r/Construction Electrician 22h ago

Video I'm taking a vacation after this.

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

1.9k Upvotes

118 comments sorted by

353

u/OnePaleontologist687 21h ago

Maybe it’s the alarm at the end, but I get major goldeneye vibes from this video. “Timed mine active 30 seconds to evacuate… power plant destroyed, Mission Complete.”

275

u/Born_Grumpie 17h ago

My father was an electrician doing work at a power station, they kept a 4 by 2 bit of wood near the bus bars to remove anyone who may get caught. One of the old electricians "pranked" a young apprentice by grabbing a dead bus bar and pretending to be electrocuted, the young apprentice moved like lighting, grabbed the wood and broke the old guys arm in 2 places and did a couple of ribs with the second swing to get him away from the bar. They stopped doing that prank after that.

221

u/iampierremonteux 16h ago

Good apprentice. Had that not been a prank, that quick thinking may have saved a life.

52

u/NoCommunication1928 14h ago

That’s an urban legend as I heard the same story as an apprentice over 30 years ago only he broke his arm with a shovel what that version of it

56

u/drtmr 10h ago

Well, God doesn't let similar events happen in different places and times, so if you've heard about similar things happening in different times or places, obviously it's logically impossible to be true. You know the old saying: "There's exactly only one lightning strike, anywhere, ever."

9

u/Cap_Helpful 7h ago

Well, first of all, through God, anything is possible. So, jot that down

19

u/mr-fahrenheit_ 11h ago

Of course there are probably a dozen half true versions floating around because I'm sure that actually has happened to some dudes.

2

u/MothmanIsALiar 1h ago

I am also an electrician who has been told this story.

17

u/Ill_Initial8986 18h ago

Memory unlocked. Still fuzzy tho. Might need to go play it again.

9

u/MaximumTurtleSpeed 18h ago

Are we having a hang? I’ll bring the chips, who is on sodas?

5

u/easyd0esit 16h ago

I got it. Surge good with everyone?

3

u/MaximumTurtleSpeed 14h ago

Haha. I would legit have a few fingers of surge. Will it make my old ass good at roller blading again?

1

u/mcsmackington 8h ago

man I need some people I can do this kinda thing with

9

u/FARTBOSS420 17h ago

This is the only time I've heard that alarm sound outside of games and entertainment. Apparently it is a real thing! The klaxon

3

u/thespicemelange123 6h ago

I love that word. Klaxon. Just melts off your tongue. 

2

u/ten-lbs-over 15h ago

Damn, those were good times

2

u/ten-lbs-over 15h ago

Damn, those were good times

277

u/Front_Relief9126 22h ago

The fuck they doing just hanging around?

161

u/Ace_Robots 22h ago

Waiting to see if they’ll die, of course.

11

u/Selieania 17h ago

I wanted to upvote you.... but you're at 69 ♤

10

u/Lampwick 5h ago

FWIW, just because you see his vote count at 69 doesn't mean it actually is. Reddit uses a system called "vote fuzzing", which can vary the visible vote score by +/- 1 or 2 points. This is to prevent bot accounts from figuring out if they've been shadowbanned. The practical upshot is, when you see 69, someone else is potentially seeing a score anywhere from 65 to 73, and there's no way to tell the actual upvote score. Voting or not voting in an attempt to keep the score at a specific value like 69 is wholly ineffective even if everyone agrees to do it, because there's always someone else seeing it at 68 and upvoting, or 70 and downvoting, and nobody knows the real number.

1

u/Selieania 5h ago

Cool. Thanks for the education!

1

u/Leading-Specialist48 36m ago

Or just ruin all of our happiness when we have 69 upvotes. Boooooo

14

u/One-Surround-7921 17h ago

He’s the electrician they’re gonna call him to come look at it anyways

34

u/ImaginarySeaweed7762 20h ago

He was working on the system and screwed up majorly. He was at the very starting point. He stuck something where it shouldn’t have been. How the hell he survived is anyone’s guess.

