Had a rush call to a residence this morning via. the dispatcher from the POCO homewire program. Fax stated" flickering and dimming lights, momentary outages,sizzling noise in panel,partial intermittent power, incoming voltage checked out ok by POCO."
Got to residence and found square d main breaker, 100 amp, had snap on terminals cooked on one leg. Bus bar looked ok after cleaning up. Rushed the breaker to the supply house and they didn't have one and they tried to find another in the area, but no such animal was to be found. They said they could get me one by tomorrow morning for 136.00. I ordered it and brought the old one back to the residence. I explained to the customer that I needed to wait till tomorrow to replace the breaker, but that I would hook up the good side of the breaker to half his panel so he would at least keep partial power to watch tv and keep his food cold overnight.
He became distraught and somewhat abusive and demanded full power immediantly. Nothing I said would bring him to reason. He called the main office and demanded an explanation and they let him have it. They said that his home could burn down, and they backed me up 100%. I told him he had two choices, 50% power for one night or 0% power. This fellow is as thick as a brick, and this repair is costing him nothing. I could not leave an arcing main breaker on in his home, but he is too dense to realize it. Sure hope tomorrow is a better day.
