May have saved an older couple's life today

Today we’re getting set up to do a house wash. It’s raining lightly. We start putting detergent on the left rear corner of the house when I hear pops and see flashes out of the corner of my eye. The meter is sparking! Long story short, I ran to the door and asked them all to come out and bring the dog.

The husband inspected the burn on the house and he thinks it’s been that way for awhile because the hole is scary deep and the lights inside flickered which has happened during the last few rains. We don’t spray within a few feet of electrical anything and will actually hand wash particular spots on a house, but the moral of the story, for me anyway, is always take pics of all things electrical if for no other reason you know what you’re getting into.

After that I drove an hour and 15 to look at a commercial job and ended up turning it down. Now I gotta drive an hour home and feel like I burned a bridge with a sizeable development company. What a day… I’m just really grateful no one was hurt today.

Crazy day huh? Did you notice any damage to the meter before you started washing?

9 times out of 10 I look at those things when I do estimates, but this time I was having a great conversation with the homeowner and didn’t even look. We hadn’t even made it to this part of the house before I heard the pops and I’m glad we didn’t spray it. This is a dumb question, but is it possible that if it had gotten sprayed the electricity could travel up the stream of water and the wand?

Yes it is

Holy smokes… electricity is one of those things that I just don’t care to fool with in any capacity other than plugging something into an outlet.