Kitz Forum
Chat => Chit Chat => Topic started by: S.Stephenson on September 13, 2016, 08:27:03 PM
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I've turned off both my modems today to make sure DLM doesn't come for me :fingers:
Storm seems to be across most of Lancashire and West Yorkshire at the moment, got some good footage but the affect on the broadband isn't nice :(
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That was a massive Storm for sure the maxim event was at 20:00
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Looking at that map, I see that Kitz, Black Sheep and Apollo11cdr (now finally with a working connection (http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,18455.msg333089.html#msg333089)) will have been right in the storm's path. :o
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Despite my efforts im in the red, hopefully it should register as a wide area event :fingers:
It pretty much reached red just because of error between 6-7pm I shut it off a soon as I noticed it was about as bright as day outside.
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Even my line seen a few CRC errors on this line and the T/Storm center was 171 Miles from my location time to get pair swap picking up storms and radio china from long distances ;)
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I love storms as it freshens the air, cools things down, leics is very muggy and hot.
However for dsl its obviously a nightmare.
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I got 2081 DS errored seconds between 6-7pm and only noticed because of how bright the light was outside, and it just got worse from then on I should have left it on to try and beat my old errored seconds record.
It was great to watch lightning jumping in the clouds at least it gave me an excuse to stop working :D
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Nice sunny calm day up here. Slept all day. Plague of wasps last night and early morning.
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Was great here during the day just got a bit electricy late in the afternoon, Lancashire however had terrential rain :lol: thanks Pennines
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I am in South Yorkshire and my grandfather's line got hit by the storm massively. He lives about a kilometre from me line of sight. Images attached show the impact. Luckily I hadn't yet changed the 12dB SNRM that was applied to his ADSL2+ line, so it didn't cause a resync. Also, it doesn't matter as much as he is on TTB LLU, so DLM doesn't exist as such. ;D
(https://i.gyazo.com/4a5e1d47f52e8ece34d32c88a7f5ec65.png)
(https://i.gyazo.com/81ed649237e4bf5272bd7ddde620c774.png)
(https://i.gyazo.com/3d0287a9a72c0396511588cb8689dbd7.png)
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Are you getting loads of daddy long legs flys in the evening have never seen so many on are walls in my lifetime and in the morning the floor is covered with with dead ones ???
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Last summer you had the wasps. This late summer the crane-flies . . . I wonder what it will be next summer? A plague of locusts or frogs, may be? :-X
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Last summer you had the wasps. This late summer the crane-flies . . . I wonder what it will be next summer? A plague of locusts or frogs, may be? :-X
I can deal with locusts and frogs but not wasps have killed over 70+ using fly spray killer in just the PC room this year that's a record, I have nothing against Wasps they just fly to close to my face and ears and chase me when I run away >:(
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I have trap jars with honey or jam in them plus water
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Sorry to hear about the storm, but met office forecast a lovely day, and this evening confirmed at had indeed been a lovely day, so I suspect there must have been some other explanation for all these events. ::)
Ref wildlife, so far this year have already dealt with a wasps nest, and humanely discouraged some dozens of horribly noisy rooks from returning to the rookery adjacent to the house. :graduate:
Biggest current threat is from an influx of pidgeons and squirrels. One pidgeon and squirrel in particular seem to have formed a bond and are often seen together or at least, scurrying away in opposite directions, from under the hedges, when disturbed. :-\
What chance a new species might emerge to annoy me next year, 'squidgeons'? :D
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Looking at that map, I see that Kitz, Black Sheep and Apollo11cdr (now finally with a working connection (http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,18455.msg333089.html#msg333089)) will have been right in the storm's path. :o
100% correct for myself, Mr Cat. :) :)
It lasted approx. 90mins, and I have to say it was one of the most awesome and scary storm events I've witnessed in the UK !! The electrical 'show' was stunning from sheet to forked lightning patterns, but the thunder claps ??!! ...... this was the scary bit as it actually sounded like a bomb had gone off in an upstairs room !!!
I'm expecting a 'Rally call' from our leaders today, as I'm certain there will be collateral damage from last nights lightning ??