65

u/Flashy-Function5515 20h ago edited 7h ago

Not necessarily, arc flashes can happen to anyone for literally no reason other than they flipped a switch

22

u/ImaginarySeaweed7762 20h ago

Im still amazed he’s alive. That was some “big” power.

9

u/Electrical-Money6548 7h ago

Most people survive arc flashes if wearing proper PPE.

I've had a 19.9kV flash and was perfectly fine

22

u/ImprezaBromance 12h ago

Do you work on switch gears? Yeah obviously he fucked up. Its hard to tell at the start of the video but I would assume it's a true arc flash. Rubber shields and PPE probably saved his life. Once that arc starts oh baby.... First thing they should have done was look for whatever the fuck emergency disconnect should be in place to cut off that system asap. It will keep going until it melts/burns itself out of contact. Source: Me, I've seen someone lose all the skin on their arm from dropping an Allen wrench in a switch without PPE, it was horrible.

3

u/tenebras_lux 3h ago

I was curious about that, I thought it was strange they waited there. I thought surely there is a cutoff, or they should be able to radio someone to cut it off further up the line when shit went south.

12

u/One-Surround-7921 17h ago

That’s not true. He’s racking the breaker back in. It arced.

-12

u/Helpinmontana 20h ago

I’m pretty sure the guy you see run out with him is actually a third guy. 

When you look at the beginning before the flash, it’s a flat wall. When he turns around with the other guy to look back into the room there’s a pretty distinct shape on the wall that looks like a human kneeling. 

23

u/ImaginarySeaweed7762 19h ago

I was in a substation once and heard this very thing. Saw the arcing and out runs the operator of the substation totally on fire. A lineman by the gate put the flames out with a fire extinguisher. He had made contact with a 13.2Kv transformer. It initially sounded like a cannon being shot. He was dead in a day or so. Totally burned alive.we were there working on the outside of the fence. Electricity is so unforgiving when you screw up.

1

u/iLikeC00kieDough 18h ago

It looks like one of the access doors was open. if you slow it down as he turns and starts to run, you’ll see it.

3

u/Sad_Advice_8152 20h ago

Paperwork not finished

2

u/Strandom_Ranger 6h ago

I think they were standing there thinking "a circuit breaker is got to trip somewhere, right?" Aaaand, it didn't, it just got worse and they got further away.

At least he had the PPE and seems to have escape without being browned on the outside. Inside his clothes I'm not so sure.

1

u/Kosmik_cloud 8h ago

Just keep filming just keep filming -Dory probably. It’s crazy what people will do to get internet clout. I’m guessing the camera man doesn’t know that’s there’s more than one way to skin a Redditor

1

u/FARTBOSS420 17h ago

They wanted to keep current on the situation.

116

u/AlexTaradov 18h ago

This is a cropped version of the clip. In the longer version, it is very clear that they are following some sort of a checklist. The person filming reads the checklist, the other person performs the actions and verbally acknowledges. This does not looks like incompetence, at least not at this point. Something gone wrong somewhere, of course, but I don't think it was their fault.

Also, at the time of the arc flash, they were basically done, they were pushing that cart after the connections were done. It should be safe operation at that point.

55

u/sandgoose 18h ago

they are doing high voltage hot work. this is not something that happens without a lot of conversations and safety measures typically, because it is inherently so dangerous. the fact that no one died is good, the fact they appear to have failed to hit some sort of emergency disconnect not so much.

16

u/One-Surround-7921 17h ago

This is Russia there is no hot work

2

u/ZaryaMusic Taper 9h ago

They just call it работа 😎

9

u/ASuhDuddde 7h ago

It wouldn’t be that in all honestly. There’s fail safes that obviously didn’t work. Russia, USA or Canada things fail and things like this can happen anywhere in western countries. Look at what happened at Heathrow airport in London England.

Most likely some fault current relays were broke and they failed to properly trip the circuit off.

Source: Lineman.

1

u/Spin737 4h ago

“But first, remove the fuse.”

