There are times as a Thermographer when you find something that genuinely scares you.
The electrical connection shown in the image below reached a maximum temperature of 458°C before we got ourselves (and the client’s electrician) out of the Switchroom.
The fault was identified during a full electrical thermographic survey of an incredibly high profile building in London and the likely outcome of leaving this much longer would have been a short circuit between the phases and a probable explosion and fire.
We showed the images and data to the engineering manager on site who scheduled an immediate shutdown to allow repair work to take place. The shutdown only lasted for 45 minutes but allowed the site electricians to repair and clean up this critical connection.
It is not often that we come across fault conditions as severe as this thankfully and we prefer to identify issues during the early stages. There are however many occurrences (some of which sadly make the news headlines) where electrical faults do cause explosions and fires.