Texas flooding how are people not getting shocked

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Sparky435

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hey Mike,
Your the ultimate electrical guru.
With this stuff in Texas. Flooding up to Meter bases and transformers flooded, I know dirty water conducts, how is the water not shocking people if a faulty ungrounded gfci can kill someone on a lake dock? Pools are flooded, equipment is flooded. Is it safe to say they have shut the grid down?
 
I am certain those areas are shut down however even if some areas are underwater and have some live circuits there would have to be unusual circumstances to get shocked. Water may be conductive with the impurities however it still has a high resistance so you would have to be in close proximity and touching something that would be at a different potential.

I am sure others can do a better job explaining
 
how are folks not getting shocked?

GFI's, and all that dirty water means everything is bonded via a liquid.

one lady on the news said here house was flooded but she still had power and was running the air conditioner, until they were rescued.
 
Sparky435 said:
hey Mike,
Your the ultimate electrical guru.
With this stuff in Texas. Flooding up to Meter bases and transformers flooded, I know dirty water conducts, how is the water not shocking people if a faulty ungrounded gfci can kill someone on a lake dock? Pools are flooded, equipment is flooded. Is it safe to say they have shut the grid down?
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The people that get electrocuted on a lake dock are in water that is at one potential and touch an object that is bonded (directly or indirectly) to something at a different potential. The lake is typically "earth potential" and the frame of a boat hoist or other objects connected to the EGC supplying that are elevated in voltage because of voltage drop on the service neutral or even the POCO's multi-grounded neutral. Might only be a few volts but that is all it takes in that situation.

That don't mean there isn't some risk for those in these flooded areas, you just need to come across the right conditions at the right time.
 
Who says they're not?

Someone receiving a non-fatal electric shock while wading in floodwaters probably wouldn't deem it newsworthy enough to report. And someone receiving a fatal electric shock also won't report it.

Electrical drownings are indistinguishable from non-electrical drownings. Unless the victim received a monumental shock that resulted in skin burns, there's no way to know that's what happened.
http://www.electricshockdrowning.org/
 
But for the most part, power is delivered via substations and if the substation gets flooded, it is shut down. The projection is that in many areas, power may be out for a month, maybe longer. Right now everyone is focused on the rescues, next on how to take care of the rescued, and only AFTER the flooding stops (in a couple more weeks yet) will anyone get a real chance at assessing the full extent of the damage. It's going to be massive though, likely worse than Katrina in that the affected area is much much larger when you count the track of torrential rain that is still going to be coming down and causing floods.
 
Considering the issue usually about potential in terms of the shock itself it would stand to reason that with all the water around that everything is at the same physical potential at this point. The concerns for shock begin to rise at the point the water goes down and differences of potentials begin take place. In some areas they do indeed shut down power to specific areas, of course the issue then is the affected equipment and it's reliability. Most would simply die from drowning due to the shock and its affects on the ability to remain mobile.

Most of the concerns (here I am acting like I work at NEMA again) found were when the waters went down and people began to clean up and sparse locations of water and dry areas and construction material created the potentials that become deadly. However, in most of those areas the power has been interrupted.
 
Jraef said:
But for the most part, power is delivered via substations and if the substation gets flooded, it is shut down. The projection is that in many areas, power may be out for a month, maybe longer. Right now everyone is focused on the rescues, next on how to take care of the rescued, and only AFTER the flooding stops (in a couple more weeks yet) will anyone get a real chance at assessing the full extent of the damage. It's going to be massive though, likely worse than Katrina in that the affected area is much much larger when you count the track of torrential rain that is still going to be coming down and causing floods.
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You are so right...this will eclipse the affects of Katrina in costs for sure.
 
MasterTheNEC said:
Considering the issue usually about potential in terms of the shock itself it would stand to reason that with all the water around that everything is at the same physical potential at this point. The concerns for shock begin to rise at the point the water goes down and differences of potentials begin take place. In some areas they do indeed shut down power to specific areas, of course the issue then is the affected equipment and it's reliability. Most would simply die from drowning due to the shock and its affects on the ability to remain mobile.

