Amigoe.com
Feb. 22, 2005

Flamingoes caused power failure 

CURACAO – The districts Jandoret, Curasol, and Boca Sami had power failure last Friday and Saturday evening between 22:00 and 23:00.  They are not sure yet what had caused this problem, but Aqualectra surmises that a flamingo is the culprit.  The other districts were not affected. 

Spokesperson Sharo Bikker explained that there is an electric cable that goes along the saltpans on the road to Bullenbaai.  “It is possible that a flamingo flew against the cable at night, but it is also possible that a flamingo had already done this during daytime, which had a delayed effect till nighttime and caused the power failure”, said Bikker.

When they traced the cable during daytime, they found nothing out of the ordinary.  The only thing Aqualectra observed was that there are many more flamingoes in the saltpans, and that these have also moved some.  The cable in question goes partly over a dam that is currently submerged.  There was a power failure in the same districts a week earlier around 22:00.  At that time, the cable fell into the water of the saltpans.  The engineers had to use a boat to solve the problem.

I'd be hard pressed to believe that unless their cables are held together by Scotch tape. A full growing Flamingo only weighs about 8 pounds - he'd have to be humming along at Mach Two in order to create that sort of damage :-)

Jake

Might be one of the new stealth flamingos that the Dutch army is prototyping. This would explain why the engineers couldn't see anything out of the ordinary, as well as the speed necessary to affect the cables.

I love news reporting like this. "This might have happened, but we don't really know for sure, so let's print it as news!"

Wow!

They have Flamingo Turbo GTS in Curacao!

Perhaps a new idea for DCA?

Harrie

Unless a flamingo shorted out two parallel wires-- a flying flamingo has the length to do that. There is at least one documented case of birds shorting out adjacent transmission lines in the States; read about it years ago.

A little competition for Divi Divi Air?? ;)

I'm telling you- my husband saw that huge 'flamingo person' flying first class out of Florida- probably a (gasp!) terrorist who dressed up, snuck down to Bonaire and sabotaged the power lines so that everyone would have to go elsewhere and leave the great diving and all to us!! (The stealth flamingos referenced earlier!!)

The Flamingo Man Prophecies.

Hmmm, strange things happening on Curaçao... Maybe they had a testflight with the new stealth Flamingo schedueld in the WEB plant on Bonaire as well??

You guys are cracking me up...Jake, your comment reminds me of the line from Monty Python and the Holy Grail..."how much does a swallow weigh"....maybe a flamingo carrying a coconut is the culprit...

Side note, since I've received my flamingo hat from Fredster...Dylon is REALLY interested in seeing the wild flamingos (really)...who cares about the fish or donkey's...take me to the flamingos...LOL!