submitted by Alan Nadon:

I bet the line mechanic got a good scare from that one!

In my opinion you should not leave untaped wires if one side can possibly be energized.

How do you get 2000A in a single 4"? Why is there blue tape on the identified conductor?
Don

The identified conductor is being used as a phase conductor. The blue tape is to keep someone from thinking that it is the grounded/neutral leg.
The equipment inside (not installed) will be rated for 2,000 amp. The POCO sizes their conductors for the expected load.
The lineman is probably still seeing spots.

Alan,
It looks like there are 3 phase conductors and an identified condutor. Why would the identified conductor have to be used as a phase conductor?
Don

It looks like the black conductor in the back is smaller than the other three. That is probably why they used the striped one as the 3rd leg. It looks like they used their standard single phase UG triplex and threw in another smaller conductor for the grounded conductor.

That's what they do around here too. Our local power company uses 1/0 aluminum for up to a 400 amp service, so I am not surprised to see such small conductors in this application.

it pretty much sum up with UG wires our POCO do pretty much the same as well here we used 1/0 AL for 400 amp service but go 600 amp they used paralled 1/0's and majorty of them used bundled triplex and they useally dont stock not too many quadplex unless unuseally large service.