ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Fire damage

I went on a call today where there was an arson fire on one side of the medical mini mall. The fire department had killed the main. My job was to get as much power back as was safe. I checked the damaged suite and it happened to be the last one furthest away from the main service. I turned off all the breakers in the MDP and looked inside the cabinet for any damage. I then turned on the main. Then after checking for damage went to each sub panel turned off all the breakers and checked then turned each panel one at a time. Aside from the totaled suite there were 4 cks that tripped. Any ideas that would improve what I did? I am not worried about the tripping breakers now just needed power and lights for clean up. Rod

Check for water and heat damage, then, after testing for shorts first, go turn things back on. It would be bad to have the fire dept out again, after a short did not clear, or someone got zapped.

I suppose you could have used a Megger if you have one. Just don't go gung ho on voltage setting and watching for sensitive loads. Meter down the line of breakers to neutral before closing in on anything that is obvioulsly faulted.
Joe

<Check for water and heat damage>
Did that as I went from suite to suite both before and after turning on the circuits.

No megger on the truck. I did take ohms and amp readings.Also the faults I did have were from the FD breaking conduit and flex. Rod