Heathrow shut down

[mrmistoffelees]

Two of my staff were due to fly out to the US told them to expense themselves a decent hotel, food and drink for the next couple of days until we can work out when they’re flying

[jfman]

Have we blamed the Russians yet so we can conscript the newly found to be not disabled young to the front line?

Originally Posted by jfman

Have we blamed the Russians yet so we can conscript the newly found to be not disabled young to the front line?

I think in this case, the Russians probably knew the entire thing could be brought down by taking one substation offline, and decided it was better to hold on to that information until they could use it.

My suspicion is that we have been the victims of our own gross institutional complacency. Again.

---------- Post added at 20:37 ---------- Previous post was at 20:31 ----------

(Edit) and on that note, I think Crawley Borough Council needs a gun held to its corporate head while it signs planning consent for Gatwick’s second runway, to be built and commissioned preferably 25 years ago.

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by jfman

Have we blamed the Russians yet so we can conscript the newly found to be not disabled young to the front line?

no it was some guy who plugged in a fast charging Chinese car and blew the crap out of the substation

Originally Posted by jfman

Have we blamed the Russians yet so we can conscript the newly found to be not disabled young to the front line?

Congratulations - you just beat Pierre…

Originally Posted by Hugh

Wow, that’s impressive - I haven’t seen that big a stretch since Saturday 1st February 1975, at RAF Cosford.

That was Geoff Capes warming up for the Shot Put at the U.K. Indoor Athletic Championships…

[Pierre]

The questions have to be:

1. Why doesn’t Heathrow airport have its own secure power supply? Seperatec from the local DNO

2. Or, if not that, why doesn’t it have its own emergency generators?

Two simple questions for a vital hub.

I mean that’s it really.

It does have its own generators, and they kicked in.

Heathrow uses as much energy as a small city, so it is not possible for it to have the back-up power by itself to run its operation safely.

A source at Heathrow said it did however have back-up options for certain key systems, but kickstarting the alternative power supplies for the whole airport took time.

The systems need to be checked to ensure they are working properly.

A Heathrow source said its back-up diesel generators and uninterruptable power supplies in place all operated as expected.

The problem lay with the National Grid, the source said, pointing out thousands of homes had been left without power, not just the airport.

The transformers in the substation drop the HV (275kV) down to a lower voltage (110kV).
They get very hot during this process and use [flammable] cooling oils.
I presume there is a reason to use flammable oils, but they are basically a fire waiting to happen.

A dodgy geezer I used to know, who ran heavy plant, explained it to me once, while he was telling me how you can use transformer oil as a substitute for diesel (thus evading duty) but that you have to add something to it as it doesn’t lubricate the engine sufficiently well by itself. I can’t remember the details (and I never did put transformer oil in my car, nor did I ever call it ‘tranny oil’ as he did ).

I think it has something to do with the fact that it has to sit inside a sealed system for an extremely long time without causing corrosion, and needs also to be an electrical insulator. As long as it stays where it’s supposed to be it can’t combust, but a risk of using oils in transformers is that if the transformer’s casing fails in some way and the oil leaks, then it can cause a fire.

If this wasn’t the Russians (and I don’t think it was, if they knew the could cause this much chaos with one act of vandalism they’d surely have held on to the info until they really needed it); and it wasn’t random vandalism (which would seem unlikely seeing as you would risk killing yourself before getting anywhere near the bit that caught fire) … then we’re looking at poor maintenance as a potential cause. I don’t want to prejudge the inevitable inquiry but, let’s face it, none of us would be surprised at that would we.

[Hom3r]

Well With a minor 30 min delay she's in the air and currently over Canada.


Just another 4.5 hours left, I just love flightradar 24

My bro-in-law was told by BA they couldn’t fly him back till mid next week, but they agreed to refund him that leg of his flight if he re-booked himself on another flight - he’s booked on an Air Canada flight to to Heathrow (at a, and I quote, "extortionate price", but he just wants to get home).

[Hom3r]

Well she took off 45 mins late, but landed 30 mins late.

[Mr K]

Originally Posted by Hom3r

Well she took off 45 mins late, but landed 30 mins late.

They always build in extra time for flights to allow for small delays, and make the passengers impressed if they arrive 'early'.
It also limits delay compensation claims.

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Hugh

Congratulations - you just beat Pierre…

Crazy thing about that comment is that my youngest son has just had a call up letter to report to the nearest TA centre for an interview about training. He's X commandos. He's not the only one ether.

---------- Post added at 12:22 ---------- Previous post was at 12:20 ----------

Originally Posted by papa smurf

no it was some guy who plugged in a fast charging Chinese car and blew the crap out of the substation

I wondered when EV's would come into it

[thenry]

The failure was "most likely" caused by moisture entering the equipment, according to the report.

National Grid, which owns the substation, missed two opportunities to prevent the failure, experts found, the first in 2018 when a higher-than-expected level of moisture was found in oil samples.

in 2022 when basic maintenance was postponed.

https://news.sky.com/story/catastrop...nt-it-13391266

Where are the jobs if jobs aren't being completed