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[oddlegs]

About 30 years ago I drove past a small sub-station and it blow up with a loud bang and lots of sparks / flames and everywhere went black 

Many years ago we went to visit my wife's sister living in North Notts. She told me that the power had been off all day and had only just been restored. She told me they had been working at the end of the road.
Of course I had to go and have a look down the hole which was waiting to be filled in.
There was a large diameter LV cable down there with a new cast iron clad lead tee joint which had been filled with bitumen compound.
"Boring" i thought and walked away. I had barely walked 50 yards when there was a terrific explosion behind me and a very bright flash.
When the fire brigade and the power company had finished their work I had another wander down.
Cars parked on the opposite side of the road were covered in molten bitumen.
I'm glad I didn't tarry on that occasion.

[oddlegs]

You might be thinking by now that the safest place to be is anywhere but where Oddlegs is.
I'll relate a (true) tale of " Oddlegs and the Exploding Pub".
Just after we were married in the early 1970's, we were driving home one Saturday lunchtime after concluding some business in the city.
We were driving down a hill and approaching a pub on the right-hand side.
Just as we drew level with the pub there was a hell of a "whuuump" and all the pub windows and splintered wooden window frames came flying out at us followed by a cloud of choking muck.
I'd hit the brakes but couldn't understand why the car wasn't slowing down much.
When we eventually stopped I climbed out and found that we had been "sledging" on the very substantial front door of the pub which was under the front wheels.
Black smoke was pouring out of the hole where the door had been and eventually people with clothes and faces looking as if they'd just done a shift down the pit staggered out coughing and retching.
Between them they had a role-call when they'd finished coughing and decided everyone was accounted for.
The fire brigade turned up and moved us all away because there was by now a strong smell of gas.
I walked down the steep hill at the side of the pub to have a look around the back.
The pub cellar was level with the lower yard at the back of the pub and where the doors had been was a gaping hole about 12 feet wide and almost as high. Leaning in an almost upright position against the gents toilets at the bottom of the yard were the still closed cellar doors complete with wooden frame and a large RSJ lintel still bolted along the top.
It was the time of the North Sea gas conversions and the landlady told the firemen that the gas board had carried out work in connection with the conversion that very morning. They had been working in the cellar ! Some conversion !
The floor in the best room on the corner was completely blown out but luckily no-one had been in that room.
The pub was eventually repaired and re-opened only for the developers to knock it down last year to build apartments, this time they made a proper job of it.
At least it survived almost another 40 years.

[Black Sheep]

Some great (and worrying) tales here, Oddleg.

If there's ever a 'Kitz meet-up' planned for the future ........ don't ring us, we'll ring you mate.  

[tickmike]

The safest form of gas leak is when it has ignited  .
 A long time ago I lived in a  house with an elderly neighbor, one day I could hear this "whooshing"  sound and went around to she if she was ok, She was in the front room looking at TV and could not hear the noise which was now loud  .
I opened her seller door to be greeted with a long gas flame down in the cellar  , I got the lady out of the house, phoned the fire brigade then went down into the cellar under the flame and turned off the main gas tap, got a bucket of water and put out the flames on the floor below where the lady had been sitting watching her TV.  .
It was another half hour before the fire brigade came.
I found out that an old 'VIR' cable had sparked to the lead gas pipe it was next too, melted a hole and lucky it had ignited the gas .
I got the job of re-wiring her house. 

[silversurfer44]

Speaking as an ex gas fitter, apprentice trained. I was always told that gas does not leak. It escapes.
Yes Tickmike I will agree that the safest escape is on that is alight. Except the one that is working it's way down the gas pipe to the meter.
I had a couple of those after natural gas was installed for the first time. I was quite fit in those days and could run from a kitchen to the meter in a cellar and turn off the tap before the meter blew up.
You see the gas would burn  quicker than it came out of the older meters hence the sound of a low hum as the flame was making its way down.
The nearest thing I've had with electricity is grabbing hold of a modification that some one had done. The problem was it was hanging free and not insulated. One gets a funny buzzing shaking sensation with that.
Still here to smile about it.

[oddlegs]

The safest form of gas leak is when it has ignited  .

