dimming house lights

There is a phenomenon known as "in-rush current" which occurs every time a load is applied to an electrical circuit or system. This is why you see a momentary dimming of lights when your A/C kicks in, or dryer, etc. The available current rushes to the load as it seeks earth. Normal, and doesn't matter if your system is old or new, it can and will happen, though to varying degree.
If you are noticing dimming/flickering lights even when new loads are not being applied to the system and, especially today during windy conditions, then there very well may be an issue on the supply side of the current coming onto the premises.
Even though the Utility owns the meter, you own and are responsible for the wiring from the point of attachment of the service, through the meter can and on throughout the premises. If you contact the Utility regarding this issue, they will more than likely tell you to have an electrician check things out first.
A licensed electrician should check and tighten all connections that are accessible, starting with the service panels on the breakers themselves, as well as every neutral connection on the neutral buss. Also have them check line/load at the meter itself. If everything checks out and you have proper voltage ( different than ampacity ) everywhere, then the Utility should agree to check connections on upstream wiring, including at the point of attachment to the premise, transformers on poles, etc.
During a storm situation like you have today, temporary dimming could be a type of brown out, where the wind is causing wiring on poles to contact things they normally shouldn't, which can lead to a very quick short circuit, not long enough to cause the protective devices to shut down the system.

it also depends on your service entrance amperage and feed wire gauge from the pole, and where you are in relationship to neighbors, and the step down tranny on the closest pole, the pole transformers burden, size, age and condition matter as well, we rewired my brothers house, he's first feed off a transformer pole that was just replaced, his power is now clean and steady. I could be wrong on all this though, i'd trust whatever keymod says as he's a pure electrician by trade i believe.

It depends, and I'm not sure if it's the same for the US because you guys don't have neutrals on all your sockets. The RCD's should detect if the ground or neutral has begun floating up to too a high voltage, which contact with other conductors could cause.

Fuses and breakers can be unfortunately very slow in that they can take several milliseconds up to 1sec for a "Slow Blow" fuse. Usually in most devices the first think an overvoltage kills is a zener or the first transistor it meets. A protection diode is good in this case as it can stop the circuit being eaten by a bad voltage before the fuse blows.

AFCI's are faster, but it's only a new code in the US that these need to be in every room - right? Your friend might need to check he has these and that they're all functional. Likewise for yourself.

Not sure if I'm more or less relieved by the idea that you have neutrals but not grounds. For us it's 3 pins, all the time. I know people say the UK/Irish plug is one of the most over engineered in the world - but I don't consider that an insult. I know parts of the US are more arid and drifting grounds could make for tripping RCDs, but you just gotta bury that thing deep (and failing that, I've heard of people watering them). Anything over 60V has to be taken seriously, it's a health risk.

No problem on the AFCI stuff. It was actually my curiosity that made me go over my old freshman knowledge on domestic electronics!

The neutrals are ground we have the 3 pin's in OZ also but the reality is back at the switch board the neutral and earth are tied together they are basically the same as far as the equipment is concerned.

High voltage falling onto the low voltage line will almost always blow your equipment the fuses are current triggered not voltage so if you have a 63 amp main breaker it has to exceed 63 amps for it to trip. One guess where the current goes and no you cannot put the smoke back in

thank you for your post.
I'm sure you know more than I.

that said, I would like to tell you what I have recently read and been told by an electrician friend.

say you have an appliance.
and the motor has a problem.
insulation is bad and a bare wire on one of the windings (a normal current carrying wire), has now broke and is touching the metal casing of the appliance.
that casing is now hot.
if it is grounded properly, current will go through the ground wire (which is a not normal current carrying wire), back to the circuit breaker panel, transfer there to the neutral wire (because the neutral and ground are bonded at the circuit breaker panel), go back on the neutral to the transformer at the utility pole, then back on the hot wire to the circuit breaker, and trip it.
this happens very fast.
there is a brief (short), intense current, which is what trips the breaker.

this was the first time I had seen the word "short ", used this way.
anyways, just throwing it out there, man.

thank you for that post.
I put a gfci in for the pool filter outside in the backyard for my Dad in 1984, when they may have been kinda new.
I had forgotten the details. I haven't put one in, in a long time now.

I just read the wiki. if I read it right, it said that you can install them where there's only a hot and a neutral.
you don't have to add or run a new ground wire.
hmmmmm.
got some more reading to do.

This is a photo of an outlet which burned due to a loose connection causing an ARC over time. This box isn't even grounded properly, though a ground would not have prevented this. As load passed through this outlet downstream to an outlet that was being used for a sump pump, the loose connection heated up and expanded/contracted over time, getting more and more loose. The looser it got, with load passing through, the more heat was generated until ignition in the wall occurred. The circuit breaker didn't trip because it did not sense an overload or a short circuit. This is a situation where an ARC Fault breaker or device would have prevented a fire.