Lightening

[skent]

A utility pole in front of a rental house we were living in many years ago was struck one night. The kids had been in bed, and my wife and I were reading at the time. The strike took out the main (200A) breaker in the basement. The kids were going crazy as ALL lights in the area were out and there was NO power anywhere. But when we got to the top of the steps we heard a childs toy playing a tune (Frosty the Snowman). It was this little stuffed deer that you squeezed the front hoof and it would play a song. The toy hadn't worked in months and was burried in the botton of the toybox, but was working now. Had to remove the battery to get it to stop. I guess the static or EMP zapped it into continual playing. Digital clock on the range was the ONLY thing damaged, other than the Main getting blown to bits.

Worst place I've seen lightening was Cape San Blas, FL. I was assigned to the old LORAN 'A' station there in the 70's. We also maintained a Radiobeacon and lighthouse. The LORAN 'A' transmitter there had been built in the 50's. The antenna (160') took regular hits, Transmitter would shut down and come right back on line. I guess they knew how to build them. Of course it was tube type equipment which tends to be more forgiving with the surges. Biggest problem was with the newer equipment (Oscilloscopes and DMM's) we used to maintain the old stuff.

Steve

 

[Bird]

SHF, you mean you don't know how to put that little seal back?/w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif I'm sure electric companies are different everywhere, but out here we read our own meters (they're supposed to check them every 6 months, but actually do it less than once a year). And when I changed out the rotten pole that my meter was on, and put a new master breaker panel on the pole, under the meter, I called the electric company on a Friday and told them I was going to pull the meter to do the job over the weekend. Of course, they said that was fine and they'd send someone to put a new seal on it next week./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

Bird

 

[PBMAX]

Patrickg, Sounds par for the course...They always seem to have to come back later and almost never in the same day...Heres one,that site I went to had 6 out of 7 bad power supplies and a bad monitor unit.Lightening jumped the surge protection and the battery charging sys and the batterys.Guess I shouldn't complain it could have taken out the radios..The power supplies weigh about 1lb the radios 85lbs(modular unit)Hate replacing those radios....Hay ever seen a 150' concrete tower? thats what this ones on.

Laziness is the Father of invention.../w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif
Lil' Paul
Proud owner of TC21D

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Around here you can buy a surge suppressor from the utility company that they put it in your meter box. I think they even replace it when it takes a hit. Something like $125. Note that this will not necessarily protect your house from a strike but every little bit can help. I think underground electric helps with lightning hits because the hit is a little more readily absorbed by the grid and still has to travel through your transformer before trying to wipe out your TV.
Just as important though is to protect your phone lines. I had a surge come in through the phone line that did severe damage to my computer and answering machine. Note that this was after I had unplugged everything that I thought could be damaged by lightning.

 

[patrickg]

Andy, You are a paragon of lightning protection virtue. I know to do better than I have done. Even in this rural but not quite dark side of the moon remote area where we are in south central OK we have our phone distribution system underground along the hwys and section lines and in heavy copper shielded direct buriel cable to the subscribers. Only phone lines above ground near here are the lines inside the houses. The electric power is plain vanilla overhead distribution. That probably explains why our electric power goes out a lot more than our phones do due to lightning. Same thing for ice storms as well. Electric wires go down under weight of ice, yet another benefit of living where it gets just cold enough to have a good freezing rain. Other places I have been got colder and had more snow but less loss of power lines. (-47F and cold walk up a snow drift onto the roof)

If only you could store some of the energy being used to make the fireworks displays you get for later use but no one has a practical method so far.

My hay barn is about a 6000sqft pole barn made from pipe with a corrugated galvanized skin. Until or unless it gets holes blown in the skin I am under the assumption that it is OK in the lightning protection area. I hope so, I have sheltered in it before while camping out on the property in a camper (Shop bld was leased out) and there were thunder storms with predicted heavy hail. We get some pretty impressive light shows here too, or so I think, not having seen yours.