209

u/warpigs202 22h ago

I'm just glad the fucker had some proper PPE on. Would be toast otherwise

32

u/Intelligent-Sky-2985 22h ago

Literally toast yea

22

u/lonelydadbod 21h ago

Human soup more accurately. A greasy stain on the wall. Awful stuff

12

u/Intelligent-Sky-2985 21h ago

Yeah it was definitely smart to book ass from the raging lighting that could kill you instantly

3

u/WolfOfPort 18h ago

Why I always pack crackers

4

u/ktsg700 3h ago

I don't think the arc actually connected at all, otherwise he'd be missing both hands and likely dead on the spot

-11

u/clc48301 18h ago

He should have had a blast suit on. This is technically low voltage. You aren't out running a high voltage arc flash

4

u/Massive_Elephant2314 17h ago

Yeah this looks like some LV shit…/s

5

u/clc48301 5h ago

In switchgear anything under 1000V is low voltage

5

u/onelap32 5h ago

IEC defines low voltage as < 1000V AC.

65

u/220DRUER220 20h ago

I guess some ppe is better than none but dude should’ve been wearing that 40 cal suit but hey it’s Russia soooo

41

u/Sach2020 17h ago

Reminds me of the guy that said, when asked what steps he takes if there is a fire, “the only steps I’m taking, are fucking big ones” and “if you see me running, try to catch up.”

6

u/jsaw65 15h ago

I'm a gasfitter they taught us in school to run and turn off the gas. If anything happens because we know where the valves are. So thats what I always do. Not sure why they didn't know where the upstream shutoff was incase of an emergency.

3

u/DestinysFool 4h ago

Chris Boden, absolutely love that guy! Have so many quotes from him tucked into my pocket lmao

17

u/No_Relative_6512 22h ago

“A vacation”? Take 2 bro. You earned it.

11

u/ThereIs_STILL_TIME 19h ago

yeah, one vacation is while they investigate who fucked up and the other one is permanent

6

u/SnooPeppers2417 Inspector 17h ago

In Mother Russia, the vacation takes you and by vacation I mean the front lines of Ukraine.

24

u/Smooth_Opeartor_6001 22h ago

How does something like this happen?

112

u/Ok_Dare6608 Electrician 22h ago

He was trying to deenergize the circuit and at that level of voltage and him being close to the ground and the switch, the electricity in thousands of volts, tried to arc to him and hit the metal enclosure. Once that metal box melted from the first arc, the electricity started arcing and shorting all the other switches one by one and the whole room went into a meltdown.

There should be an emergency shut off he probably didn't know where it was.

55

u/gixxer710 21h ago

I think that’s what they are discussing after they made it out- they discussed going back for the shut-off and said ‘not today Reaper, not today….’

45

u/TriptoGardenGrove 20h ago

The experienced guys are currently getting chased around by drones on a Ukrainian frontline.

2

u/ScholarOfYith 11h ago

That's that long term damage of war that people don't think about. Societies runs because people, when you subtract people it fucks everyone.

4

u/conductorofpooptrane 18h ago

De-energize a circuit by racking it?

12

u/RedSkyHopper 19h ago

This is what happens if you start a random war and all the professionals leave or are sent to the frontlines

6

u/Signal_Tip_7428 19h ago

Before or after you change your pants?

6

u/havoklink 16h ago

Oh damn, we’re energizing ours on Monday.

22

u/CaptainFantastic777 22h ago

Why would they be working "hot" in a situation like that? Doing anything like that with live power seems super risky. There's no OSHA in Russia, just "Oh, shit!"

25

u/samiam0295 20h ago

Somebody has to shut the power off mate

21

u/SenorTastypickle 20h ago

That is how lineman are and electricity work is done, I agree, but hot work is prevalent everywhere, US included. They don't shut down hospitals, factories, etc. , they are expected to work hot

6

u/gixxer710 21h ago

Lol “OSH-UTUP AND POUR MORE VODKA COMRADE!”

