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Another Transformer Fire Knocks Out Power in Southern California

Power Protection FEATURED ARTICLE

Another Transformer Fire Knocks Out Power in Southern California

 
September 25, 2015

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  By Joe Rizzo, Contributing Writer

According to Los Angeles’ Manhattan Beach Police Department, over 5,000 homes lost power when a downed transformer at 11th Street and Poinsettia Avenue, caused an outage. This also brought down a 16,000-volt power line on the block, which unfortunately was the cause of a subsequent electrical fire.


The outage was reported around 8:30 on Sunday night, September 20. Southern California Edison (News - Alert) (SCE) quickly showed up at the scene where an official stated that initially a little over 5,600 customers were listed as being without power in connection with the downed transformer. Due to the fact that the power line was still energized, firefighters had a delay while SCE workers turned off the power, their first priority.

But Manhattan Beach was not the only outage of the night. Montebello, which is about 30 miles inland from Manhattan Beach, reported a transformer exploding about an hour and a half earlier around 7 p.m., in one of its residential neighborhoods. The power surge from the first transformer caused several other transformers to also explode, knocking out power to more than 1,100 SCE customers in the area.

Between the two transformer issues and fires it was estimated by SCE that about 7,700 customers were without power at some point between Sunday evening, September 20 and Monday afternoon, the 21st. SCE crews worked overnight at all the affected areas in an attempt to minimize the down time. SCE stated that by 10 o’clock Monday morning, power was completely restored to both locations.

It seems this summer has been playing havoc with California’s power transformers. Twice in July, on the 15th and the 30th, underground transformer vaults in the Long Beach area exploded. Of course it does not help that California has been experiencing record breaking high temperatures this year.

According to the National Weather Service, on September 20, record high temperatures were posted in Long Beach (99 degrees), Woodland Hills (104 degrees), Camarillo (91 degrees) and Bob Hope Airport (104 degrees).

This brings up what appears to be an ongoing problem for residents and businesses in these, as well as other areas. Regardless of the time of day, when the power goes out, there is no telling when it will be restored. The question that needs to be asked is what can be done to try to save as much information and equipment during situations such as this.

Connecting your more sensitive equipment and data storage devices to an uninterruptable power supply (UPS), such as those provided by Minuteman Power Technologies, could save a lot of money and headaches.

A lot of equipment today is designed to know when it is running on battery power as opposed to being plugged in. Regardless of whether it is for business or home, having a reliable UPS to maintain crucial equipment, data and peace of mind seems to be a logical move.




Edited by Rory J. Thompson
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