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I'm just hoping BT's wide area event recognition works for you better than it failed for me the other week.
Stuart
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Ha ha ..... at least one out of the three people Mr Cat mentions, has access to a magic DLM re-set button ........ if needed ?? ;) ;D
Perks of the job I suppose :-[ :)
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Yep... that really was some storm.
It started off as a nice sunny day and I decided to do some gardening. All was going ok until about 3pm when it suddenly went dark. Black clouds seemed to roll in from nowhere (ok from over the sea). I thought I had better start packing things away, and before I could even do so the heavens opened. Within 10 mins we'd gone from sunshine to dark skies.
The rain started in earnest in seconds. Going from nothing to torrential downpour immediately. I got soaked trying to put the tools away as there was no real warning nor distant thunder. The really magnificent thunder and lightening show didnt start until later .
My daughter was stranded and couldnt get home from work, it took the trams out of action (and are still out on some routes) and I believe trains & planes were also affected. A few major stores were flooded. Some roads became impassable.
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MEN (http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/greater-manchester-plunged-darkness-great-11883098) has an article with vids showing the chaos in and around Manchester. From what I can gather, we got it here about 30-60 mins before Manchester, but they got the brunt of it. Presumably the storm clouds will have backed up by the time they reached the Pennines.
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And I missed it all. No modems lost yesterday.
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I have seen these storms on youtube that come from the atlantic the clouds can get very dark and huge massive rainfall.
When we do get storms in leicester they nowhere near as dark because by the time they get here they weakened. Most of the atlantic weather tends to start turning north when it hits the uk. So the west and north west gets most of it, the south east is as if its got its own different weather pattern.
I also observed on sunny days (most days) if I look east the sky is blue, if I look west its nearly always cloudy.
Sometimes but isnt very often, when we below the jetstream, I see dark low fast moving clouds, but they little puffs, like cotton wool puffs, completely worn out.
When we (and london ) get storms its usually the ones that come from france moving north.
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No amount of DLM resets will cure the problem I have now ...... the whole bl00dy DSLAM is down, along with others in the area.
Now, this wasn't a direct result of the storm, as I was on-line until midnight before I shot off to bed. I managed to get a connection this morning at 7am, but have had a few phone calls from neighbours saying their circuits are down. a quick WHOOSH test also shows mine down as well.
However, apart from having to hold longer conversations with t'wife :o, I'll find something to do. ;D
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It was right over my house too.
The storms were definately causing problems as the Sky tv box went off for a while.
Also the cctv cameras I have would go off for a split second.
On the connection part I got plenty of ES's, and my download SNR dropped to 3.8 . its usually just above 6.
I've heard there is other weather warnings for the 15 and 16th. Let's hope its not as bad!
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I was on the eastern edge of the storm, the closest the lightning/thunder gap was around 20s, or 4 miles, I think. There wasn't much rain left on this side of the Pennines - Manchester must have taken it all!
The impact on the line was tiny. Very little on the SNRM graph, but noticeable on the FEC graph. It kept retransmission a little busier, but that did its job - almost nothing visible on CRC or ES.
It is, I think, the first time I've seen the effect of a thunderstorm on my own line.
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I have been watching the circuit to the Eagle's nest, on and off, ever since Kitz noticed that G.Inp had been disabled (http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,18412.msg332316.html#msg332316). G.Inp was finally restored to the circuit but the US SNRM has been very variable. There was a period when the modem and DSLAM remained in a synchronised state but the upper software layers were having severe problems. Possibly the Plusnet problems, as others have reported. :-\
When I checked, earlier today, this is what I saw --
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There was a period when the modem and DSLAM remained in a synchronised state but the upper software layers were having severe problems. Possibly the Plusnet problems, as others have reported.
Doubt it. Admittedly I havent checked the PN forums of late, but as I mentioned in the other thread, the vast majority of those reporting problems seemed to have IPs in the same range. Being that since moving over to dedicated WBMC, the IP's are allocated to a more geographic location I thought it may be more localised and related to near to the MSIL's... when someone checked, they were indeed in a similar region down south somewhere.
Aside from that I dont think anything PN related could cause the upstream SNRm to vary like that. That 1dB spiking started on Sept 10th after a period of outage.
