TREES AND POWER LINES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22389, 8 April 1936, Page 14

TREES AND POWER LINES

DANGER DURING STORMS "LIVE" FENCES ON FARMS [by telegraph OWN correspondent] TE AROHA, Tuesday A formidable summary of the damage done to the Thames Valley Power Board's equipment by the recent storm was presented at to-day's meeting of the board by the chief engineer, Mr. N. G. McLeod. The report showed that, in addition to 128 ordinary service lines, 43 main lines were brought down. Of the latter 10 were 11.000-volt mains. Dealing with causes, the report stated that trees were the most prolific source of trouble and that, failing the expensive solution of placing all lines underground, the only satisfactory way of dealing with the situation was to seek legislative authority to control the growing of trees. The idea of such legislation was to prevent the growing of other than certain classes of trees within two or three chains of any road. ]t was admitted that some people did attain great affection for trees, said the report, but such people would doubtless change their views had they seen some of the settlers' experiences through the recent storm. Not only were trees responsible for bringing down, the actual power lines, but were nearly always the cause of these broken lines being carried across wire fences, with the result that long lengths of inno-cent-looking fences became veritable death traps.

Events during the recent trouble had shown that the matter of live wire fences must be seriously considered, an all consumers should, in their own interest, take prompt steps to efficiently earth all wire fences. All consumers had been previously issued with a pamphlet containing instruction as to tho earthing of fences, but many of those that had been treated had not been effectively maintained.