Yeah, the news guys are pretty clueless.
"2 to 8 guage wire". Unh, what? More like #2 to 500MCM wire!!
"700 to a million to replace". Depends on what the sparky who said this was meaning: to fix back up the way it was before it was trashed, or to provide a pile of cable in the middle of the floor large enough to fix the damage, WITHOUT installation costs factored in. A million bucks of raw cable is a lot of cable, and from what they've shown us, the thieves gutting a few motor control centers. And they took the time to strip at least some copper out of the insulation, so they weren't feeling very rushed.
From what I've seen the copper might be worth a few 10s of thousands at the going scrap rate. The big cost is to repair the damage.
To be much more than that in just a couple of days of demolition would involve more than a couple of guys and would need a truck or two and a machine like a Bobcat or something.
Just my 2 cents...at spot market value!! ;>)
Jon.
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