Power to lamppost cut after stray voltage shocks dogs

Jan. 9--A downtown street corner beside the Museum of Contemporary Indian Arts, just across the street from the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, has been dark for the last week due to an electrical short-circuit in a lamppost.

City firefighters taped off the corner Dec. 31 after a San Francisco couple reported their two dogs, walking on wet pavement, had been shocked there. Stray voltage is a major problem for people and pets in many urban areas, particularly where electrical wiring is old.

Public Service Company of New Mexico spokesman Don Browne said Friday that the utility turned off the circuit of the underground line that feeds the streetlight on Jan. 1.

"The potential is that the circuit that feeds the light is eroding," he said. "Apparently, it's 30 to 40 years old. Both the streetlight and the circuit are owned by the city and so we're awaiting some direction from the city on how to handle this. It may take excavation and replacement of the circuit."

Former Public Works Director Robert Romero said Tuesday, the day he was appointed city manager, that he had not heard about the problem at the downtown corner.

The New Mexican's story about the situation on Jan. 1 touched off a round of discussion among pet enthusiasts that reached all the way to New York.

On Jan. 2, the New York Daily News reported that the recent snow there, as well as salt used to melt the icy pavement, is likely to increase the number of incidents of stray voltage.

But Blair Sorrel, who runs a Web site devoted to such incidents, said shocks from stray voltage can happen any time of the year.

"There really isn't a seasonal disparity," she said. "Salinity, of course, is a factor, but we get shock reports year-round, and, in fact, Florida has the highest national average of contact-voltage incidents, spiking in June."

Sorrel said an average of 30 people a year are killed from stray voltage, but even minor shocks can frighten dogs.

"There's a level of contact voltage called nuisance or tingle which is innocuous, which may just be startling for a pedestrian or a dog walker, but it's terrifying for a dog," she said.

Last March, a Brooklyn dog walker was hospitalized after he was bitten at least 10 times by the dogs when they were frightened by an electrical shock, Sorrel said.

She said she became interested in the problem of stray voltage after reading about a dog named Zorro electrocuted in the West Village in 2001. New York's electric utility Con Edison began to take the problem seriously in 2004 after Jodie Lane, 30, was electrocuted after stepping on a metal plate in the street in the East Village, she said.

Sorrel said Con Edison has begun to address the problem by using nonconductive paint on street lights, replacing metal with fiberglass and replacing traditional street lights with lower-power light-emitted diodes or LED lights.

Contact Tom Sharpe at 986-3080 or tsharpe@sfnewmexican.com.

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