Wind Turbine Shutdown - Surprise

There are 350 wind turbines located along the Buffalo Ridge Wind Farm cluster near our place in SW Minn.

I have never seen them all operating at the same time, when we go there.

They automatically feather the vanes, as needed, during heavy winds. This is noted in the cited piece.

I was not aware that shutting down wind turbines because it is too windy was an uncommon site?

Around here it happens all the time!

Salmon Beach, near Esperance on the South Coast of Australia may have found the way to resolve the issue of high winds .... see pic below... bury one of the blades in the dirt.


Actually it is a decommissioned wind turbine, but hey, let's not ruin a good pic story!

Is there still an operating wind turbine there?

I remember seeing an operating unit there back in 1986.

The surprise is when they accidentally hit the turbine's emergency stop and the mechanical brakes kick in. Apparently you don't want to be underneath one of these as the shower of molten metal is rather nasty.

_{Jack - Told to me by someone who had this happen and had to explain the damage to their company car which was unfortunately parked right underneath when this happened.}

As part of the emergency braking system, you would think that a load bank 'short circuit' could be first applied, (even with reverse current), even for a few seconds as part of the emergency braking cycle with the hot metal shower.

Obviously under normal emergency stop procedures other things are supposed to happen to reduce the turbine speed first (such as turning the blades, etc) before the brake is thrown, but if you accidentally bypass these safety measures (which I am told actually happened on a windy day with the turbine running at speed) get ready for a fireworks show.

What's really unfortunate is I was a few weeks late to the site and so missed the event myself.