In December 1967, lightning struck a large oil tank in Manhattan Beach, CA. It rained oil over the South Bay for two days!
Several years ago a crow perched at the wrong place on a transformer on a utility pole near our home in Gardena. There was a flash. The crow was sudden-fried. Our electricity was out for hours.
Post here out-of-the-ordinary catastrophes you’ve witnessed or been near (reported on your local TV or radio news, for example).
I’ve been on pipeline right-of-ways after line ruptures. The power of these pops is horrendous. There’s an area just outside of North Bay, Ontario where the line’s blown a couple of times, and you can walk the right-of-way, picking up rocks that are normal rock on one side, and melted black solidified lava on the other.
There was another line break near Rapid City, Manitoba where the heat of the ensuing fire melted the front end and the glass on a pickup truck. You could see the flames for miles. It’s quite eerie to walk the area - it destroyed all life there, and now nothing will grow back. The one in Rapid City blew in the middle of the night, and the next morning there was supposed to have been a survey crew in the exact spot. If that thing had blown 6 hours later, it would have vaporized the whole crew. Literally.
As background, these lines are up to 48" in diameter, with 1000 lbs per square inch of pressurized natural gas. When they blow, the valves at each end will snap shut (in theory), but there’s still 25 - 30 km of gas to burn off.
start-your-own-Urban-Legend thread?
That was a vivid description, Pipeliner. A couple of weeks ago a natural gas pipeline near Carlsbad, NM exploded close to a campsite where a large extended family was camping. The last survivor of 12 victims died yesterday. (Albuquerque Journal)
For some reason, I can’t think of any anecdotes now.