[SBE] Copper Thefts

[Barry Thomas]

This is a forward from the Miami SBE Chapter email list.
 
Barry Thomas, CPBE CBNT
Atlanta, GA
barryt at sbe.org

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From: membership-bounces@ sbe39.org [mailto:membership-bounces@ sbe39.org] On Behalf Of Mcmartin, John
Sent: Friday, April 11, 2008 7:15 AM
To: Clark, Roz (CXR-Tampa); membership at sbe39. org
Subject: RE: [SBE39 List] Copper theft at 6AM Wednesday in NewPort Richey...

Hey Everyone,

 
This is what happened to one of the Clear Channel sites in Sarasota.   Tim White is the Chief Engineer down there.  Here is his account of what happened.  I cut and pasted his email to me below.

 

John McMartin

Director of Engineering

ClearChannel - TampaBay

 

813.832.1933 Direct

813.832.1086 Fax

 

WFLA  WDAE  WXTB  WFUS

WFLZ  WHNZ  WMTX  WBTP

 

Friday morning at about 5:00 my phone rang from one of our transmitter sites telling me the line voltage had dipped below the normal lower limit. I cleared the alarm, took some readings on the transmitter which was fine and went back to sleep. 

 

Our generator is just big enough to run the transmitter and rack equipment, but when the air conditioner compressor starts it will sometime draw enough current to shut the transmitter down momentarily. Yes, the AC needs a relay to shut it off when the genset is running - it's on the "to do list". 

 

After a couple of hours I began to get suspicious that there was more to the story so went to the site to investigate. 

 

What I found was like nothing in 30 years I have seen yet. A copper thief pried the cover off of the electric meter panel and attempted to remove the wires. On the third leg of the three phases he attempted to cut the wire first and then in apparent frustration gave it a mighty yank. I don't know if he (or she) just didn't realize the box is a 480 volt feed and was live or is really this stupid but you can imagine the pop the unfused primary feed made when phase 3 and phase 2 met each other. The meter box burned, the conduit going to the power company's transformer looked like someone used a cutting torch on it. 

 

I took pictures and you can see them here. Click on pictures of interest for hi res close-ups. We looked all over the surrounding woods and field for a body but didn't see one but unless there were some good gloves and heavily insulated cutting tools used - I am pretty convinced there is a very sore person in the area. 

 

Here are the "shocking" pics - I used an image gallery called "coppermine" for the fun of it! 

 

Enjoy... 

 

http://easmonitor. com/coppermine/ displayimage. php?album= 1&pos=0

 

Tim White

(941) 552-4818

 

From: membership-bounces@ sbe39.org [mailto:membership-bounces@ sbe39.org] On Behalf Of Dave Anderson
Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2008 9:45 AM
To: membership at sbe39. org
Subject: [SBE39 List] Copper theft at 6AM Wednesday in NewPort Richey...

 
It’s not just the big towers they are after, guys. 

 
The 80ft tower at my office in New Port Richey primarily used for WiMax long distance repeating for some of my engineering clients got everything nailed.

 
All the ground bars, they even dug down 1ft to the top of the ground rods and cut the wire there.  Ground kit’s copper right to the mastic.

 
The funny part is this tower is hardly noticeable on the road due to trees.  

 
So last night spend the evening putting it back together, and put up a IP camera with motion detecting recording.  

 
Wasn’t there a FDLE task force setup for us at one point?

 
Several of my contract stations have been hit in one case 3 times in the past year.

 
Regards,

 
Dave Anderson, CEO

Fleeman Anderson & Bird Corp

Voice 727-853-1237

Fax 727-841-7110