The Billy Positioning System (BPS)

A little "engineer humor" from one of our Power and Structures engineers...Enjoy!

It’s the 21st century and most of us have either used GPS on our phone, NAV in our car, or some other type of directional system to help find our way around town. However, William L. Allen Jr. (Billy), an engineer here at Memphis Light, Gas and Water has shunned those technologies, and has created his own positioning system utilizing over 10,000 network connections to produce geographical results in a matter of yoctoseconds. It is known as the Billy Positioning System, or BPS for short.

Billy has memorized the location of over 60 substations in the MLGW system. He also knows how they are all connected via 161 kV (kilovolt) transmission lines and 23 kV or 12 kV distribution circuits. When Billy needs to determine which direction he is headed in, he looks at the transmission lines along the road and says something like, “That’s a 161 kV transmission line because it uses the larger insulators and thicker conductor, and if we’re in the Cordova area, it must connect Substation 39 to Substation 72 from the north side, therefore quite simply, we’re heading west.” (Billy’s wife does not appreciate the power of BPS as much as his fellow engineers.)
So, the next time you’re lost and the NAV in your car goes kaput, give Billy a ring, describe the nearest transmission line to him, and he’ll get you going in the right direction!