The modem may require a full power cycle. You do sometimes see that happen across various modems, I think NS had one a few weeks back, and I've also seen someone else (using a Billion?) within the past month on this forum see the same thing and as I suggested it vanished after a power cycle.
As I said at that time, its something that I've observed way back to the days of just adsl and it seems to be more likely to occur if the line has been knocked out due to a power surge or after a power outage. Going back 10 yrs I had a Voyager 2100 router, which seemed to have a habit of doing this if my mains had been switched off and hadn't been shutdown gracefully first.
I too had one myself within the past couple of days. Something knocked me offline at 03:51. I dont know what caused the resync at that time, (possibly a storm - dont know was asleep).. but note that when my line automatically came back up it also showed that spiking. You can then see at about mid-day I had noticed it myself on DSLstats, so I performed a power cycle. It went as soon as I did a full power cycle. It seldom works with a simple resync and needs a full power down to clear.
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I have seen these storms on youtube that come from the atlantic the clouds can get very dark and huge massive rainfall.
When we do get storms in leicester they nowhere near as dark because by the time they get here they weakened. Most of the atlantic weather tends to start turning north when it hits the uk. So the west and north west gets most of it, the south east is as if its got its own different weather pattern.
I also observed on sunny days (most days) if I look east the sky is blue, if I look west its nearly always cloudy.
Sometimes but isnt very often, when we below the jetstream, I see dark low fast moving clouds, but they little puffs, like cotton wool puffs, completely worn out.
When we (and london ) get storms its usually the ones that come from france moving north.
My daughter said the other night it reminded her of Florida storms.
We used to go to Florida several times a year where they do see this type of storm more frequently. I have distinct recollection of one particular day on Palm Beach. Beautiful day sat on the beach when the coast guard came flying past in his jeep warning everyone to clear the beach immediately. We were totally confused at the time why as the weather was beautiful and although the wind had picked up a little bit everything looked ok to us. We started packing up our towels & beach bags and was making our way back to the car when the sky went black. We just made it back to the car when the heavens opened. We had to sit in the car for about a good half hour before we could move as the rain came down in sheets and visibility was practically zero.
It wasnt the only time it happened, but I think that may have was our first experience of seeing how quickly storm clouds could move in from the Atlantic which may be why it was the most memorable.
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No amount of DLM resets will cure the problem I have now ...... the whole bl00dy DSLAM is down, along with others in the area.
Now, this wasn't a direct result of the storm, as I was on-line until midnight before I shot off to bed. I managed to get a connection this morning at 7am, but have had a few phone calls from neighbours saying their circuits are down. a quick WHOOSH test also shows mine down as well.
However, apart from having to hold longer conversations with t'wife :o, I'll find something to do. ;D
Hopefully all is well now BS?
I noticed the other night that Vispa (a Manchester based ISP) was saying there were localised outages.
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I posted to soon earlier in the thread.
The Storm has knocked me down to interleaving. My noise margin seems closer to 6 too (6.1).
So much for DLM's wide area incident reporting. Unless of course it damaged the actual line.
What happens if a phone line gets a strike on it?
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After my experience the other week I simply do not believe that BT has any wide area event management running, or at least if they do it simply DOES NOT WORK!
Stuart
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Hopefully all is well now BS?
I noticed the other night that Vispa (a Manchester based ISP) was saying there were localised outages.
Thank you ...... all was restored by approx. 4pm the same day. I know not what the 'fix' was though ??. :)
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Some of you guys my already be getting some T/Storms this evening but does not look as severe its more spread out.
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Here down south, had some ominous rumbles in the distance this afternoon, starting about 5-ish. Seemed to be coming from all sides, then skies dark as night by 7pm. :o
But it came to nothing, still very humid out there, but still dry and no more sound of thunder.
