Christmas death roulette.

[bigclive]

I'm just going to have a quick rant and clarify something for any labour hire companies wanting to dabble in municipal Christmas lighting in the belief that it's "easy money".

 

Sending casual crew on two one day courses, namely IPAF and the G39 "course" does NOT mean that they have their "street lighting ticket" and it does NOT mean they are electrically qualified.

 

In particular the G39 one-day course ONLY covers the removal and replacement of a cable head fuse in an electrical pillar (as shown below) and a REAL street lighting operative is also expected to have a full City and Guilds electrical installation certification or a recognised equivalent and will have served an apprenticeship or received training while working as a helper with a skilled coworker for several years who will educate the trainee on safe working practices in that area of work.

 

By all means use unskilled crew to simply plug Christmas lights into pre-installed Cee-form sockets on lamp posts. But if you are getting the same crew to do electrical repairs and wiring modifications then you should be aware that if anyone is doing electrical work outdoors then they are in a very well grounded environment and any brief electrical contact will result in much higher current flow through their body than in an indoor environment. Especially when it has been raining.

 

A cherry picker may have rubber wheels, but the rubber is loaded with carbon and the porous surface is very conductive when wet. Likewise the fibreglass bucket on a van-mount access unit usually has a wooden footplate connected to the steel chassis with metal bolts. In wet conditions this will provide a sound electrical connection between the person standing on it, right down through the boom and chassis and onto the road via the stabilisers whether they are in direct contact with the road or on the blocks of wet wood sometimes used under them. Proper (and very expensive) electrical utility industry access units have insulated fibreglass boom sections. But still won't protect from a hand to hand contact. It's also worth adding that rubber soled shoes only insulate when they are dry. The power distribution industry has thick rubber soled dielectric boots which are also only regarded as being safe when dry.

 

So let's talk about "municipal Christmas lights". The majority are basically aluminium frames banged out from cheap factories, complete with sharp welds and rough edges. They generally have a large length of mains voltage plastic tube containing LEDs or tungsten lamps, or they may have long strings of mains LED or tungsten fairy lights stretched across them and strapped onto them tightly with lots of cable ties. Unlike permanently installed electrical equipment they are taken down, piled against each other in vans, stored as heavy piles in the minimum space possible and then thrown into vans and put up again every single year. They get crushed and bent and are then subjected to more abuse in an effort to straighten them out again. The tubes get punctured and water gets in, the strings of lights often get torn apart if they snag while being handled and reveal live strands of wire. The connectors are often chosen for their cheapness and will often physically fail, and the junction boxes will get crushed and cracked.

You do get better quality lights with 24V DC strings of lights on them, but they often still have mains wiring on the panels feeding the transformers.

 

So inevitably when you put these lights up there will be sections that don't work and repairs will be made in situ, noting that the fault may not be clear if a wire has snapped but remained in place even though it has exposed live copper protruding from it. The fault may be intermittent and require "wiggling" of things while powered to help trace it.

 

So there's a road closure deadline or an impending switch-on and because EVERYONE wants their Xmas lights put up at the same time, crews are stretched. They're trying to repair faulty electrical equipment in the dark, the wind and the rain for fear of looking bad. Their feet are wet, their waterproofs are saturated inside and out (noting that designer breathable waterproof materials are not helpful in regards to electrical insulation value) and they're fumbling about with exposed mains wiring that most likely has no RCD protection (water and RCD protection don't mix). If there is an RCD it may have been bypassed by a previous "expert" or it may just be corroded inside and of unknown functionality. Outdoor electronic equipment is prone to corrosion and internal electrical tracking, which means that "off" doesn't always mean completely off.

 

Anyone who works full time with outdoor electrical equipment can tell you how many exciting electrical paths electricity can find due to the fact it takes ALL paths of resistance. Bad wiring, corrosion, faulty equipment. It's a minefield, and if you work professionally in that industry you will quickly learn how to avoid providing a path for fault current through your body. But unskilled workers who do not normally get exposed to that scenario will not realise the gravity of what can happen.

 

When a worker receives a shock they may get lucky and pass enough current to get a sharp tingle or whoosh up their arm, but with no lasting effects. In the right circumstances (greatly increased in wet weather) enough current may flow to cause muscular contraction onto live metalwork. If current flows down through the chest cavity to ground it can not only cause partial (or complete) contraction of the heart muscles, but it will also potentially cause your diaphragm to contract meaning that many people who are electrocuted can't shout for help, but simply make a quiet groaning noise. In that situation your only hope is for someone on the ground to realise the situation and try to get you down, risking a shock if they touch the base of the access unit in the process. Even without getting locked onto metalwork there is also a risk that even a brief pulse of high current through your chest can cause the same loss of muscle sync.

