[GOPJ]

Construction crews and utility workers are as careful or not as they've always been. That hasn't changed. Either dogs have been shocked for some time and it wasn't reported, or something new has entered the system.

After the electrocution in New York, Con Ed tested about 260,000 underground structures, manholes, metal plates and service boxes and found less than 1 percent of them had stray voltage, company spokesman Joe Petta said. Still, two more dogs were shocked in New York this week.

In Boston, the main utility, NStar, took out full-page ads in the Boston Herald and The Boston Globe this week, pledging to check more than 30,000 manholes. But they blamed construction crews, not utility workers.

"It is unacceptable when construction crews can damage our system, walk away from a dangerous situation and then assume no responsibility for what they have done," NStar president Thomas J. May said in the ad.

[TexKat]

or something new has entered the system.

I know that there is a looooooooooooooot that I am not aware of. But this is the first for me. Like you I wonder if something new has entered the system. With all the construction that is going on here in Texas and elsewhere one would think there would be more out in the media.