You’re Grounded, Buddy!

Power went out this morning. Wanna know why?

Little dude decided to short the transformer. Knocked power out on my whole street.

I of course did the red-blooded American thing and went outside and poked him with a stick. Oddly enough the wife doesn’t seem to understand that dead animals and fire pits are two things that need CONSTANT poking with sticks, and I’m one of those good people who is willing to shoulder more than my fair share of the labor.

He actually looks pretty good, all things considered. We had a finch do the same thing last year and it had a strip of feathers blown off and a gaping hole in its neck. The squirrel appears to have severe burns on both paws, snout, and a dab on the chest. Not sure if he got a cross-chest arc, or just generated enough heat through electrical resistance that he flash-fried his brain. Either way he likely was dead before he hit the ground.

The power guy had to tinker with our pole as well as the one at the end of the street.

Neighbor was cooking breakfast and she was pissed that her electric stove had gone cold!

RESIST THE POWER!!!!

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0 Responses to You’re Grounded, Buddy!

  1. Bubblehead Les says:

    Living less than 2 miles from the plant that caused the largest Blackout in U.S. History, plus living on a section of the local grid that was wired into the neighboring town back in the 60’s, so calling City Hall does squat, I don’t have to resist the power. It resists me!

  2. alan says:

    Obviously, that is a throw down squirrel.

    I saw a lineman toss a dead squirrel into his truck once and I asked him why he was collecting roadkill.

    He said, “That’s a throw down squirrel.”

    I said, “huh?”

    He said, “When someone asks why a transformer blew up, you throw that squirrel down on the ground and point to it.”

    • Weerd Beard says:

      You know the corpse disappeared at about the same time the lineman left….Can’t confirm or deny.

      I will say my neighbor and his son were sitting on their porch when Mr. Treerat rode the lightning, and saw him make his final flight.

  3. 45er says:

    “did the red-blooded American thing and went outside and poked him with a stick”

    Oh, if that were only untrue, but alas it is just too true.

  4. guffaw says:

    Years ago, I worked security at a steel foundry, with its own transformer connected to the grid. One night, it blew. BOOM!
    Power gone, lights out.
    We found the cat later…best we could figure, she turned her head into one contact, and pawed the other.
    The result threw her about 100 feet.

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  6. Dave H says:

    Maybe you should quit smearing peanut butter on the transformer?

    Best example of wildlife-induced outages I ever heard was in Colorado. Eagles like to perch on the high tension lines because they’re up high, and crews keep the brush cut away underneath so it’s easy to spot prey.

    [If you’re eating, you might want to stop here.]

    The problem was that eagle poo is gooey ands stringy, so it makes a long dangly thread when it exits the bird. So long that it could string all the way to the ground from a bird perched on a 175,000 volt line. Poof.

    They tried a bunch of solutions, including putting out bait that would modify the texture of the eagles’ by-products. Nothing worked. The final fix was to raise every high-tension line an extra five feet from the ground.

  7. alcade says:

    Actually, Weerd, I believe the red blooded American thing to do would have been to run ballistics tests.

    Found me a dead possum ‘while back. Since I’m not a hunter, it’s essential to find out how my firearms will perform.

    It’s in the name of science.

  8. Old NFO says:

    THAT is why you get gas for stoves and heat 🙂

    • Weerd Beard says:

      Yep we’re all gas here. Love it, both that it works when the lights are out, but also it just cooks better, and cheaper.

      Still I don’t have gas internet….

      • MiniMedic says:

        Heh. Our base housing is fairly new, and they installed as many gas appliances as possible for energy conservations reasons.

        (Yes, the tree-huggers got THAT far into the DoD…)

        I like gas because I know VERY quickly if I’ve left the oven or stovetop on longer than intended…and I’ve done that once or twice with electric!

  9. AuricTech says:

    Resistance is useless!*

    *if less than one Ω

  10. DeadCenter56 says:

    With a burn on the snout I bet he was trying to bite the wires. Little buggers get into the attics around here and eat the wires and occasionally cause house fires.

    Ospreys occasionally build nests on top of our poles and cause the breakers to trip.

    • Weerd Beard says:

      Snout and forelimbs and a little gout on the chest. Looks more like he was climbing on it rather than chewing it.

      But yeah all rodents are natural chewers (they need to as their teeth will never stop growing and need to be filed down often) and they will chew through damn near everything including things VERY bad for their health.

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