't change the reality. And people get distracted and forget to lock doors - or don't even forget exactly - they are just distracted. One stolen sign + one distracted individual should not lead to the death of another individual.

Contractors do NOT wear the appropriate gear when they are doing work in the vicinity of a high voltage vault. I don't care what OSHA says - they do NOT do it. And contractors DO prop open doors to high voltage vaults - again, it doesn't matter what they are supposed to do - they DO prop open the doors.

You can get morally righteous all you want, but there is no indication that this kid did anything wrong except open the wrong door. And I can think of many equally inocuous results that could end up at exactly the same result.

I have worked in various areas where the goal was to protect people from themselves. If we didn't care about that - why would we be participating in this column? The current rules don't do diddly to protect people from themselves. OSHA is all over many manufacturing facilities, but how many high voltage vaults for non-industrial facilities have you seen them in? Do they even have jurisdiction over areas where people are not working on a regular basis? OSHA is for 'Occupational Hazards'.

Whatever the law is, it isn't working.
 
The maintenance worker had unlocked the utility room from inside the Owen Hall on Monday, Norberg said. Afterward, police discovered that the room's exterior door was closed but that it was unlocked, she said. Officials had said Monday that the ground-level utility room wasn't accessible from Owen Hall and was locked with two sets of keys, one each for two sets of doors.

Officials have removed the exterior door's lock assembly for a forensic examination to determine whether the mechanism works. Norberg said Purdue will conduct an independent investigation to "to find out all we can about this accident occurred."
 
Preventable electrocution

Preventable electrocution

I sent this to Purdue.

Sadly, the death of Mr. Wade S. Steffey has come to pass at Purdue. I can think of only a few select universities that have such a fine reputation concerning engineering as Purdue. However, this electrocution is unconscionable because it was likely preventable, design & review wise, to allow for imminent electrical shock risks such as are reportedly present in the high voltage electrical closet where Mr. Steffey was apparently electrocuted. For the room not to have an automatic means to become artificially illuminated, especially considering the room did not have the required light switch present at each entry (this would appear to be a code violation if true), was unsafe. Additionally, for the facility to rely solely upon an unmonitored mechanical locking means to limit access to such electrical hazards present in the closet was short-sighted because these devices are known to fail in many ways. Furthermore, the special immanent hazards of exposed live electrical conductors or terminations, especially those at high voltage, should be kept to a minimum to such degree as having at least two redundant physical barriers; apparently, this closet has only either locked entry door as the sole intervening physical barrier.

I would encourage Purdue University to perform a through safety review of its facilities to not only ensure code minimums are present but to assure public safety is achieved. Engineering codes of ethics commonly stated within the first canon show that; ?the engineer shall hold paramount the health, safety, and welfare of the public?. A fine engineering university such as Purdue should be leading by example of and by its performed duty in this regard in the classrooms and in its facilities.
 
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