 

Humans have a horrible weakness involving electrical current. The human heart is composed of a lot of separate muscles that contract together in sync to force the blood round your body. When a shock occurs they can be knocked out of sync and the heart can go into a state of ventricular fibrillation. What that means is that with loss of sync the muscles will all twitch and spasm like a DMX rig with corrupted data. The heart requires that they be in sync to work, so it will not pump blood round the body well if at all and death will quickly follow. The only hope is that if people on the ground can get you down and apply fast chest compressions they can keep the blood flowing round your body by basically providing manual operation of your heart. But to reliably get it back in sync it requires the URGENT application of an AED (Automatic External Defibrillator) that will analyse what is left of the heart beat and if possible it will provide a synchronising pulse at a very accurate time in the hearts waveform. It then depends on the rescuers applying ongoing compressions to finish trying to get it back in sync. From the point of the shock to the re-starting of the heart your chances of survival are measured by the second, so if an AED does not get applied quickly then the chance of being saved is low.

 

The aftermath.... If someone is electrocuted in a situation like this, the HSE will want hard proof that they were suitably experienced to be working with what caused their death. They will pursue any qualifications presented and validate their accuracy both in terms of documentation and interviews with co-workers. If it is discovered that a company has employed unskilled operatives to do work beyond their safe abilities then the company directors will potentially be charged with manslaughter and face a period of time in prison and be banned from engaging in similar work in the future. It doesn't matter how much they wring their hands and sob uncontrollably because the person they killed was a "lovely person". The HSE doesn't do "sympathy".

 

And in the aftermath EVERYONE gets hammered with MORE red tape and "certifications" including the companies that were providing their guys with full training and a safe work environment. Basically everything gets aimed at the lowest denominator, much as it has in the construction industry.

 

So I wonder who's going to be playing roulette this Christmas.

 

http://i280.photobucket.com/albums/kk164/bigclivedotcom/dno.jpg

[alistermorton]

<applause>

[laseranger]

<applause>

 

And another Well said!!!!

[Stuart91]

In smaller towns, the issue often isn't crewing companies putting lights up, it's a collection of well-meaning locals who organise the displays and put them up themselves.

 

We come across a couple which seem very well organised (one run with military precision by an ex-navy officer) but I imagine many others will be far more slapdash.

 

Is there a "Dummies Guide" anywhere that people could be pointed to if they are thinking of taking something like this on? A concise summary of some of the points Clive makes above could be very helpful. The problem usually is that people aren't aware of what they don't know, and might be assuming that their rubber soled shoes will render them immune to shocks. Having the risks explained properly might be enough to prevent some of the them undertaking hazardous tasks that they're completely unqualified for.

[themadhippy]

And there was me expecting a sweep stake on which well known celebs would be shuffling off there mortal coil over the festive period

[alistermorton]

And there was me expecting a sweep stake on which well known celebs would be shuffling off there mortal coil over the festive period

 

Admittedly that was my first thought, too.

[Stuart91]

This would be a great idea for a reality show - where C-list celebs are forced to rig Christmas lights in the pouring rain. Whoever goes the longest without being electrocuted wins.

[bigclive]

In smaller towns, the issue often isn't crewing companies putting lights up, it's a collection of well-meaning locals who organise the displays and put them up themselves.

 

We come across a couple which seem very well organised (one run with military precision by an ex-navy officer) but I imagine many others will be far more slapdash.

 

Is there a "Dummies Guide" anywhere that people could be pointed to if they are thinking of taking something like this on? A concise summary of some of the points Clive makes above could be very helpful. The problem usually is that people aren't aware of what they don't know, and might be assuming that their rubber soled shoes will render them immune to shocks. Having the risks explained properly might be enough to prevent some of the them undertaking hazardous tasks that they're completely unqualified for.

 

 

In these situations the groups involved usually have the local council install suitably protected Ceeform sockets in the location of the lights and simply plug them in. Or if electrical work is done it is usually by a group member who is an actual electrician, usually with a background in outdoor work.

 

What I'm really saying above is that sending casual crew on a one day fuse pulling demonstration and then announcing that they have their "street lighting ticket" is like sending them on a one day first aid course and then announcing to customers that they have their doctors ticket.

 

At best it's deceiving customers, at worst it results in the Dunning Kruger effect where the local crew actually believe they are electrical experts.

[ianknight]

This would be a great idea for a reality show - where C-list celebs are forced to rig Christmas lights in the pouring rain. Whoever goes the longest without being electrocuted wins.

 

Now that's an idea for a programme - anyone know someone at Love Productions - they might be looking for a new hit? :P

[Brian]

From the point of the shock to the re-starting of the heart your chances of survival are measured by the second, so if an AED does not get applied quickly then the chance of being saved is low.

 

It's a sobering thought that the survival rate for 'normal' heart attacks, outside of a clinical setting, is somewhat less than 1 in 10.

 

Working under the conditions Clive describes is like signing your own death warrant.

[djw1981]

Brian,

 

Just to be clear - I assume you are referring to cardiac arrests, not heart attacks there. The survival rate for a heart attack / MI is much higher than 10%, whereas for an out of hospital cardiac arrest it is, as you say much nearer 7%.

 

Sorry - pet topic from my day job.

[Brian]

Sorry - pet topic from my day job.

 

 

Thanks.