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Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Years of failure to maintain the power grid in Penn Hills now catching up with Power Company who is playing catch up and its putting many in danger.

On the screen shot you see below you can see over 4 weeks there have been 9 recordable electrical incidents on my computers back up power supply unit . Now 1 of them is thunder storm related  which is normal to see the others are all because of power grid in this area not being properly maintained and there are many more that have happened which happened to fast for unit to record them . Although  the power company  has spent  considerable money here to bring in new power lines and upgrade substations and they have replaced some rows of poles and upgraded some main  lines that's only about 20% of the power lines in Penn Hills
That means most of the infrastructure in Penn hills is close to 60 years old  Now where not as bad as some areas where wiring has not been touched or upgraded since late 1930's where you can still find old square transformers  on the poles in some  of the other power company's  in the area

So now the problem happening in this area of Penn Hills which encompasses the Hulton road, Bessemer , Valemont Heights and Shannon Heights  is we are having for past few months where all of a sudden the power just blinks out for several seconds and comes back on or just goes down dim.
This is a very dangerous problem as it causes surges on power lines and can damage  electrical items in the home. Now I have installed a very good Surge protection system on my home including power back up for computers but this is still not enough to protect when you have these Quick spikes and especially low voltage brown outs,
which are going on and can mess with refrigerators and freezers and Air conditioners  as they cycle on and off and causes there overloads to trip which is going to be really interesting as everyone starts turning on there units. I already lost a window unit a few years back because of power fluctuations .
Now the power company is aware of the problem but so far does not seemed interested in finding out what is causing it.Because they will not discuss with local officials what they are doing to find the problem or if they are even working on it .
But I may have discovered part of what is going on. This morning while feeding the birds I was in the back yard and I heard a very loud Voltage Arc like when a transformer is going bad or wiring is breaking down ..It sounded like it was coming from around the Indian creek valley area and as loud as it sounded it means a very bad situation is going to happen at the worse time and the grid is going to go out as something is breaking down electrically, and hopefully some where  the power company can easily get to and fix and not in the wooded areas. Worse yet a very bad brush fire could develop or homes could be damaged by the surge. When things finally go to hell  and break down . Several thousand homes and business could be effected especially if this is a substation issue which is over on Coxcomb road  and in Jefferson heights and if they are  involved as some home owners now think thats  where problem is coming from. Of course the even bigger worry is the very large high voltage supply lines just installed in past couple years as they run in this same area when they where being installed one line failed and fell onto Frankstown Road because it was not properly attached.
 What ever is going on  the power company better get to the bottom of it and get it fixed before we have a major fire  and major damage in homes .
in this area and answer to officials what they are doing to resolve it.  Of course electrical issues are just one of the many major issues going on with infrastructure in this area there are gas and water lines all over this end of Pa. going on 100  Plus years old.  a recent newspaper article reported many  tens of millions of dollars need to be spent to upgrade lines as well.  Yes this area went thru a major depression and all company's got hurt but now many are back in the black and need to start playing catch up before we start having major issues.


Monday, April 6, 2015

A fire which took 3 Pittsburgh firefighters Lives and put a young man in jail for life now under review as it may not have been arson

t was a horrifying situation as 3 Firefighters perished in a February 1995 fire in Pittsburgh's Homewood /Brushton section. It was even more horrifying  when it was announced to be an Arson fire.


Ultimately a young man  17 yr old  Gregory brown Jr.would be accused and sentenced to life in prison and his mom Darlene Buckner  convicted of insurance fraud.


But from the very start of this case things have not been adding up
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2519&dat=19970219&id=oyZdAAAAIBAJ&sjid=yloNAAAAIBAJ&pg=1716,2381438&hl=en
Because of these discrepancy   The Innocence Project became involved because they believe justice was not done in this case.

While the Fire Investigator hired by the insurance agency that covered the home felt it was possibly related to a defective natural gas pipe line  The City and Federal Investigators  felt it was Arson and pursued it as a criminal case.

A new trail was ruled and then immediately   appealed by Allegheny County DA which the appeal has been overturned and unless further appealed will proceed .

One big thing this new trial will be hinged on is the Fire Investigation Techniques used at the time. 
as it has been revealed in Arson Case Re-Trial after Re-Trial how the Investigation techniques used 
even today are flawed  often called junk Science and even with modern science are being challenged  and there are many questions as to how the case was handled and the fact paid informants where used and not revealed .You better believe the DA is worried the young man will be found innocent  If this young man did set the fire and killed the 3 firefighters I say Fry the SOB  and let him rot in prison . If not then right a wrong and set him free. This trial is going to open up many old wounds but they can not properly heal if justice was not properly done. Lets settle it and all the rumors which have been swirling around the fire community  ever since the fire happene