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have any of you experienced exiting from a good sized, free standing power tower......?

the middle armeteur is the cleanest exit, however the backside of the structure is doable, but the thing gets underhung as FUCK real quick.

i know this thing is HOT, and im wondering if anybody has stepped off one of the armeteurs that hold the actual energized cables. obviously each structure is different, but are you going to feel some electricity from those things with a pair of hiking boots on?

im trying to make a decision on which exit point to leave from at sunrise tomorrow, and like i said off the side is way better, especially with the forecasted winds tomorrow.

Energized cables don't touch the metal structure ( high volt power lines ) as each line is a different phase...the structure would explode ( cross-phase ). They hang on, or sit on, insulators. They also have minimum clearences.....they can reach out and get you. Off the subject, how high is the exit point ?

the very top box is 450, so the arm is probably lets say 410-420. still plenty high. im just scared to get shocked off the fuckin things.

as a general rule, look at the length of the isolators, you should never get closer to a cable than that. (if possible stay away as far as possible)
and never get inbetween 2 different cables (since the rule above may not apply here...), so prevent flying inbetween cables on canopy.

jumping from the arm, above the isolator, falling next to the isolator is no problem. (as long as you are not doing anything stupid like staticlining or mcconkeying it) because when you fall next to the cable you dont have a connection to the tower anymore.

this is just a guess, but maybe on the really really high voltage, espacially the current voltage ones, static load could hit you in freefall (i read that there are 500kV to 1MV current voltage lines, some in canada i think), but i dont know if thats really a danger, just a guess... i would stay away from those.

when climbing around on stuff like this, especially the high high voltage ones, you may feel static load, tooth fillings tickling like sucking on a battery, and some other fun stuff...

if im wrong with anything here please correct me.

take care!
hirschi

Well......did you go for it ?

about to go dayblaze, its pretty remote...........finishing this corona and im out

Have Fun

Have you seen videos of engineers inspecting HV cables from helicopters?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tzga6qAaBA
The static was hitting him and the heli. So I guess you don't have to worry about getting close to ONE cable.
So 2 things can go wrong: grounding out or crossing the cables(short circuit).
I would never even get close to those towers, I was electrocuted 6 times by 220v mains, it hurts(!). Wonder what 500000v feels like?

I've been off 3 power towers in the UK. On one of them, the platform was maybe 5-6 m below the bottom wire and when you grabbed the rail to climb over you could really feel the static zapping the palm of your hand. That was kind of freaky.

well, after all (and totally flame away if you will!), i climbed the tower today. the armeteurs were doable, but i went uptop to the cage and was just going to split the wires. a solid 2 second delay would have allowed me to clear the wires then pitch, but i was INSANELY freaked out. normally i take that fear and after some deep breaths i can turn that into focus, but today it just didnt happen. if i had someone more experienced with me it may have been enough motivation to jump, but i ended up hanging out of the top twice ready to exit and climbed back over. i couldnt do it, so i ended up downclimbing. an experienced friend is going to come with me next time so im not soloing, and ill make it happen then. all i could feel today was black death, so i went with my gut and took the long way down.

but its cool, i just jumped our 500 foot E with a friend from seattle so at least i had a badass sunset jump!

no shame in that, tower is going to be there for a while. can you take a pic of the top next time so we can see what your taking about.

thanks

Here's a video that shows a bunch of jumps from power towers. No problems jumping them, but you will get a small shock if you jump close to the insulators. Most of the footage is 10yrs old.

http://www.youtube.com/...&feature=related

Good to hear from you. Walk away and live to jump another day.

so the wires hang down probably close to 80 feet from the top box. a good solid 2 second delay would clear them, and its almost 500 feet where the top box is......ill definitely get it next time

Dude, it takes way more self control to fold and down climb then to jump and play a hand you don't fell 100% about. You'll kill it next time. We had a great jump today, and the tower will be there next time. Cheers!!!

Looks like the lower platform is a winner too!!

yeah, thats the bullshit pussies usually spill.
size also doesn't matter.

Even with a go and throw you're gonna open WAY below the wires. It is a mind fuck the first few times you jump threw them, but the visual are awesome!

How far is the space between the most narrow set of wires?

if i had to guess i would say about 20 feet between wires where its narrowest, maybe even a bit more like 25-30. i highly doubt my PC would get caught even if i pitched early, but like you said, MINDFUCK is definitely the word. ill be back this weekend with a buddy and am going to send this shit, no fuckin doubt this time

If you get a chance, place a vid cam face up ( on the ground ) below the exit point to catch your exit. Fully charged battery, and an empty card or tape, and zoom it in some. Then just let it run.

haha...Prick.

Is that the power tower in your area? The one near the major metropolitan area? It looks like it. If so, why didn't you talk to the highly experienced guys who regularly hit it, and why did you go up it in the day? If I'm wrong, my bad, but this just sounds like re-inventing the wheel to me. That area has some really solid guys, and a few of them will even give you tattoos or handjobs.

Those the towers I am thinking of, ?
.

THE? theres 8 within a short visual distance, so im not sure which one youre referring to. definitely not the ones that get jumped on a regular basis though......... the one i climbed NOBODY jumps anymore, a few people have in the past, and ive already gotten all the information i could out of those folks. noone else is down to come out and hit that except one buddy who did not make it out...........its fuckin sketchy

@ray yes, no harm no foul, nobody saw me out there. as soon as the rain subsides ill be climbing at 430 am and jumping between the wires at the first speck of light with another local...........the shopping cart worked exactly like you said it would too................

Let me get a call too.

Like I said, if I'm wrong, my bad; so yeah, it's my bad. Just saw the low numbers and recent date and thought I'd ask ya. I don't live there, and half the folk I was raging with there don't anymore either, so it's not my dolphin to flog.

But yeah, by the power tower, I meant the one that gets hit more times per night than a beach club ladyboy hooker during the KL tower event.