this post was submitted on 20 Jun 2024
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I've never seen an entire tower fall over like that, that's kinda terrifying.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, that’s not very typical, I’d like to make that point.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It's not supposed to look like that

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Well the front is not supposed to fall off.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (3 children)

I’ve never seen an entire tower fall over like that, that’s kinda terrifying.

Me neither! I wonder what caused it. Looks like maybe some bolts came off the feet? Since normally there would be huge concrete pads that they are connected to.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (2 children)

There are, I guess, 4 tower feet, they are very big structures. So my guess is that the "workers" were told remove the leg bolts, sand-blast the foot, then renew the bolts.

"Now guys, I’m off for a smoko, have it done before I’m back". "OK guv".

Instead of doing it one foot at a time, the obvious method, the "workers" then rush off, "Hey Mick, you do leg one, Jim you do leg 2, Manuel you do leg 3, Franco you do leg 4". "OK let’s go".

In 10 minutes all the bolts are removed, the wind picks up, the lateral force on the cables increases and bang, down she goes.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Haha who put the project manager in charge 😆

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Occam’s Razor strikes again.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Reading the updated story, it definitely sounds like poor procedures.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Apparently there's some rumours going around that they were doing some maintenance work on the pole when it happened. Don't know how true it is though.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Rusted to hell, would be my guess.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

One update said there was no corrosion damage. That was my guess, too. The mystery continues! Maybe eroding soil?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

You'd expect to see the concrete base come out if that happened. It does sound more like poor maintenance than anything else.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, that's a good guess. I presume they do regular inspections, so it would be interesting to know how this got missed.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Funnily enough, I just watched a YouTube video of yet another bridge collapse in the states, if it's anything like that case, the corrosion and decay would have been duly noted on successive inspections, and duly ignored by the powers that be.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I wonder if we will ever know, or because they are a SOE they may fall outside the power of anyone to investigate them.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

That's not a thing at all. SOEs face investigations like any other company. Kiwibank for example is getting prosecuted at the moment by the commerce commission for fair trading act breaches

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Sorry I should have been more careful with my words. The government does investigations into itself all the time, and because of the Official Information Act they results generally get made public, even if they was no issue found.

But for a company, the rules are different. If there is some legal action to be taken, then that happens whether it's SOE or company, but if it wasn't negligent then we don't have any path to get info from the internal investigation.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Ah right that's fair enough, SOEs definitely are a blindspot from an OIA perspective. I thought you meant in comparison to a private company, which would be the same if not worse.

I think in this case a combination of the huge public interest and the heavily regulated environment transpower operates under the causes will come out. But I guess we'll see

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Yeah my original comment did a terrible job of communicating my point 😆

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Kiwirail definitely didn't get out of being investigated.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Yeah sorry, poor wording. What I meant was companies only get investigated when they are negligent or breaking a law, and only if they get charged do we get information about it.

Government departments will do internal investigations and then the results are accessible under the Official Information Act, regardless of outcome, so we tend to get more info if it's government.

But on thinking about it, Transpower are probably keen to give people an explanation if it was some freak accident to protect their reputation, so we may find out anyway.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Happened when my phone was on 5% so no internet for me for a couple of days. I'd forgotten how much I like candlelight.