We worked on that principle in the steelworks.
We used vast amounts of ultra pure hydrogen gas as the atmosphere in razor strip annealing furnaces. The steel does not tarnish in an hydrogen atmosphere.
For that purpose it is ideal as it does not react with the red-hot steel and is also a remarkably good conductor of heat.
The snag is that it is "very" explosive over a wide range of mixtures with air.
We had large cabinets with pressure regulators, flowmeters, and control valves.
In each cabinet was kept burning a small natural gas flame.
The principle was that in the event of an hydrogen escape it ignited the hydrogen before it had chance to build up.
Of course retorts filled with large quantities of hydrogen gas at around 1050 degrees centigrade are a disaster waiting to happen anyway.
I've always lived dangerously, I must have a guardian angel 'cos I'm still here.   

[oddlegs]

Some great (and worrying) tales here, Oddleg.

If there's ever a 'Kitz meet-up' planned for the future ........ don't ring us, we'll ring you mate.  

There's no truth in the rumours about my ancestor Thomas Oddlegs Farriner who had a little accident in his Bakery in Pudding Lane in 1666.
And of course my cousin Oleg Oddlegs Whoopsky who made a slight miss-calculation when experimenting with his reactor in the Ukraine can't really be blamed. It could happen to anyone.
I look forward to your call.   

[Black Sheep]

  @ Oddlegs 

I think you'll recognise me, perchance we should meet. Forget the 'red rose in the lapel' though ............ I'll be the one in the corner wearing a nuclear-blast outfit, with a lead-lined blanket or two in near proximity. Oh, and I'll be supping a pint of Sam Smiths, just in case there's a few of us dressed the same.

[silversurfer44]

Black Sheep, Is ta from Alifax/Uddersfield?
The brew that stuff there.

[Black Sheep]

Nay sir. I thought Ttey brewed it in Tadcaster , and I live over th'hill in Gods Country (Lancs). 

[silversurfer44]

As far as I know black sheep was brewed in Halifax by one of the small breweries. But like anything that sells well Allied Breweries will want a share.
Tetley's is no more as is John & Sam Smiths in Taddy. They got swallowed up a long time ago.
Just because tha won war a 't roses don't mean tha lives in God's own County. It's still Yorkshire for that.
I know there will be a Lancashire lass joining in soon. Mind you she went to live in the South of France.
That's if she reads this thread.

[UncleUB]

Black Sheep beer is brewed in Masham, N Yorkshire by a breakaway member of the Theakstone family,hence the name "Black Sheep"

[Black Sheep]

Aha, we were talking at cross-purposes SS. On my post I mentioned I'd be supping 'Sam Smiths', and the next post you ask if I'm from Halifax, because that's where they make the stuff ?

I assumed you meant they make 'Sam Smiths' in Halifax. I now see you were referring to my alias. 

You're are of course correct, 'Sam Smiths' have reinvented their best-seller (Ayinger-Brau) and is now served up at a piddly 2.5%ABV (I think ?). So 'Taddys' has been the Lager of choice for the last 8 months. It's a slightly different taste, being more 'tangy', but is acceptable.

PS ..... this site's glorious leader also lives in Lancs. So therefore my gangs better than your gang !! 

[oddlegs]

Aha, we were talking at cross-purposes SS. On my post I mentioned I'd be supping 'Sam Smiths', and the next post you ask if I'm from Halifax, because that's where they make the stuff ?

I assumed you meant they make 'Sam Smiths' in Halifax. I now see you were referring to my alias. 

You're are of course correct, 'Sam Smiths' have reinvented their best-seller (Ayinger-Brau) and is now served up at a piddly 2.5%ABV (I think ?). So 'Taddys' has been the Lager of choice for the last 8 months. It's a slightly different taste, being more 'tangy', but is acceptable.

PS ..... this site's glorious leader also lives in Lancs. So therefore my gangs better than your gang !! 

Oh dear, Oh dear, Black Sheep.
I was just thinking what a fine fellow you are, going along with my daft ramblings.
And then you tell me that (one) you drink lager, and (two) you come from Lancashire.   
I know you can't help where you were born, but now that border controls have been removed, the least you could do is move to Yorkshire's golden acres.   
The other matter (drinking lager) is really beyond the pale when good Yorkshire Best Bitter is available.
I'll grant you that you need to avoid the national (and multinational) brewers, but there's some lovely stuff available from smaller breweries.
In your defence I guess that you're a lot younger than I am. I'm sure that in time you'll see the light (ale).   
Thanks for the craic.

[Oh Snap.]

After reading the horror stories in this thread, I am considering getting the electric and gas cut off and living life by the light of a candle! 8|