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Animal causes power outage

Sun, 08/13/2006 - 10:38am — Rick

OLYMPIA - An animal got into a downtown substation, causing a late-night power outage, Puget Sound Energy said Saturday.

The power outage occurred at 11:24 p.m. Friday and affected 1,400 customers throughout downtown and as far east as Pacific Avenue. The outage caused a delay in production and delivery of Saturday's Olympian.

"A PSE crew member was on site at 12:10 a.m. Saturday and found an animal had gotten into the substation at Thurston Avenue and Franklin Street and gotten into equipment that caused a circuit to short," said Dorothy Bracken, a spokeswoman with Puget Sound Energy.

Power was restored at 1:05 a.m. Saturday, according to Puget Sound Energy. The Olympian regained full power after 2 a.m.

Both stories have failed to mention what kind of animal caused the outage. There can only be two reasons for this omission:

  1. There was not enough of the little critter left to identify.
  2. The "animal" was actually part of a well-known infestation of mutant CAIMANS (released into the lake by stevenl) who have begun to attack our infrastructure as a first step toward total domination of the Olympia area!

I report, you decide.

Comments

Sun, 08/13/2006 - 11:52am — Jade

Oh my God...

It IS Godzilla!

Jade

(A Rose in the Pumpkin Patch)

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Jade
Sun, 08/13/2006 - 11:56am — Meta Hogan

I think it was Kevin "O"

I think it was Kevin "O" Sullivan. I hope he's okay.
Sun, 08/13/2006 - 12:07pm — Rob Richards

"O" Sullivan

That's great.
Sun, 08/13/2006 - 1:52pm — Sarah

Yep

Reliable informed rumor has it that a fedora wearing caiman was seen stuffing a nutria into the equipment. Our source did not interfere because she assumed the caiman was using innovative dinner cooking techniques.

Besides, it is really not safe to interfere with a caiman. I know this from re-education camp.
Mon, 08/14/2006 - 7:00am — stevenl

Hmmm

I see Rick has once again twisted the knife by reminding all the world about my little mistake in releasing those critters. O, the heavy burden I must carry for the rest of my mortal days-- and probably beyond! Just for one tiny error in judgment! But on another note, I visited the Naval Museum in Bremerton yesterday and noted that the Navy once had a submarine called USS Caiman. It served in WWII and was later sold to Turkey, who ran it aground. Supposedly, that was the end of the story, but I have it on good authority the old USS Caiman was purchased and reanimated by a mysterious fedora-wearing, chain-smoking, nutria-fur-coat-wearing private party. And, the craft was allegedly spotted recently under the 4th Ave. Bridge. Well, at least that was the rumor I was told.  Hmmm USS Caiman
Sun, 08/13/2006 - 4:48pm — DrewHendricks

Reminds me...

I was lollygagging in bed one morning, listening to the sounds of the morning between lollys and gags, and suddenly there was a great 'boom' like someone had fired a shotgun just outside my house. The sudden silence which followed told me that the refrigerator had stopped, so I assumed the power was out. I glanced at the clock - its blank face confirmed the power was out.

Naturally, I sprinted out the door to see what had happened (I'm an idiot like that - it could have been a guy shooting the transformer with a shotgun...)

I found that a squirrel had stepped into the main circuit providing power to the four houses around me. He was part of the circuit for just a few moments before most of the contents of his stomach and intestines boiled off into steam and exploded through his - well, that just about finishes that story. You might not want to know what the path of least resistance is for squirrel guts, anyway. But I know. I've seen it.

Yes, there was certainly enough left to ID the species, if not the sex. He's* still buried right there, where he fell. (I didn't want my wife to have to see what the path of least resistance was, either.)

*Yeah, OK - I'm not sure it was a boy squirrel, but I'll make sexist assumptions about dead squirels that I just would not make about people. So sue me!

Mon, 08/14/2006 - 10:52pm — Robert Whitlock

Rick,Will you decide for

Rick,

Instead of just reporting, will you decide for us too?

I thought the power outage was kind of neat. It's nice to be reminded of what it was like before electricity became an everyday phenomenon. Not to mention the dark...

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