Retrieve and move on

By this morning the wind had stopped and it was possible to go and survey the damage at Goodlie Hill.  Bill and I walked up and met John, the land owner, who had taken the ladder up on his quad bike and trailer.  This is what we found.

The wreckage!

Not much could be salvaged.  The battery had landed on the solar panel and bent it, The wind turbine was in bits, not all of them to hand, and the electronics were water-logged.  With a couple of new antennae the mesh-box might still work.

Mesh-box, solar panel and battery

Wind turbine - remains

The force of the wind had obviously been terrific.  Welds on the steel frame had broken, steel bolts had snapped and coach bolts fixing brackets to the tree had bent.  It's just over a year since the wind turbine was installed and in that time we'd only had to replace the battery once (a month ago).  Now there will no longer be an off-grid power solution in use as part of the GAB network.

Ready to roll

Fortunately the new pole with the NanoStations remains rock-solid on the tree, presumably offering much less wind resistance than the old pole and wind turbine.

So, undaunted, we loaded the wreckage onto the trailer after first unloading our reel of steel wire armoured mains cable.  We then set off down the hill with the reel and laid the cable across the surface of the field all the way to Bill's place at the bottom of the hill where it will be connected to his domestic electricity supply.
 

Bill proudly shows off the reel after laying the cable

Adrian, the electrician, has very kindly agreed to reschedule his work so that we can get the Nanos powered up next week and subscribers back online.

Of course this is just a temporary fix.  In due course a trench will be dug along the route of the cable and the cable will be buried underground out of harm's way and posing no danger to livestock.