If someone were able to only spend a few days (less than a week) in NH in a pickup camper, what do you think would be the top 3-5 things to see?

Patrick

 

[patrickg]

Paul, I have never seen a concrete radio/antenna tower. I've seen antennas on tall concrete structures. I have climbed a few towers in my day but not for pay. Haven't been much over 150 feet but that was enough for me I am not all that fond of heights (without an airplane suit strapped on), I do it but it isn't the most fun I ever had with my clothes on. Doing things at the mast head of a sailboat at 50 feet can be more exciting than a 100 ft tower. Luckily I never was up during a known lightning situation (tower or boat).

Once while sailing in December (cool clear air with good winds) off the So Cal coast we were sailing up the winward side of Catalina had been to Avalon and were almost circumnavigating the island clockwise. As we approached Catalina harbor (Known locally as Cat harbor, west side of the isthmus where island is only a couple blocks wide) I heard a periodic clicking sound. As the sea state was pretty calm and we were only making about 3-4 kts it was easy to hear sounds that weren't particularly loud. I thought it might be the electronic log (sort of a odometer/trip meter) that is driven off the knot meter. It is driven by a series of DC pulses and increments in 100ths of a nautical mile. I thought it strange that I had never heard it before but went merrily along with NO WORIES, MATE. Over time it slowly got faster but as the wind hadn't picked up or changed to a more favorable direction we hadn't gained any more boat speed. And over time the ticking got a little faster. Very curious this ticking. I engaged the wind vane (a sort of autopilot that steers by the relative wind) and went below decks in pursuit of the source of the ticking. Funny, the VHF radio never ticked like that before... O H M Y G O O D N E S S... Unscrewed and removed PL-259 coax connector from back of radio and there was the ticking. A periodic arcing from the center conductor to the shield. As I was using G O O D coax the dielectric did not break down with the voltage high enough to arc over a quarter of an inch through the air. Probably 25,000volts. My mast head antenna over 50 ft above the water was trying to be a lightning rod and getting fairly close. I shorted a spare SO-239 female coax connector and screwed the end of the antenna lead onto it then jammed it under a 2 inch wide copper ground/bonding strap and thought happy thoughts.

We did not get hit by lightning and for whatever reason the series dc blocking cap in the output of the radio had held and the radio didn't get fried. As I caried a spare antenna, if need be, I could have jury rigged a workable system to call for help if we had taken a hit and survived. That was my L A S T gasoline auxilliary powered sailboat. Of course later I wondered why I didn't give more thought to the fix I had performed, I could have been smoked out of my sox if the antena was hit while I was monkeying around with the connectors etc. When I got home I bought a multi position coax switch with one position reserved to ground the antenna for static/lightning protection thus firmly nailing the barn door shut just after the horse left.

So Paul, a question for you or anyone in the group. Just how safe is it to be on a tractor with a cab in a potential lightning situation. My cab is fiberglass on top (no protection except rain, snow, wind, blowing dust, etc.) and wouldn't do squat regarding lightning protection. As it has a built in ROPS there is good metal at all four corners. Maybe I could put some thin metal on the top and bond it electrically to the metal frame of the ROPS structure. Not that I want to work in thunder storms but stuff happens fast and you don't always get a good advanced warning. Lighning wise I don't think I am particularly safer with the cab than standard ROPS. Any thoughts?

Patrick

 

[patrickg]

kubotadriver, For some real enlightning lightning info, check the stats on the average number of people killed annually in the US from lightning strikes while they are on the phone. Cordless could literally be a life saver. I haven't seen a breakout on how many got zapped at the computer keyboard from lightning via the modem or AC power.

Patrick

 

[patrickg]

Re: Lightning

Ernie, Ball or rolling lightning? Nope, heard and read about it but never witnessed that "plasma" display. I used to be amused by the old timers talking about sheet lightning. Best I could figure it was just plain vanilla cloud-ground or cloud-cloud lightning obscurred from direct view by intervening clouds so that the cloud lights up but you can't see a well defined bolt. Also heard references to "heat" lightning which I think is the same thing.

