20 Jul
2006
20 Jul
'06
4:30 p.m.
Reminds me of one of my worst memories on the big iron systems. Had a
computer that was on the top floor. The building maintenance people =
were
running the grounding cable on the lightning rod down to the earth rod..
And discovered this wonderful cable channel that carried the power from =
the
basement MGs up to the main frame power supplies. The inevitable =
happened
and a lightning bolt took out all the supplies on the entire system. =
The
overvoltage crowbars saved most of the logic. But the lightning =
literally
vaporized the power cables, and the MG was a big piece of toast.
Nobody was punished - the union said that there were no guidelines =
stating
this was a bad thing. And common sense seems to be a rare commodity.
So presumably those people who install cables (we call them
'electricians' over here normally) don't actually have to know the
behaviour of electricity. Or that lightening is a fast, high voltage,
high current, pulse that will get anywhere given half a chance. And so
it's best to keep it well away from everything else.
Tell me, are there any guidelines about connectings these idiots' private
parts to the output of that MG set? If not, do so :-)
-tony