June 2, 2006

"NO OUTAGE" REPORT:
POWER STAYS ON DESPITE DRIFTING SAILBOAT

At 7:30 a.m. May 18, an unmanned sailboat broke its mooring and drifted in the current until the mast caught the overhead transmission line beside Card Sound Bridge. The line is one of two delivering electricity to the entire Florida Keys.

"The mast contacted the line on a transmission structure near shore, but no consumers lost power," said FKEC Transmission Director Dennis Minton. "Within four milliseconds [four millionths of one second], all of the load on that line was switched to the other transmission line on the 18-Mile Stretch. From there, it was directed to FKEC's Tavernier substation where, during the same four millisecond time frame, power was diverted in the opposite direction of normal flow back up to the Key Largo and Oz Moody Substations."

As a result of this immediate and automatic switching, FKEC's members in the Upper Keys never even lost power. "And it's worth noting that, without the 'new' second transmission line running down the Stretch, the entire Keys would have been without electricity from 7:30 until 11:30 a.m. that day, when the boat was finally towed clear of the line," Minton said.

The second transmission line was added to the Keys' power system after Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

The boat's caretaker had maneuvered the craft under the bridge days earlier and dropped anchor in Card Sound for temporary harbor. The mooring line had apparently snapped early that morning, setting the craft adrift. The transmission line in that area follows the height of the bridge, with the highest lines in the navigable channel. The unmanned vessel had drifted out of the channel into the shallow waters near shore before contacting the lines.

"The automatic redirect of the load on that transmission line was an amazingly fast process," said FKEC CEO Scott Newberry. "The fact that none of our members noticed the switch or experienced any outage time is proof that FKEC's relay engineers, substation and transmission departments have our system set-up right for the most efficient and effective operation. I commend them all for a job well done."