New York Yankees radio announcer John Sterling has a pretty good home run call: “It is high. It is far. It is … gone!”
While that is exciting for a call at Yankee Stadium, home runs don’t garner much excitement for SolarCity and its solar array behind town hall — just past the outfield fence of the town’s recreational softball field. Since the 1,118 panels were installed in 2013, a large number of solar panels have been destroyed by the long ball of the slow-pitch softball players that go more than 25 feet over the outfield fence and into the panels.
Town Manager Richard J. Johnson said a combination of newer bats and balls that go farther have shown the need to install protective netting along the field’s outfield fence. During a recent visit, about a dozen solar panels with circular smash marks in them were piled next to a generator.
“When it was put in, SolarCity said to us, ‘We are going to see what the softballs do to the panels.’ And there’s some long ball hitters in the softball league. So they need to put up some protective fencing … We don’t have much of a choice. That’s a significant investment. But they wanted to see how it would work and they are losing some panels.”
Johnson said 30-foot-high poles will be installed behind the fence along with black nylon netting. The fencing will be paid for by SolarCity. The town signed a 20-year agreement with the company, which has also placed thousands of panels at Glastonbury High School and the town garage.
“It’s a black nylon that will pretty much disappear. It’s about as aesthetic as we can get it,” Johnson said.
About Redden Custom Netting
In 1958, John Redden started Redden Net Co. Ltd to supply commercial fishing gear to the fishing communities of the Pacific Northwest. Now, more than fifty years later, we have an in-house net loft staffed by professional, experienced net builders – and our executive team has more than 100 combined years of experience in every facet of industrial netting. So no matter what industry you’re in, if you need a net, we can build it.
Over the last fifty years, our technology, applications, and materials have become more complex, but our business philosophy remains simple. Treat employees and customers – right. We do. And we’ll do it for you.
Contact:
Phone: 1.800.667.9455 (Toll Free)
Email: info@redden-net.com
Web: http://redden-net.com