Mounted search and rescue

[Karen Nesbitt <spanishequines@yahoo.com>]

Responding to:

 

Message: 3
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 2010 06:40:29 -0400
From: "Irvin Lichtenstein " <ilichten1@verizon.net>
Subject: Re: [MSAR] heaters
To: "'Mounted search and rescue'" <msar-riders@lists.ibiblio.org>
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Tank heaters are a leading cause of barn fires.  Most codes ban immersion
coil type heaters and require a ground fault detector and a leakage or micro
current detector breaker so partial shorts or high resistance shorts trip
the breaker and shut off the heater. 



Horses are big enough that differences in ground potential from front to
back can electrocute an animal and have where lightening or power lines have
partially faulted to ground.  In one case in Chester County, PA the horses
were over 400 feet from a pole with a partially faulted line.

 

------------------------>>>>>

Irv,

 

I have seen horses do stupid with tank heaters when owners being equally dumb neglect to fill the tanks.  The animals will yank them out and play with the elements.  Yanking wires, knocking tanks over...seen owners leaving tree branchs overhang in the tanks and where horses can get into trouble too.  Horses just gotta fiddle flop with anything, but then it takes a dumb owner to give them dumb things to play with.

 

Tank heaters are great for labor savors, but you need to monitor them, you need to make sure they have ground fault and circiut breakers are operational.  AND MAKE SURE THE TANKS ARE FULL.

 

Water can calcify on them and burn them out if you water is high on lime or calcium deposits.

 

Barn fires are also caused by improperly put up hay. 

 

Bad wiring is a great cause of barn fires. 

 

What about those electric fencers.. they dont work well if they are arching all the time and the fencer is in the barn.  Improperly installed electric fences are useless and a bum fencer in the barn could be costly.

 

I know of one too many horses tickled by lightening while it swished its tail walking into the barn door hitting the fencer with its wet tail coming in from the rain and the horse dropped dead on the threshhold while the owner lead the horse in.  Its a miracle the owner did not die too but for some lame reason she happened to  drop the lead line right before the horse flicked its wet tail onto the fencer when coming in from a storm.  Freak accident, but could have been preventable had the dang fencer not been put where it was near the door and the lines to the fence not so close to the barn.  The wires for the fencing were right out the stall door. 

 

I got to wonder about some of these not so smart "smart" electricians in their installations and the things they neglect elsewhere that just let horses get into trouble. 

 

Been tickled by lighting myself as lightning hit a hotwire fence 50 feet away from me and at the beginning of a storm.  I was fortunate.  I lived.

 

How are you safe proofing your barn?

        Karen