An explosion at a Consolidated Edison substation has set off a massive oil-spill cleanup along the Bronx River.

Scores of workers are cleaning up an unknown quantity of a light, clear oil similar to mineral oil that flowed into the city’s storm sewer system on Nov. 4 when a 345-kilovolt transformer containing 30,000 gallons of the fluid caught fire. A machine malfunction created an electrical arc that ignited the oil at 152 Kingston Ave. in the Dunwoodie neighborhood.

The resulting smoky fire was controlled in 20 minutes, and no one lost power from the event. Much of the oil, which was used as a dielectric fluid to cool the transformers, burned or remained on-site, but some of it mixed with the water used to quell the flames and escaped into the city’s sewer system, where it flowed into the Bronx River near the Cross County Parkway. Read more..

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Mamadou Diallo with his two-year-old son, Ibrahim, in their Bronx apartment. The family was put in financial peril because of thousands of dollars in erroneous utility bills.

When that first unexpectedly high Consolidated Edison bill — with a balance in the hundreds of dollars instead of the usual $70 — landed in Mamadou Diallo mailbox in the Bronx last year, he simply paid it.

 This week, experts from the Children’s Aid Society and the Catholic Charities Archdiocese of New York will be answering selected questions about foreclosure and the housing crisis.

The Diallo Family

 Nafissatou Kante with two of her children, Ibrahim, left, and Issagha.

Moussa, and Madany, 10, reading ion their bedroom

Then came the whopping bill from Cablevision, and mysterious demands from phone companies. And the Con Ed balance continued to grow, from $404 one month to $634 the next.

All he could think, he said, was that “something is wrong; someone is trying to steal my electricity.” Read more..

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Bronx Man Suffers Jolt After Walking On Manhole

A Bronx man suffered a shocking jolt when he stepped on a manhole while crossing the street and was overcome by a rush of electricity.

Stray voltage investigators for Consolidated Edison were at Southern Boulevard and Leggett Avenue where the victim, 34-year-old Jermaine Bedell, told police he was jolted and burned around 9:30 in front of the Giant Launder Center. Bedell said it happened the moment he stepped off the sidewalk and onto a metal cover on the street.

Bedell’s girlfriend Yvette Reyes says he called her in agony.

“All I understood was the left side of his body [was hurt, he was saying] ‘I’m in excruciating pain in the ambulance,” Reyes told CBS 2.

Police and EMS confirmed Bedell was brought to Lincoln Hospital where officers said they noticed a smell of something burning on him.

“Do we pay to get excruciating pain in the streets?” said Reyes. “You don’t know what you’re going to step into.”

In the past year, Con Ed received 115 reports of stray voltage. About 40 of those cases involved Con Ed equipment..

A company spokesperson said Con Ed is proactive about the problem, with a fleet of trucks dedicated to stray voltage-related repairs. CBS 2 was told such incidents are down dramatically since the death of 30-year-old Jodie Lane, a Columbia University graduate student, in 2004. She was killed stepping on a metal plate.

Some residents now simply try and avoid walking on the covers at all costs. “Just stay away from these metal grates, that’s about it,” advises city resident Lou Kizner, who admits he doesn’t always follow that rule himself.

Bedell, a former school custodian, will remain hospitalized overnight. The extent of his injuries is being kept under wraps by his doctors.

In investigating Bedell’s incident, Con Ed says there was no stray voltage found and no malfunction in the larger service area that would explain Bedell’s claim that a simple walk down the street turned dangerously electrifying.

SOURCE: WCBSTV

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