Most of the concerns (here I am acting like I work at NEMA again) found were when the waters went down and people began to clean up and sparse locations of water and dry areas and construction material created the potentials that become deadly. However, in most of those areas the power has been interrupted.
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But won't you have voltage gradients across the water? :huh: Think of a pool.
 
mbrooke said:
But won't you have voltage gradients across the water? :huh: Think of a pool.
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Maybe I don't understand properly, but the problem is rarely with a gradient in the water. The trouble comes up when you grab the ladder or step on the drain.
 
norcal said:
This story was linked on Drudge.

http://abc13.com/warning-about-flood-dangers-after-man-is-electrocuted/2358976/
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Some of the comments though :eek::roll:

Animedude5555:

Water conducts electricity. Water shorts out the circuitn the home. Circuit breaker trips. Now there's no more electricity to the yard light. If it's not energized then he can't get electrocuted. Sounds to me like maybe they had an old box with actual fuses (no breakers), and somebody put a penny in the fuse socket, completely removing the protection normally provided by a fuse.
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Starlink9c

Sub panels are supposed to be GFI. Not the main panel
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gadfly56 said:
Maybe I don't understand properly, but the problem is rarely with a gradient in the water. The trouble comes up when you grab the ladder or step on the drain.
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In terms of walking around outside or being only partly immersed I guess thats true, but I have read many cases where people in pools not in contact with anything get killed from the gradient from say an electrified pool light hence why I asked.

Id be curious to know at what point in height (water wise) does the person run the risk of being killed when something is electrified in the water itself.

In this case though it sounds like the boy grabbed the light and then completed the circuit through the water which would not make it a gradient case.




MasterTheNEC said:
I would imagine you would. But to what extent considering the contamination Lord only knows.
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I don't want to think what might be in that water :sick:


I personally think people should not even go near these flooded waters. I sounds like the boy was electrocuted with 120 (guessing) which means 13.8kv utility power is probably present. A downed 13.8kv line makes for way more danger.
 
I read an article sometime back which gave a lot of clarity to what seems very related to electrocution in water. I am sorry, but I do not recall where I read it so I can neither quote from it or reference it.

It was about GFCI's and boat dock wiring and the dangers of electrocution surrounding that.

As you all well know, electricity takes the path of least resistance. When that path passes the heart it can easily cause death by putting the heart into arrhythmia, where the heart goes out of sync. It takes a very minute amount of electricity passing through the heart to cause this.

The salt water at seaside docks conducts electricity better than the human body, therefor the electricity passes around it. In lake water the human body conducts better than the water so if the person is in the path the electricity passes through the person and is very lethal.

As to the flood waters, they are usually very muddy, dirty, with many electrolytes in it. I would surmise that saves many lives.

In Dumas Texas in 1963 two girls were electrocuted on the lawn. A radio was plugged into an extension cord, and a sprinkler was on. One girl was getting electrocuted, the other came to help and also succumbed to it. I wondered about that for years, being as they started out on their feet, the electricity had to of taken a path through one foot, passed through the heart and back to the ground on the other foot. Reading the article about fresh water and the path of least resistance kinda cleared that up for me.

Just my thoughts on this matter.
 
Dinasaur said:
I read an article sometime back which gave a lot of clarity to what seems very related to electrocution in water. I am sorry, but I do not recall where I read it so I can neither quote from it or reference it.

It was about GFCI's and boat dock wiring and the dangers of electrocution surrounding that.

As you all well know, electricity takes the path of least resistance. When that path passes the heart it can easily cause death by putting the heart into arrhythmia, where the heart goes out of sync. It takes a very minute amount of electricity passing through the heart to cause this.

The salt water at seaside docks conducts electricity better than the human body, therefor the electricity passes around it. In lake water the human body conducts better than the water so if the person is in the path the electricity passes through the person and is very lethal.

As to the flood waters, they are usually very muddy, dirty, with many electrolytes in it. I would surmise that saves many lives.

In Dumas Texas in 1963 two girls were electrocuted on the lawn. A radio was plugged into an extension cord, and a sprinkler was on. One girl was getting electrocuted, the other came to help and also succumbed to it. I wondered about that for years, being as they started out on their feet, the electricity had to of taken a path through one foot, passed through the heart and back to the ground on the other foot. Reading the article about fresh water and the path of least resistance kinda cleared that up for me.

Just my thoughts on this matter.
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I well know this is not the case.
 
In a related story...

Many years ago when dinosaurs walked the Earth I was in a frat at LSU, and the Greek system there had this massive party every year called "South Seas Island Weekend" where all the frat houses built elaborate sets (like theatre sets) in their yards. A common feature in these sets was some sort of pond made out of sheets of Visqueen surrounded by bales of hay. The house next to ours had such a pond spanned by a rope bridge with structures at the ends made of 2X4's. During the last minute pre-party clearing of tools and scrap from the site, a guy standing knee deep in their pond reached over and picked up a circular saw (the old type made with a metal shell) that was lying on the hay bale next to it. He was electrocuted.
 
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