Multiple Power Outages and Explosion in Central IL (10/11/15)

Last night in central Illinois (near Peoria,) at exactly 11:11pm, the all the power to my friends neighborhood went down for about four seconds. Two of us were outside around a small bonfire and had just been joking about how it's 11:11 on Oct 11 and suddenly: blackout... and then everything came right back on.

This happened once more in exactly the same way a few hours later; and once again shortly after that, but the third outage coincided with a loud explosion off in the distance. It would have been about 4:00AM at that point. My friend and I have no explanation. The skies were clear and there was virtually no wind at all.

I've done a search of the local news agencies and outage reports for some reason for the brief blackouts, but to no avail. Same story for the explosion...

I wasn't going to post a thread about this except that I noticed this thread which describes an unknown explosion in LA last night at *approximately* the same time. I wanted to submit this report to the forum for speculation, corroboration and/or explanation by someone more knowledgeable in terms of power grids, blackouts etc.

Thank you for reading and all input is welcome.

a reply to: Aqualung2012

It is most likely something perfectly benign like a transformer blew or caught fire..

In Philly I can tell you of a power outage that took out about 5 blocks last summer, mine being one of them, for roughly 3 hours in the summer because a transformer on a pole blew..

Within the past month their was a fire in a box downtown that dropped power in a few buildings on the main street through Center City .

Power comes on, power goes off and power fails.. Really anytime anything that is subjective to grounding, overheating, some other element like that will eventually fail.

a reply to: opethPA

I'm inclined to agree that it's most likely a transformer issue, except I would guess that if this were the case; the explosion would have came right along with the first outage, not shortly after the third... But alas, I am ignorant to the workings of the power grid.

I've never seen anything like it personally: where there is a lapse in power for a few seconds and then returns for a couple hours, then off again, on again and then *boom!*

I do agree that it's likely something as simple as a faulty transformer... although still unusual.

Thanks, and Opeth rules!

If you saw the power blinking out in an entire neighborhood and than an explosion and power going out, that is an exploding transformer. The prior blinking would be the transformer trying to recycle the power I believe before it becomes overloaded. Once it can't handle the load....Ka-blooey!

originally posted by: Aqualung2012
a reply to: opethPA

I'm inclined to agree that it's most likely a transformer issue, except I would guess that if this were the case; the explosion would have came right along with the first outage, not shortly after the third... But alas, I am ignorant to the workings of the power grid.

Actually, that is exactly how it happens.

a reply to: Rosinitiate

Sounds more than reasonable to be sure, but it wasn't necessarily what I would describe as "blinking." It was a sharp and solid "out" for about four or five seconds, then back on for a few hours. The second time was the same as the first, and the third was *followed* by the explosion, after which the power remained on for the rest of the night.

That's what strikes me as being so odd... If the transformer finally gave way and exploded: wouldn't the power go out completely until it was either fixed or the electricity rerouted or something?

originally posted by: Aqualung2012
a reply to: Rosinitiate

Sounds reasonable to be sure. It really wasn't necessarily what I would describe as "blinking," though. It was a sharp and solid "out" for about four or five seconds, then back for a few hours. The second time was the same, and the third was *followed* by the explosion, after which the power remained on for the rest of the night. That's what struck me as being so odd.

A fault or short in the transformer. The explosion is The arc blast when it becomes overloaded but the prior blinking was the transformer still attempting to handle the load.

To be more clear...from foggy memory, a fault created a surge to the transformer, the transformer send that load back or to ground fault so it can continue to function properly, but whatever was causing the short (maybe a squirrel, poor guy) kept sending tremendous loads to the transformer. It got too hot to handle and exploded from the excessive heat.

So it's possible for the power to stay on after the transformer fails/shorts and creates an arc blast?

(Not being argumentative, just following through with my question, I do appreciate your knowledge of the subject.)

originally posted by: Aqualung2012
So it's possible for the power to stay on after the transformer fails/shorts and creates an arc blast?

(Not being argumentative, just following through with my question, I do appreciate your knowledge of the subject.)

Yes, after reading my post I noticed I wasn't that clear. I edited it above.

a reply to: Rosinitiate

Thanks for your efforts in explaining the issue. I still don't understand how power could go on uninterrupted *after* the transformer ultimately exploded, but it's alright I won't push the question since you've already answered it.

originally posted by: Aqualung2012
a reply to: Rosinitiate

Thanks for your efforts in explaining the issue. I still don't understand how power could go on uninterrupted *after* the transformer ultimately exploded, but it's alright I won't push the question since you've already answered it.

Honestly, I'd need to know more too. but a transformer can become overloaded and still function after it sends the load somewhere, it can't however continue to handle multiple surges. And electricity moves in a wave and happens so fast that it's literally instantaneous (speed of light and all that) but if something is causing a short, like a squirrel over two lines, using OHM's law, or Kirchoff's law, I've had a couple but you can figure out the amps of the surge. Once the transformer tries to protect the circuit by sending the surge load either back where it came or into a ground (displacing it into the ground) it will try to function normally. If the load it sent back hits the short again and cycles back, the same thing takes place until the transformer can no longer handle the heat and than explode.

If you had power on after the explosion it was from another supply source.

Someone might be on to either correct myself or better explain it.