Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!know!news.cs.indiana.edu!rutgers!mit-eddie!xn.ll.mit.edu!xn!tonyb From: tonyb@titania.juliet.ll.mit.edu ( Tony Berke) Newsgroups: sci.electronics Subject: Re: Stray Voltage? on 60 Minutes Message-ID: Date: 17 Apr 91 20:11:25 GMT References: <746@newave.UUCP> <1991Apr15.172627.13060@hubcap.clemson.edu> Sender: usenet@xn.ll.mit.edu Distribution: usa Organization: M.I.T. Lincoln Lab - Group 43 Lines: 28 In-Reply-To: rbrink@hubcap.clemson.edu's message of 15 Apr 91 17:26:27 GMT In article <1991Apr15.172627.13060@hubcap.clemson.edu> rbrink@hubcap.clemson.edu (Rick Brink) writes: From article <746@newave.UUCP>, by john@newave.UUCP (John A. Weeks III): > In article <3853@uc.msc.umn.edu> dwm@msc.edu (Don Mears) writes: >> Can someone explain what they were talking about on 60 minutes on 4/7 >> in the piece on stray voltage from old power lines that caused >> dead and deformed animals, and shocks to people? These did not look like >> high voltage power lines, just normal ~10kv distribution lines. You don't have to go to the cow barn to find stray voltage. [more...] I have an interesting addition to this... I have some friends that live near some big voltage lines in Mason, NH. They have a fiberglass hot-tub sitting on a cement slab. One day I was halfway into the tub, with one foot on the slab and one in the water, when I recieved a pretty healthy zap. This happened to enough people that an electrician was called in, and it was eventually determined that the tub was floating, electrically, at some distance above ground, and the potential in it was getting there do to some potential gradient (in the soil?) coming from the power lines. This sounds like 'stray voltage' to me, but I still don't quite understand the mechanism. P.S. Ironically, these people own a veal farm. Perhaps stray voltage is actually creating in dung-heaps? (A voltaic pile, as it were). -Tony (tonyb@juliet.ll.mit.edu)