Last Thursday night I sat down at 10:30 pm for my weekly effort in the Northern
California Contest Club NS Sprint, a half hour contest for CW hotshots. Things
were going good on 15 meters when at 10:35 pm a strong noise suddenly showed up
at my usually relatively quiet suburban QTH. It raised my noise floor by about
20db from the usual on 15 and 20 meters, perhaps a bit less on 40 and 80 where
atmospheric noise was more of a factor.
After the contest ended at 11 pm, I decided to do some quick checking. I drove
down the street in the direction of the noise holding an HT out the window, and
found a noisy spot about a quarter mile from my house. I then went back with on
my bike (well lit, on a very lightly traveled street) with the HT and a 432
yagi. I found an area within a pole or two where the noise peaked. There was no
visible arcing, so I went home for the night.
In the morning I repeated the trip on the bike, and then drove back with my
W1TRC ultrasonic detector. I easily found the culprit pole. Then looking
around, I noticed a broken side mounted insulator on the high voltage line,
with that line laying across the service drops to four nearby houses.
I went home and called my RFI contact at First Energy, who was out of the
office. But his voice mail message gave an 800 number to call in an emergency,
which I did. Once I got the agent to understand that the problem was not at my
house, she then wrote up a trouble ticket. By the time I came home from doing
some projects at 5 pm, the issue had been repaired.
I don't have good measurements, but it seems that the noise in that direction
is now somewhat less than it had been before. Had I been hearing low level
leakage across a cracked insulator? That I may never know for sure.
I wonder what the chances were that I'd be on the air when that insulator
broke? And if not for me, whether I caught it immediately or at some later time
when chasing noise, how long would that high voltage power line been laying
across those low voltage lines? And what could have happened with that?
This list does not pass photos, but I'd be happy to send a photo of the bad
pole to anyone interested.
73 - Jim K8MR
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