This is a true story that happened about 30 years ago.
Our boy scout troop was in a cabin in Blue Ridge mountains.
A few of us were hiking down the road. There were a few large
manholes on the side of the road.

We opened one. It was about 3 ft deep. As near as I can remember it
had only one cable inside. The cable was flexible and had a tee in
the middle with a removable rubber cap.

One of the guys thought it was a water valve. He stuck his thumb into
the "valve" thinking he was going to wet the rest of us and a blue
flame shot out. It cooked his thumb nail.

If I remember the details, it was only one conductor. The tee must
have been there to be able to plug in another line in the future. It
was almost like it was a quick connect plug.

Of course, we never told the scoutmaster. Anyone have more info on
what exactly we were messing with?

Terry wrote:
This is a true story that happened about 30 years ago.
Our boy scout troop was in a cabin in Blue Ridge mountains.
A few of us were hiking down the road. There were a few large
manholes on the side of the road.

We opened one. It was about 3 ft deep. As near as I can remember it
had only one cable inside. The cable was flexible and had a tee in
the middle with a removable rubber cap.

One of the guys thought it was a water valve. He stuck his thumb into
the "valve" thinking he was going to wet the rest of us and a blue
flame shot out. It cooked his thumb nail.

If I remember the details, it was only one conductor. The tee must
have been there to be able to plug in another line in the future. It
was almost like it was a quick connect plug.

Of course, we never told the scoutmaster. Anyone have more info on
what exactly we were messing with?

Yeah, an old wive's tale.

"Pop`" wrote in message
news:RXbfi.4564$xy.2806@trnddc06...
Terry wrote:
This is a true story that happened about 30 years ago.
Our boy scout troop was in a cabin in Blue Ridge mountains.
A few of us were hiking down the road. There were a few large
manholes on the side of the road.

We opened one. It was about 3 ft deep. As near as I can remember it
had only one cable inside. The cable was flexible and had a tee in
the middle with a removable rubber cap.

One of the guys thought it was a water valve. He stuck his thumb into
the "valve" thinking he was going to wet the rest of us and a blue
flame shot out. It cooked his thumb nail.

If I remember the details, it was only one conductor. The tee must
have been there to be able to plug in another line in the future. It
was almost like it was a quick connect plug.

Of course, we never told the scoutmaster. Anyone have more info on
what exactly we were messing with?

Yeah, an old wive's tale.
Or maybe they were picking the wrong mushrooms up there in the mountains.

On Sat, 23 Jun 2007 11:14:49 -0400, Terry
wrote:

Our boy scout troop was in a cabin in Blue Ridge mountains.
A few of us were hiking down the road. There were a few large
manholes on the side of the road.

Theere are no manholes in the Blue Ridge mountains.

Although it is interesting that where there is just forest now, there
were once farms. On both sides of where Skyline Drive is now. It was
bad farming on the side of a mountain, even a short mountain, and when
the Midwest became available, most of those farmers went there. Their
houses collapsed, the forest filled their fields and ripped up their
"roads". I think maps give the location of a few visible remnants of
what was there around 200 years ago.

The "T" sounds like a splice. The cap could be covering a set screw.
Something like this: http://www.aplussupply.com/nsipolaris/polarisblue.htm
but for high voltage



"Terry" wrote in message
...
This is a true story that happened about 30 years ago.
Our boy scout troop was in a cabin in Blue Ridge mountains.
A few of us were hiking down the road. There were a few large
manholes on the side of the road.

We opened one. It was about 3 ft deep. As near as I can remember it
had only one cable inside. The cable was flexible and had a tee in
the middle with a removable rubber cap.

One of the guys thought it was a water valve. He stuck his thumb into
the "valve" thinking he was going to wet the rest of us and a blue
flame shot out. It cooked his thumb nail.

If I remember the details, it was only one conductor. The tee must
have been there to be able to plug in another line in the future. It
was almost like it was a quick connect plug.

Of course, we never told the scoutmaster. Anyone have more info on
what exactly we were messing with?