What are the colored balls hanging on power transmission line cables? What are they called? What is Balisor?

What are the colored balls hanging on power transmission line cables? What are they called? What is Balisor?

Answer:

The colored balls installed along the length of wire on overhead transmission line are called as aerial marker balls. This colored balls act as visual warning for low flying aircraft's so that conductor wires can be seen by pilots to avoid accidents.

Aerial marker ball or Colored ball

Explanation:

Power transmission lines are the tall strcutures which carry electricity through conductor wires from generating station to different distribution units. it has 4 main parts

1        1.  Grounded Metal Tower

2        2.Overhead Ground wires

3        3. Insulators

          4.Conductor wires

Power Transmission line 

But Power transmission tower height is threat to low flying aircraft's especially during take off and landing. The conductor wires are too thin to be noticed from inside the cockpit and their color is such that they blend in the background making it even more difficult for pilots to spot them.

The Plastic balls hanging along the length of conductor wire  are used to highlight structure to make visually recognizable for the aircraft pilots. They are often used when transmission lines cross major highways , valleys, etc.

Marker balls on Power Line

Plastic ball is mostly installed on Overhead ground wires because it is the top most wire on transmission line.

What is Balisor?

Some countries use Balisor instead of Marker balls.

Balisor is a system of glowing beacons that use Cold-Cathode low pressure neon lamps positioned along the length of high-voltage power lines which are used as aircraft warning light.

Balisor - Neon Lamps