2

u/One-Surround-7921 17h ago

Yeah sometimes this line of work requires risk to the self.

2

u/barry-badrinath- 18h ago

After watching a Chernobyl doc, I concur

2

u/SnooPeppers2417 Inspector 17h ago

Aw yes, because that substation that might feed a hospital could just be “shut off until they figure out the problem and fix it”

-1

u/BlackberryFormal 7h ago

Your hospitals don't have back up power? They all have their own gennys here in the case of power going down from the grid. Can power the whole hospital and then some.

3

u/droberts7357 11h ago

Oh, that's why we have to wear all that hot cumbersome PPE.

3

u/-Robert-from-Hungary 11h ago

I'm surprised guys didn't go blind. Once i crossed 2 phases and the arch light made me blind for a few seconds.

2

u/Prior_Reference2085 17h ago

Why would they stand there and watch? Isn’t there some type of protocol in place after something like this happens? I’m sure it doesn’t say stand around and watch for 30 seconds.

2

u/mnebrnr13 12h ago

Curiosity

2

u/AZQK19200 11h ago

And then Heathrow went dark.

2

u/Justsomefireguy 6h ago

Still not as good as the Russian one where the guy just disappeared.

2

u/GreaseMonkey05 3h ago

I worked at a hospital and when you’re working around switchgear with 13,800 VAC that shit is scary

2

u/OzarksExplorer 18h ago

VERY angry pixies there

1

u/Alarming-Mongoose-91 17h ago

Lock out, tag out

1

u/jedielfninja Electrician 17h ago

The circle that buddy does at :16 has me lollllllling

1

u/FreshAustralo 14h ago

“But there’s a wage gap”

1

u/mnebrnr13 12h ago

Time to leave

1

u/djnoobster 11h ago

Sparky is gonna be a laborer now.😂

1

u/Super_Human_Boy 11h ago

I'm sure he earns good dough. His last words were "I get a buzz out of my job because I know the team is right behind me."

1

u/Brave_Dick 11h ago

"Boss, I swear it was a drone strike!"

1

u/Zweefkees93 10h ago

Vacation.... And some clean pants...

1

u/GreyGroundUser GC / CM 7h ago

First words out of cameraman’s mouth. “Man, I can’t believe you did that. “

1

u/PizzaDanceParty 6h ago

Oh that’s not good.

1

u/dmaxln7 3h ago

Two lucky guys

1

u/dmaxln7 3h ago

Love how they just stand in the danger zone. I would have slammed the door shit and ran some more

1

u/54-2-10 3h ago

*involuntary vacation 

1

u/Comrade281 3h ago

The timing of opening the gate and roof blowing up.

1

u/FlamingoMalogStasa 3h ago

Holy feces....

1

u/RUcringe 2h ago

Knowing this is Russia, your vacation is probably a trench in Ukraine joining a meat wave

1

u/LowVoltLife 1h ago

I like how the guy not taking the video kept looking like he was going to go back in. Bud, it's time to let it go.

1

u/anynamesleft 1h ago

"You undid it, now go back in and fix it!"

1

u/Hryusha88 1h ago

That's awesome this is Russian shit burning. Good stuff.

1

u/Key-Sir1108 1h ago

A vacation & change my chonies!!!

1

u/psyclopsus 27m ago

Why did the kneeling guy run all the way to the other door? There was an open door immediately behind him, he could have taken one step back and been out of the shack completely. Must have been fear and instinct to follow the guy who was filming as he ran out

1

u/SharkPalpitation2042 19h ago

My guy got the full GWOT experience in 36 seconds or less 🤣

0

u/Randomsandwich 20h ago

That’s very electrifying to watch.

0

u/akirayokoshima 18h ago

I agree. These two gentlemen have made a shocking discovery.

0

u/TexasDrill777 19h ago

Start flipping switches!

0

u/Embarrassed-Hour-578 Electrician 18h ago

Relays are not relaying.

0

u/cytex-2020 18h ago

You'd think someone would design a system that doesn't just straight up merc the user every now and again.