ECN Forum Forums Safety Discussion and News Occupational Safety Discussion What's Your Story, Were You Ever Shocked?

First good zap I got was from a metal 3Ø 220/380 Volts plug while inserting it in the cast iron receptacle, The earth wire was loose and so was one of the phase wires which made contact with the casing of the plug. I was around 15 and it happened on the farm in The Netherlands. AAuucchh!!

I had a few zaps from 220 - 230 Volts more due my own mistake and not testing or checking the on / off switch myself. I have learned from my stupid mistakes and "test prove test" and not assume things are off.

The biggest jolt I had was while on a 33 kV cable fault and my mate and I were thumpering at 32 kV dc, 1 pulse every 3 seconds. We prelocated the fault, then when the digger opened up the hole next to a commercial driveway, and exposed the cables, no external damage visible, (they all had previously been repaired before) we had to listen with the microphone which cable made the most noise to id the correct cable prior to cutting, well my mate put the microphone on the metal zippy sleeve while I had the other microphone and headphones on. WAAAUUUUWWW. : We were both jolted about 2 metres away into the soil, I saw blue sparks in my eyes, so did my mate and had a zap through his leg as well, but both unharmed but shaken allright. One microphone was arcing to the cable while the other was still on a concrete drive nearby. We survived :and so did the listening equipment. In hindsight we were thuping from about 1 kilometre away at 32 kV dc, where the fault was the arc would go to the screen of the cable and back to the thumper, must have had at least a couple of kV's at 1500 Joules. Lesson Use HV gloves while touching a HV cable with listening equipment.