Author - Scott McCoy

Submitted By - IBEW Lineman  Non-reclosing on a station breaker is not sufficient protection for lineman in the air or on the ground.While reconductoring a circuit fed directly out of a substation in CT, the tail of a 556 covered AL wire got the better of the lineman positioned in the air to lower it to the ground. The tail of the new primary swung into a phase, that was thought to be beyond our reach,  of a 13800 circuit below new primary being installed. The result was about a 5 second show of the monster. The lineman in the air tried to break the arc by pulling the grounded conductor away from the energized ciruit below, but that only made things worse. His only option was to drop the conductor to the ground break the arc which would not let up.