Contrast with a week ago, forecast was for a nice dry day, so I set about some outside painting. About an hour after I started the heavens opened, poured down for about 24 hours. And modern water-based Eco-friendly paints do not take kindly to pouring rain, so spent most of the past week trying to rescue it all. :'(
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I spoke too soon, massive thunderstorm with torrential rain, for a good hour or two, starting about 4- 5am. :'(
It did give me the opportunity to verify the accuracy of www.lightningmaps.org - very accurate indeed it turns out. I could literally identify each and every flash in real time as they happened, and the locations of each strike were entirely credible, several within a mile in the time I watched it.
And my connection stayed up all night too, can't see any stats though, never set it up.
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Here in Newbury we had a massive storm last night that started about 7pm. It stop/started until about 6.30 this morning.
A few pictures from last night here http://www.newburytoday.co.uk/news/home/19277/storm-strikes-west-berkshire.html (http://www.newburytoday.co.uk/news/home/19277/storm-strikes-west-berkshire.html)
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Yes I heard about Newbury; One report said that people at the railway station were standing on the benches to get out of the torrent of water. Didcot station was flooded and closed too, I believe. :o
Incidentally, I should have known I was tempting fate when boasting that my broadband had survived... I have since found out that whilst broadband is indeed find, the phones are out for self and all immediate neighbours and possibly the whole village. It may not be entirely coincidence that, in the early hours of Friday, the Fire Brigade were spotted pumping water away from a flood in the next village, at a location not far from the telephone exchange. ::)
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From the news reports it appears that Didcot had it as bad if not worse than Newbury. Newbury station was also closed and I believe that it was later the next morning before trains were calling there again.
Travel the next morning was also disrupted with several roads closed due to flooding – even the M4 motorway was affected.
Our exchange wasn’t missed by the storm. It didn’t flood but it did take a lightning strike. There’s a picture of the building just after the strike near the bottom of the page in the link I posted earlier.
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From the news reports it appears that Didcot had it as bad if not worse than Newbury. Newbury station was also closed and I believe that it was later the next morning before trains were calling there again.
Travel the next morning was also disrupted with several roads closed due to flooding – even the M4 motorway was affected.
Our exchange wasn’t missed by the storm. It didn’t flood but it did take a lightning strike. There’s a picture of the building just after the strike near the bottom of the page in the link I posted earlier.
Looks like that is part of a video... wonder if they got the actual strike.
(https://forum.kitz.co.uk/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.newburytoday.co.uk%2Fupload%2F1473966847757.jpg&hash=c9ffdc17df139858f544e8ff19b391c765584a8f)
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I believe I’ve found the original video. Unfortunately they miss the actual strike and strangely there is no sound of the hit on the video.
There is bad language on the video so if you watch it please mute the sound if you’re likely to offended or there are minors around.
The link https://twitter.com/ROD558/status/776513853081395201 (https://twitter.com/ROD558/status/776513853081395201)
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Was the exchange still in use and, if so, we're there any ill effects?
I would assume that a BT exchange would have pretty effective lightning protection?
I would also assume that good lightning protection would be enough enable such a building withstand a direct strike. After all, buildings like the worlds' giant skyscrapers are presumably struck on a regular basis, yet are able to continue business as normal, unnoticed by users of all the computers and IT apparatus inside.
But these assumptions and presumptions are open to challenge. If anybody can share authoritative knowledge about BT exchanges and their lightning protection, I'd be all ears. :)
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Thanks for finding the original vid. As you say he didn't catch the strike but you would have thought the sound would have. There is a clap of thunder after the smoke, but bearing in mind his proximity you would have thought it would have been more instantaneous and quite loud.
Look at what happens to all the lights inside the building how they flicker on, off and back on again.
You can see the lightning rods in between the masts, which is where you would have thought the lightning would have struck. Would the switch on of emergency generators cause smoke?
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Having watched the video I would suspect that the smoke could well be from the generators starting, in my experience most emergency generators are diesel and the smoke seems to only appear for a short while which would be consistent with a diesel genny.
Stuart
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Thanks for finding the original vid. As you say he didn't catch the strike but you would have thought the sound would have. There is a clap of thunder after the smoke, but bearing in mind his proximity you would have thought it would have been more instantaneous and quite loud.
Look at what happens to all the lights inside the building how they flicker on, off and back on again.
You can see the lightning rods in between the masts, which is where you would have thought the lightning would have struck. Would the switch on of emergency generators cause smoke?
