I am sure most have heard or seen the wild fires burning all across the west coast. I honestly lost track of how many places were up in flames. Unfortunately for people in Okanagon County Washington, it was dang near a flashback of what happened around 4-5 years ago. Wind fueled fires ripped through the area causing total destruction in some areas. Many homes were lost along with a few lives.
In some counties in Washington the local power companies reported thousands upon thousands of poles burnt to the ground. A couple Public Utilities reported 1,100 poles that needed replaced. With crews from all over combining forces it took around 2 weeks to get everything back up and running again.
Just like 4-5 years ago, I had the opportunity to go to Okanogan County/Nespelem Indian Reservation and help rebuild their electrical grid. I work for a small cooperative and we only have a total of 50 employees. So sending a crew of Lineman out of the area definitely leaves us short handed if anything major were to happen back home. Now the Nespelem Coop is an even smaller Cooperative and they needed our help plus an additional 4-5 other crews from various utility companies around the area.
I wasn’t part of the first crew to go, so I was on the B team this year. :wink:wink The first crew we sent worked with other crews to get the main line rebuilt. After 11 days they came home and the B team was on their way to rebuild the main tie line over the top of what they call the plateau.
A Day With A Lineman #9
After a 5 hour drive it was straight to work, load a few 40 foot poles on the line truck and a couple pickup. Access is limited and it took about 40 minutes to get up to the plateau from where they were able to stock pile a bunch of poles. Winding, narrow, paved road turned into dusty gravel road that seemed to go forever..
We honestly couldn’t ask for better weather. The smoke had blown out of the area, the temps dropped to around 80F and there was a gentle breeze... I felt a little guilty because the first crew that came up wasn’t so lucky. 96F, super Smokey, and they were down in the bottom working in the burnt up heavily wooded areas. Up on the plateau it was a totally different story. I guess we will start with changing this pole?
Even though being up on the plateau it was relatively flat, the rocks up here were crazy sharp. We had to plan out our routes to these poles very carefully. These poles aren’t right next to the road, I mean why would anyone do that. There were a couple that were easy to get to but 90% of them took some time to get to.
As the sun set at the end of our first 17 hour work day, we knew it was gonna take us a few days to make our way across the plateau to rebuild this tie line. The sunsets up here were nothing shy of amazing. I often caught myself staring off into the sunset.
After some broken sleep and a bite to eat it was back at it bright and early. 5:30 am comes really fast when you are working until 10:30 pm and have a couple cold ones with the guys and BS about the day.
With another load of poles on the trucks it’s back to setting more poles and getting the wire up off the ground.
If these poles were along any type of “road” we could have set twice as many poles in the amount of time we were there. Each hole had to be dug by the excavation because after 2 feet of dirt it was pretty much solid rock. Banging away with the excavator was the only way we could get close to the proper setting depth. The setting depth is based on the height of the pole. If it is a 40’ pole the formula is - 10% of the height + 2 feet - So the setting depth of a 40 foot pole is 6 feet. If it were a 60 foot pole then it would be set 8 feet deep. There you have it a little lesson on the setting depth of power poles.... Just a friendly reminder, Don’t call them telephone poles when you are talking to a Lineman... :wink:wink
Did I mention the weather was pretty much perfect... Hot enough to easily work up a sweat to get the dust to stick to your face, yet a nice little breezes to cool you off. Blue skies and Sun..
When you have a good crew of guys working together, being productive, having fun, and all having a saw in how the job gets done, time sure does fly. These 17 hour days felt like my typical 10 hour day at work. Before I knew it the last pole of the day was put in the ground and it was time to clean up and get things ready for the next.
We ended up being there for 5 days and were able to get their tie-line together across the top of the plateau. There were still another 20 or so poles that needed to be set on the other end through some wheat fields but they had a contractor crew scheduled to come and do it. We tried really hard to stay and the General Foreman was blown away at the progress we made and even more blown away at what the first crew was able to get done. He said he had no idea how those guys got some of those poles changed out and how fast they did it. I guess you could say we represented the Columbia REA pretty well. :wink:wink
Finishing up the last day of work we had 2 poles that needed set by hand with the excavator and a long span of wire that needed to be brought up and sagged to the correct tension. I didn’t get any photos of us Hand setting poles but to explain it in a “simple” way.... the excavator digs the hole, with a hook on the bucket of the excavated we lift the pole and stand it up vertically. Using pole pikes (12 foot fiberglass poles with a metal spike on the end) we stab them into the pole in 4 directions keeping it straight. Then the excavator backfills the hole and the pikes are removed... See easy as that.
This is a view from the corner pole looking across this valley to the pole we set by hand. There was another pole just behind it that we set by hand also.
As the sun set, I took the last few clicks on the hoist to finalize the sag. Just in time to make up this corner pole and finish what we came to accomplish. Dang that couldn’t have worked out much better than that.... plus check out this view!!
A Day With A Lineman
Hive On
and
Stay Safe
and
God Bless
That is difficult and often (I imagine) thankless work.
Great images, great info, great post all round.I had no idea that was your occupation @jlsplatts. I am proud of you.
Thanks!! Ya I have been in the trade for 15 years and I have never looked at doing anything else.
We Lineman tend to fly under the radar... that is unless you power is out then we get yelled and cussed at. Lol.
Fantastic images @jlsplatts.
🤔 I just got done rapping with you on discord and was stumped for a minute when your name didn't magically appear by typing that "@" symbol.
“Wait wait.... whoa whoa hold up!!” LOL I
I wish I would have taken more photos of the burnt up woods and structures. It was a pretty big mess.
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