pwr_october-2023 - 32

MARNIE SURFACEBLOW
Haunted Hydroelectric Horrors!
Providing employees with a safe and healthy workplace is paramount. Never
dismiss persistent workplace environmental complaints, no matter how " crazy "
they may seem.
Una Nowling, PE
A
lone SUV motored through
wooded hills on a late October
night. The woods were blanketed
by fog so thick it sometimes obscured
vision past the end of the hood. Maya
Sharma, lead field engineer for Surfaceblow
& Associates International,
cautiously navigated the route while
Maya's boss and the company's vice
president, Marnie Surfaceblow, stared
at the fog with wonder.
" This is great! The hills, the forest, the
fog-and we're hunting ghosts! It's ...
it's ... like I'm back in the haunted woods
of Scotland! " Marnie bounced in her
seat with joy.
Maya frowned. " So ... ma'am, our
contract says we are traveling to this
hydroelectric power station to both investigate
and, um, I believe it says in
the contract 'exorcise, with all available
resources'... ghosts. Why? " she asked.
Marine laughed and replied, " Because
they're ghosts! Will-o'-the-wisps! Specters,
spirits, asuras, ... "
" Forgive me, but I must a-sure you
there are no asuras here, " Maya pronounced
with confidence, then added,
" Besides, I am Hindu, I follow Maa Kali,
and asuras are terrified by her. "
" Ah ... but does her mantle of protection
cover you and your boss? I recall Kali
used a trident and sword to fight asuras.
I have a trident, although I didn't bring it,
but you don't even have a single sword
of your own. " Marnie paused and mused,
" Isn't your birthday coming soon? "
Anticipating an awkward moment in
the near future, Maya quickly asked, " But
ma'am, why would a physical object have
any effect upon incorporeal objects? "
" Easy! " Marnie exclaimed with a broad
smile and green eyes sparkling in the dashboard
lights. " We use a magic sword! "
" We have neither tridents nor
swords; nor will you find nunchaku, vials
of blessed water from the Ganga, or
anything unusual in our luggage. Please,
no more talk about ghosts. " Maya focused
on the road as the streetlights
of Nixie, West Virginia, became visible
through the thinning fog. Within minutes
they reached their hotel and Maya
parked under the front awning. There
was some struggle retrieving their personal
bags, as the SUV was packed with
special equipment Marnie had brought.
As they walked through the reception
door, Marnie said flatly, " Oh, the hotel's
haunted too. "
" Of course it is, " answered Maya with
a sigh.
Unsettling Occurrences
Maya warmed her hands with mint tea
as she and Marnie shared breakfast at
the hotel with two of their clients-Lead
Night Operator Fiona Maus and Technical
Superintendant Rhys Owens, who descended
from Northumbrian steam engineers
and Welsh miners, respectively.
The breakfast buffet was unremarkable,
save for Marnie horrifying the staff by filling
her four-liter thermos with the " bottomless
coffee " option. After the usual
small talk about the weather, Rhys began
sharing the backstory.
" The plant started as a run-of-river
grain mill in about 1810, and we don't
know much 'bout the history until 1892.
Someone put a DC generator on the
wheel, and gave the town the first electricity
folks hereabouts had ever seen.
It caught on pretty quick, so townsfolk
raised money and dammed the river,
flooding the upper valley. The dam wasn't
finished until 1910-there were lots of
startup problems. The old-timers claimed
river spirits cursed the dam, " Rhys said.
" Oh, nixies, hence the name of this
Marnie
town, "
said
matter-of-factly.
" Yeah, nixies, naiads, and rusalka don't
like dams. Kelpies and undines can
adapt, and Nessie has no problems. "
There was incredulous silence around
the table, which Marnie seemed oblivious
to. Fiona continued the story in relatively
short order. " Operation started in
1913 with three active and one spare
penstock. They chose these crazy 38-Hz
AC generators, and with all four running
they could reach about 20 MW. I see that
look, Ms. Sharma, you're thinking 'why
38 Hz?' No one seems to know, but
rumors are that Nikola Tesla himself designed
them. There's another hydro plant
in upstate New York using the same generators-I
think it still uses them. "
Setting her coffee down, Marnie eagerly
added, " It was when last I visited
them. They're incredible! The definition
of 'steampunk,' worthy of Webster's. "
Fiona nodded. " They worked, and
1. Marnie rigged up a unique " ghost detector " and connected it to her old laptop as an analyzer.
Source: POWER
32
when the grid settled on 60 Hz, we
used leather-belt pulleys with about a
1.6 to 1 ratio for frequency matching.
But, they were noisy, poorly-balanced
maintenance hogs. So, in 1937, we got
some New Deal money from the government
and swapped three of the four
turbine-generators with 20-MW, 60-Hz
units. The fourth one ... " Fiona trailed
off and Rhys continued.
" We planned to change all four, but
there was an accident trying to replace
www.powermag.com
POWER | October 2023

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PWR_ October-2023

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