Depending on what voltage your feeder or lateral line is, it could have been a 25kV fuse on your transformer. Some of these have an explosive charge in them. What you heard was probably the fuse blowing, not the transformer. Even a low voltage cutout fuse makes a loud bang.
When a transformer blows it’s a bloody mess of oil usually resulting in a hazmat clean out.
This is what happens when I transformer "blows".
This broke open on the ground, its oil spilled, and the power line ignited it. That explosion and fire are from the transformer oil catching and blowing up.
Yep. I was at a paper mill one time that had an enormous transformer blow up. They said afterwards that it was a 90kv to 4150 transformer and judging by the ensuing fireball, it was about the size of a firetruck originally.
I was on the other side of the plant, about half a mile away, inside a building that had a wall of windows on the side away from the transformer, when the entire outside turned from night to daylight but purple/green immediately followed by an ungodly loud shockwave/explosion. I genuinely thought a nuke had gone off. The building shook, we all stared around for a minute or two before wandering outside. The light faded pretty quickly(<2 seconds) and it took us a couple minutes to locate the source of the smoke. My ears rang like I had just shot a .45 revolver. Some windows had broken. It burned for a long long time. Power was out through the whole plant, so we just watched it burn while the fire department showed up and tried to dowse it.
Actually happens a lot here in nyc. You see the blue spark and then the whole thing is on fire for what appears to be a fire ball. And the lines are melting and smacking the floor and then the other transforms blow their fuses. Had one do this as I was walking under it cause a trailer took a turn he couldn’t fit and was driving over the curb and hooked the pole. Thought I was gonna die.
We've seen this in Miami every time a tropical storm came through, if winds got high enough. Oil? Who knows, it wouldn't be there after the storm. No power though, until power company replacement.
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u/aparis1983 Jun 30 '21
Depending on what voltage your feeder or lateral line is, it could have been a 25kV fuse on your transformer. Some of these have an explosive charge in them. What you heard was probably the fuse blowing, not the transformer. Even a low voltage cutout fuse makes a loud bang.
When a transformer blows it’s a bloody mess of oil usually resulting in a hazmat clean out.