Only just re-visited this thread. I think you've all pretty much cornered it by way of a) All Exchanges have lighting protection, both for the building and the equipment inside. b) Without conclusive footage it is hard to say, but the flickering lights coupled with the seemingly black exhaust smoke of a diesel genny kicking in and 'coming up to speed' to provide power to just 'essential circuits', I think rule out a direct strike ?.
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It never occurred to me the generator might be on the roof, but I suppose it makes sense.
But if it failed to start for some reason, I'd not be too keen on going up there to try and fix it during a lightning storm, no matter what kind of protection was provided. :-[
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In all the Exchanges I've been in ...... and that's a few hundred ..... I've never seen the Genny-set located on the roof.
The exhaust flue may be routed as such that it appears on the roof, or the plume of smoke has just risen up from somewhere near ground level (or basement if the Exchange is large enough) where most Genny's are located ?? No way of knowing from that poor footage I fear ??.
As an aside, the largest genny's I ever saw were in Preston (Moor Lane) these were two mega-watt babies and the control panel to synch phase when switching from 'Mains' power to 'Genny back-up' power was like something out of Star-Trek, beautiful to see it in action ...... but noisy isn't the word !!!
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It never occurred to me the generator might be on the roof, but I suppose it makes sense.
But if it failed to start for some reason, I'd not be too keen on going up there to try and fix it during a lightning storm, no matter what kind of protection was provided. :-[
It is probably quite well protected and could even be on the top floor with an exhaust through the roof ;)
Stuart
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ref my own phones... Still dead, 4 days on from our share of the storms. This is fate getting its own back on me as in an unrelated recent thread, I was singing the praises of landline reliability vs mobile. :D
But I'm not so sure the floods at the exchange were the problem after all. I just drove along the road, past the cabinet. Had to wait for the contraflow traffic lights they've set up, to protect some busy engineers, several OR vans parked up. I'm guessing, only guessing, that scene might be highly relevant to our dead phones. ::)
And actually, spare a thought for these guys too, let alone working on a rooftop. Just a head and shoulders protruding above the road surface, of a busy 'A' road at near dusk. Even with the traffic lights to control the traffic, I'd find that scary. :o
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Thank you for mentioning the safety aspect, 7LM. I kid you not, only today my closest work buddy nearly got wiped out by some old dear (He estimated to be in her 80's) who turned the corner off a main road too fast, proceeded to mount the pavement and if my mate hadn't jumped out of the way of the Cab he was working in, he would have had very serious injuries or quite possibly dead.
I didn't witness the event but a few folk going about their business did. My mate was in the midst of installing a line to a premises and after returning to the EU's premises he struggled like mad to krone terminate the pair to the NTE, he said his hands were shaking that much !!!
The old dear was shook up as well, and it was put down to a near-miss accident by my mate. Alas, in our kind of work there is no full-proof protection when working kerb-side. :no:
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In the village tonight, the guy wasn't even on the kerb. He was in the middle of the traffic lane, buried in a pit up to his armpits.
This time they had full traffic control with temporary lights, presumably as the job was not expected to be quick. But I've also seen them do similar further down the same road at bottom of my garden, in a different pit, for quick jobs, with just traffic cones, a parked van, and a colleague to stand in front of the cars to stop them. It's a 30 limit all the way along, which probably means safety controls are more relaxed because, of course, everybody observes 30 limits. If only. ::)
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Alas, in our kind of work there is no full-proof protection when working kerb-side. :no:
There's a PCP outside our living room window, right by the edge of a roundabout, with the doors opening on the pavement side. There's even some railings to keep cars on the side that cars belong. Nice and safe?
Unfortunately lots of cars and vans use that pavement as a cut-through to drive away from some shops. At some point, something managed to hit, and dislodge, the solid (big) stone blocks in our garden wall ... the pavement most certainly isn't a safe place to work.
And to outdo that ... a car on the pavement side managed to reverse through those railings and out onto the main road.
Video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K09MMyga9tw).
(PCP just off-screen to the left).
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There's no limit to human stupidity, is there?
