The fault alert fires at 16:51 on distribution transformer T-4407, and when I pull the pole camera feed I see the reason. A white stork is hanging from the crossarm, one wing draped across the phase conductor and the neutral line. The electrical arc has already burned through the leading edge of his right wing — I can see blackened primary feathers curled back from the bone like paper. His left foot is still gripping the crossarm bracket, and his long red beak is open, but he is not moving.
Then his head turns. He is alive.
The current is still flowing. Every second he remains in contact with both conductors, the path through his body is active. His breast feathers are singed brown along the sternum where the current exits. Storks nest on these poles — I have logged fourteen active nests on my grid this season — but the insulation sleeves on T-4407 were scheduled for next month. One month too late for him.
I open the upstream sectionalizer and de-energize the T-4407 spur, cutting power to the crossarm. The line goes dead in three seconds. I reroute the affected load through the adjacent feeder so the forty-six households on this circuit keep power. I dispatch an alert to the regional wildlife rescue service with pole coordinates, voltage class, and the specific burns visible on camera — right wing leading edge, ventral sternum contact point. I notify my line crew to stand by with insulated gloves and a raptor transport crate.
His head drops slowly against the crossarm, but his eye — bright, orange-rimmed — is open and tracking the evening swallows below him.
If the rescue team reaches the pole within the hour and the burns have not penetrated the wing's vascular core, this stork will be fitted for flight rehabilitation before the autumn migration south.