This is the frame of the "search beam" appearing:
I'm pointing to the lamp we're talking about. It turns on for a moment, and then turns back off.
This is the nub for me.
From my experience as an aeronautical engineer, dealing mainly in Avionics (although I'm also a qualified sparky and have wired and rewired a number of houses) I can tell you that when power is restored to a circuit, not all lights on that circuit illuminate at exact the same time. If you have LED lamps and incandescents on the same circuit, a momentary contact can result in the incandescents starting to flick on but the LED lamps remain out. This is because most household LED lamps have a
"driver" which ensures that the voltage and current are correct. There can even be variations between incandescents depending on the wattage and the type of filaments they use.... a 40w household lamp will light even with momentary contact, but a 500w floodlight would barely show a flicker. Lamps not coming on at exactly the same time when power is momentarily restored is commonplace and not proof of aliens.
Also, I will add that, for someone who claims to be an expert in electrical systems, the OP sure does miss a lot of knowledge of those systems, for example, he clearly has never heard of a
"recloser" or a
"sectionalizer", nor know what their function is (though I have no doubt that upon reading this post, he will rush off and Google these terms, then come back and claim he knew exactly what they are all along).
Reclosers are automatic, high-voltage electric switches which are distributed throughout the electric grid, from substations to residential power poles. They range in size from small ones used on single-phase power lines, to large three-phase ones on substations and on high-voltage power lines. Their function is to automatically shut-off the power grid when a fault condition occurs, then within a few seconds, test the circuit to see if the fault condition was temporary, or if it still exists. This is done by automatically "reclosing" the circuit, and if the fault is still there, it will shut off again. Multiple reclosers are deployed so that they also act as sectionalizers, ensuring that a whole grid doesnlt drop off because of a fault in one section of the grid.
Anyone who has experienced power outages will have experienced the effect of these devices themselves... and it usually manifests in one or the other of two ways. Firstly, you might have had a power-out in which the the power goes off, then a few seconds later, comes back on, and stays on. This is because the recloser did its job correctly.. it tripped the power off, then tested the circuit by trying to turn the power on and because the the fault condition no longer existed, it left the power on. Secondly, you might have had a power-out in which the the power goes off, then a few seconds later, flickers back on before going out again. That is the recloser doing it job again. It tripped the power off, then tested the circuit by trying to turn the power on and because the the fault condition still existed, it left the power off.
Not sure how they work in the US, but here reclosers can only test the circuit once before tripping off permanently, and requiring a manual reset.
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