News Electrical sub station near heathrow airport 'blows up'? - possible russians?

[Moley]

Looks like Heathrow is starting to open. I'm watching a BA A350 landing at the moment and an BA A380 lined up coming in to land. Good old FlightRadar24

 

[UKMeterman]

Ok, it was a 275KV to 66 KV transformer on a twin transformer site. This provides power to one corner of Heathrow. I am supprised that LHR did not seem to have or were unable to have switching operations to take power from their other feeders. For details on the North Hyde grid supply point start here, https://ssen.tractivity.co.uk/images/blob/6744a18d-692c-4a10-b27f-f2c5cd2c3448/North Hyde Grid Supply Point - Strategic Development Plan - For consultation.pdf

 

[Teddy Lop]

I thought you'd use inert gas if anything for a substation? We had them in CAA facilities we did some work in; the only time the official, top down instructions are that in the event of the fire alarm sounding you "run like funk and GTFO"

 

[Moley]

Inert gas fire suppression is used in switch rooms. I seem to remember it's something like halon? Outdoors it's water.

 

[Moley]

There's 2 other 132kV subs near Heathrow. I'm surprised they haven't got feeds from them. Longford 132kV to the west and East Bedfont to the south. Open Infrastructure link

 

[UNG]

Inert gas fire suppression is used in switch rooms. I seem to remember it's something like halon? Outdoors it's water.

Halon was banned by the EU back in 2000 and phased out up to 2003 with no new installations although I think the regulation allowed existing halon systems to remain until such time that they were triggered or decommissioned there is a few alternatives around I remember a company developing a system using oxygen reduced (depleted) air where the oxygen was reduced to 9% so it would still support life as we only need / use about 4% of the oxygen in the air we breathe while combustion (fire) needs an oxygen level above 10% to support it

 

[snowhead]

According to the Heathrow boss last night they lost 2 out of their 3 supplies.
They can safely run on 2 but not on 1.
I'd guess they can run on 1 in a national emergency but not when they're having to manage 200,000 passengers.

Presumably the 2nd loss, assuming the first was the 275KV TX on fire, may have been from the other 275KV TX which was also shut down, due to the 275KV main incomer being remotely shut off due to unknown damage, to enable fire fighting.

Can't find where I spotted it but UKPN is the iDNO for Heathrow.

Post 39 on the below link suggest someone with knowledge of the site.

Substation fire / Heathrow rail closed (21/03/25) - Rail Discussion Only

Heathrow Express - half hourly service, for Airport staff ONLY towards Heathrow How is/was this being enforced?

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[UKMeterman]

According to the Heathrow boss last night they lost 2 out of their 3 supplies.
They can safely run on 2 but not on 1.
I'd guess they can run on 1 in a national emergency but not when they're having to manage 200,000 passengers.

Presumably the 2nd loss, assuming the first was the 275KV TX on fire, may have been from the other 275KV TX which was also shut down, due to the 275KV main incomer being remotely shut off due to unknown damage, to enable fire fighting.

Can't find where I spotted it but UKPN is the iDNO for Heathrow.

Post 39 on the below link suggest someone with knowledge of the site.

Substation fire / Heathrow rail closed (21/03/25) - Rail Discussion Only

Heathrow Express - half hourly service, for Airport staff ONLY towards Heathrow How is/was this being enforced?

www.railforums.co.uk

There are a number of feeds to the site, some are N+1 but did not take into account a 275KV supergrid transformer getting upset.

 

[littlespark]

I just found out it wasn’t the Russians after all….. It was Jimmy from 1979 public information film trying to get his frisbee back.

View: https://youtu.be/KryOYburlFI