1y ago

Live: Tens of thousands lose power amid outages across Northland, Far North

www.rnz.co.nz

Updates: Tens of thousands lose power amid outages across Northland, Far North

I've never seen an entire tower fall over like that, that's kinda terrifying.

22 comments

Yeah, that’s not very typical, I’d like to make that point.
- It's not supposed to look like that
  
  Well the front is not supposed to fall off.
I’ve never seen an entire tower fall over like that, that’s kinda terrifying.
Me neither! I wonder what caused it. Looks like maybe some bolts came off the feet? Since normally there would be huge concrete pads that they are connected to.
- There are, I guess, 4 tower feet, they are very big structures. So my guess is that the "workers" were told remove the leg bolts, sand-blast the foot, then renew the bolts.
  "Now guys, I’m off for a smoko, have it done before I’m back". "OK guv".
  Instead of doing it one foot at a time, the obvious method, the "workers" then rush off, "Hey Mick, you do leg one, Jim you do leg 2, Manuel you do leg 3, Franco you do leg 4". "OK let’s go".
  In 10 minutes all the bolts are removed, the wind picks up, the lateral force on the cables increases and bang, down she goes.
  
  Haha who put the project manager in charge 😆
  
  Reading the updated story, it definitely sounds like poor procedures.
- Apparently there's some rumours going around that they were doing some maintenance work on the pole when it happened. Don't know how true it is though.
- Rusted to hell, would be my guess.
  
  Yeah, that's a good guess. I presume they do regular inspections, so it would be interesting to know how this got missed.
  
  One update said there was no corrosion damage. That was my guess, too. The mystery continues! Maybe eroding soil?
Happened when my phone was on 5% so no internet for me for a couple of days. I'd forgotten how much I like candlelight.

22 comments