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Randy Cassingham's BlogHistorical Details and Author's Notes from This is True®
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Mystery Power Outage
We have a pretty complex power system at our house in the country: critical systems (heat, fridge/freezer, and the office, including the computer network) are on backup power so we can run them for days in case of a power outage. The worst so far has been just a few hours, most recently when a pole on the edge of our property snapped when it was really, really cold (apparently the pole had rotted, and then couldn't take the cold). So I was really perplexed when I got an alert last night that the backed-up circuits had failed ...yet the rest of the house was on. Huh?!
Weekly Weird News
A neighbor who's quite an experienced handyman came right over when we called from Las Vegas* this morning, and my assistant led him to the garage where the switching equipment is. He's not really familiar with how it all works, so I was describing it to him on the phone. A circuit leads to the backup system, and from there it leads back to a subpanel where the backed-up circuits are. After hearing how it works, he said that the main breaker for the subpanel was off (not tripped, but turned off). He flipped it back on; sure enough, the heat came right on (it was just about freezing there today, and the heat had been off all night.
How is that possible that it could be turned off, Kit and I wondered. Once the network was running again, I could log in to the security camera system: sure enough, no one had approached the house before the network dropped out. Then it hit me: there is "someone" in the garage. We have barn cats that keep the rodent population down around the house. We don't have a barn, so they stay in the garage, and are in when we're out of town. They were probably bored and bouncing around the garage like mad, playing. The only thing I can figure is they were playing near the breaker switch, and knocked it to "off". There's precedent for that: when we were on another trip, we came back to no heat (but that wasn't a power problem). Turns out the cats had pulled a temperature sensor out of the boiler, presumably by playing with the wires that came out of the sensor. That's now taped in nicely. I guess I need to secure the breaker switch for the backup power, too. Crazy cats!
*Kit and I are attending the Affiliate Summit. The twice-yearly event is probably the biggest gatherings of online businesspeople held. They have one in New York or vicinity each August, and one in Vegas each January, and it's an amazing gathering: there are 4,125 attendees at this one. I come to network and get new ideas from the many presentations. If you're doing business online (not just as an "affiliate"), you should definitely check it out.
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12 Comments on This Entry
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Posted by Rus - Newark, NY on January 19, 2010:
LOL! Wow! Now all you need to do is train the cats to turn things back on when they turn them off!
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I have to finish the attack training first! -rc
Posted by Ron - New Jersey on January 19, 2010:
Depending on the type of breaker enclosure that you have, you can either lock the breaker in the on position with a padlock, obtain a breaker lock (uses a screw to attach to the breaker) for that type of breaker, or change the cover for the breaker panel to one with a door on it.
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Since it's on the outside panel of a backup power system, changes won't be easy. I'll need to get home and take a careful look at it to see how to secure it without obstructing the circuit-breaking function that keeps things safe and the equipment from damage in case of overload. -rc
Posted by Kathi, Brooksville, FL on January 23, 2010:
But they were just having fun......!
Them darn cats....!
I've had cats play the phone messages on our answering machine. I know someone whose cat called 911 one time. It took them a little while to figure out what happened, because nobody was in the house at the time. Apparently it stepped on the speed dial button set for 911.
Posted by Cindy in Cleveland OH on January 23, 2010:
Crazy cats indeed. Clever little things. We brought home a cat who 3 days later had a litter of 5 kittens. Being lazy, or intelligent as I prefer to think of it, we obtained a power litter box until they could be weened and given away. I was furious with my husband for unplugging the darn thing regularly. When confronted, he was baffled. As it turns out, one of the kittens was doing it. I now know which one because when little Fluffy went to her new home (with a dear friend of mine) the silly thing would wake her up in the middle of the night by turning on her make-up mirror ... while at the same time we had no more problems with mysterious unplugging litter boxes.
By the way, 4 of the 5 kittens did get adopted into happy homes and we kept Fluffy's much dumber little brother.
Posted by Tom, North Carolina on January 23, 2010:
Maybe you've thought of this, but if you can rotate the setup (either the breakers or the box) 90 degrees, the cats could clamber on the breakers without tripping them. That might mean remounting the box so it seems to be on its side, or even mounting it horizontally (face up on top of something, or face down attached to the ceiling). (All this not true if the switches are super easy to move, but most are too hard to trip without the cat's full weight.)
Or why don't you hire an attendant to watch the cats 24/7? :)
Posted by Tom, North Carolina on January 23, 2010:
Two types of cat repellent might help. (You can tell we have cats; we feel your pain.) Anyway ...
1) You can put double sided tape on the switches, or put strips over them. It won't stop the breakers from working, and cats absolutely hate the feeling of walking on sticky tape.
2) There is a spray you can get at pet places called "Bitter Apple". It is supposed to smell and taste like everything cats hate, so just getting it near the switches might help keep them away ... however I hated to mention it because spraying moisture near your circuit breakers might give anyone pause, and might not be a great idea. Still, it is up to you.
Good luck to you and your mousers! Sounds like a garage our cats would love!
Posted by Curt, Portland Ore. on January 23, 2010:
You could just put a door on the breaker panel, and chicken wire enclosure around the plumbing!
Posted by Stephen, Wisconsin on January 23, 2010:
Both the double-sided tape and the bitter apple spray are good suggestions, Tom, but not foolproof. We tried both of those things when trying to keep our cats from clawing on the furniture. The cats didn't seem to care at all. One cat actually made it her mission to pull the double-sided tape off the arms of the couch, thus causing more scratching than normal. But I've been long convinced that our cats are freaks, so maybe they aren't a good control group.
Posted by Tom, North Carolina on January 24, 2010:
I actually like the chicken wire idea better! Would love to know how that works out.
Posted by Bruce, Chilliwack BC on January 25, 2010:
Easiest is to tape a small clear plastic box over the breaker switch - hockey tape is good and thick and easy to pull open if you fold a bit to make a pull tab - just make sure it is small enough so the cats cannot pull it easily also. My 20 year old fax machine has a nickel taped over the autoreceive button since the cats would step on it and turn it off.
Posted by Dave - Harrisburg, PA on February 4, 2010:
As Ron in New Jersey described, there actually are breaker locks that attach to the handle of the circuit breaker. These are intended to prevent exactly what you experienced; the accidental switching off a circuit breaker protecting a 'critical' circuit. They have a small screw with a clamp that prevents manual switching of the breaker, but do not interfere with the breaker's internal tripping mechanism in case of circuit overload. The only (minor) inconvenience is you'd need to use a small screwdriver to remove the lock should you need to reset the breaker if it trips. If the breaker would trip, you just need to remove the clamp, turn the breaker to the off position, return it to the on position (after finding and correcting the reason for it tripping, of course) and then re-attaching the clamp. They are used where I work on numerous 'critical' circuits.
Posted by joebanana, So. Cal. on February 27, 2010:
I don't think so. Have you ever turned off a two pole breaker? It's not like you can just tap it, and it goes off. It takes a little effort, and a thumb helps a lot. Unless your "cats" are tossing around your weight set, I don't think they "turned off" that breaker. Just go try it yourself.
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I'm well aware of how much pressure it takes to turn off a 20 amp breaker. Each one of the cats weighs plenty more than that. -rc