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It can't be protected against, that's for sure !! :-X :)
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Update - at last, after 5 days, we have working phones again. :thumbs:
Of course I don't know for sure it was caused by the storm, but bit of a coincidence if not.
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And to outdo that ... a car on the pavement side managed to reverse through those railings and out onto the main road.
Psst, @BlackSheep, do you recognise that roundabout? If you've been training over this way, you may well do...
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When I started to read your post yesterday, my heart skipped as I thought this must be the 'Cab at the roundabout' that every OR engineer I know detests. It really is a death waiting to happen in our opinion, but statistics will probably say otherwise ??
Then, a milli-second later, I seem to recall you mention you live in Yaaaaarkshire ;D ?? If so, the only training I've done there is in Harrogate ..... quite a few times actually. But, the training seemed to move en-masse down to Stone/Staffs a long time ago with just the odd event being held at Harrogate. So, if it is Harrogate we are talking about my memory isn't good enough to remember the said roundabout ??!!
I do remember 'Gyrating Geoffrey' though ..... mad 'stard !! ;D ;D
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Then, a milli-second later, I seem to recall you mention you live in Yaaaaarkshire ;D ?? If so, the only training I've done there is in Harrogate ..... quite a few times actually. But, the training seemed to move en-masse down to Stone/Staffs a long time ago with just the odd event being held at Harrogate.
So, if it is Harrogate we are talking about my memory isn't good enough to remember the said roundabout ??!!
Exactly. One of the roads off that roundabout leads to the Openreach training centre here. From the number of vans that go in and out on a daily basis, I reckon it is still up and running. There's a whole forest of telegraph poles there too.
I did wonder, on moving into the area, why Harrogate seemed to have gotten the fibre deployment relatively early. I originally wondered if it was because Liv was from Harrogate, but have since decided it was more likely that it was used as an early "on-the-job training" location.
The downside of this location is that when our line was installed, the engineers were very keen to follow every H+S foible to the letter ... just in case they were seen by someone passing by :whistle: It added to the delays somewhat.
I do remember 'Gyrating Geoffrey' though ..... mad 'stard !! ;D ;D
I had to go look that one up... and one of the links points straight back to this site!
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Exactly. One of the roads off that roundabout leads to the Openreach training centre here. From the number of vans that go in and out on a daily basis, I reckon it is still up and running. There's a whole forest of telegraph poles there too.
I did wonder, on moving into the area, why Harrogate seemed to have gotten the fibre deployment relatively early. I originally wondered if it was because Liv was from Harrogate, but have since decided it was more likely that it was used as an early "on-the-job training" location.
The downside of this location is that when our line was installed, the engineers were very keen to follow every H+S foible to the letter ... just in case they were seen by someone passing by :whistle: It added to the delays somewhat.
I had to go look that one up... and one of the links points straight back to this site!
Sorry, I didn't make myself clear in the other post. I mean we have a very similar set-up on my patch in Gods country (Lancashire), with a Cab sited right next to a mini-roundabout (a painted circle), with all sorts of vehicles thundering past at 40mph literally inches away from where you are working.
The line-of-sight at the roundabout junction is such that there is no need to decrease your travelling speed. I've said it before on here, the older you get, the more aware of ones mortality you become !! :-\
PS .... I think the Harrogate roll-out was probably because all the posh folk live there !! ;) ;D ;D Lovely place though and only a gentle hours drive from my hovel.
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I figured you refered to your own problem spot too. I imagine current siting requirements are a tad more onerous.
"My" roundabout was the one in the video (surprised that the video didn't capture 3 Openreach vans leaving :-X). Nicely kept... but it barely slows the traffic in some directions either.
And you're right that the place has some posh people & places. Unfortunately, it has also suffered from that quaint blight of developers: spliteverythingintoflatsitis. Which has now become a nasty case of nosparewifichannelosis. Thankfully it can be held in remission with 5 GHz treatment.
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Ah right ..... my apologies again ..... I hadn't spotted/played the video in your above post ::)
Hells bells, I have to say that particular Cab is probably in the worst place I've ever seen !! I must confess, I've never noticed it before on my travels to Harrogate but should I end up going again, I certainly will. :)