Patrick

 

[Wingnut]

never had the pleasure .... but I can report one "twice removed" experience. My mother tells me she was in the room when, during a thunderstorm, my grandfather pointed at something out the window and a bolt of lightning came through the window, burned a line up his arm, across his shoulder and burned an exit hole and blasted out the opposite window. Did see the scar so don't think it was an April fools' joke ... Oh and, yes, he did live for another 45 years ...

too bad that common sense ain't

 

[skent]

Baltimore Gas and Electric offers a similar device. They will cover any loss from a "Man Made Surge" that damages any electrical appliances connected to the grid. This would cover switchgear accidents, sub-station glitches, surges/sags caused by industrial switching loads and crossed lines. They say (in the fine print) that it 'could' reduce the chance of damage due to lightening strikes in the area, but any damage due to close (could you define close???) or direct power line strikes would not be covered.
We typically unplug sensitive devices (TV/Computer/Maytag Washer) anytime lightening it in the area.

On second thought, maybe I'll leave that Pentium P75 computer plugged in next time (time to upgrade?)

Steve

 

[Youare]

I live in southern New Hampshire and in the summer we can get some pretty intense thunder storms. One summer back a few years we got one of those storms while the wife and I we out of town. The night before we left I had been putting some wood in the woodshed which was about 20 feet from the house. The woodshed had a metal roof. I had hung a drop light from a nail in one of the rafters which was plugged into a weather tight outlet box on the side of the house.

When we left I unplugged the light. Just 10 feet from the wood shed was a big old pine tree, the base measured 52" across. Upon returning home late the next evening I saw a huge tangle of pine limbs along the back side of the house. Lighting had struck the pine tree exploding the tree about 30 feet off the ground. The top of the treee was hurled toward the roof of the house, one of the branches hit the chimeny and a few shingles were torn. The top of the tree some 40 feet long lay along side the house with the tip touching the base of the tree.

The intresting things is the lighting craved a path down the tree trunk to the height of the woodshed roof. The drop light, still hanging in place had it's blub blown to pieces. One of the two wires in the cord was blown out in at least a dozen places. The plug at the end of the cord was blown somewhere. It had been laying close to a corner of the block foundation of the house, which was now missing a chunk 8" high by 3" or 4" deep. That's all the damage there was.

I was thankful the light was unplugged from the outlet, and that I was not home when it happened.

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Bird,

Oh yes, we have the pleasure of reading our own meters too. We even get to pay more for it. /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif.

Around here they get a little upset when you cut that seal. Usually when I've needed something done, I've just called the power company and had them come pull their meter. Of course, that leaves me running on the generator for a couple of days. But, I figure they don't charge for it and I don't have to worry about the tag. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif. They've actually been pretty good about pulling and re-connecting, they've been right on time or ahead of time. Actually disconnected before I was quite ready last time.

SHF

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Re: Lightning

ErnieB

I think I may have seen the ball type. I was just a boy, 13 or 14. I can remember this bright blob shooting through the house. Out of the kitchen, through the dining room into the living room and smack into the TV. Happened real fast, and I'm still not sure what it was.

SHF

 

[Bird]

Re: Lightning

We had a little bit of thunder and lightning during the night last night; sure wish there'd been some rain with it./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

Bird

 

[patrickg]

Youare, I don't know... If yo could have known in advance the extent of the damage, it would have been interesting to have watched from a safe distance. That being impossible (OK for the scifi types - - UNLIKELY) you had the best outcome possible in the circumstances, no one hurt and minimal damage to stuff. What a story!

Patrick

 

[PBMAX]

patric,I suppose the ROPS might take the initail hit but, I wouldn't count on the tractor to take even the slightest off a hit.Even if it's just the static discharge.Think about it this way.If you are in an auto and it gets popped.In theory the body of it conducts the electricity around you and bleads it off to the ground etc.You mean while atleast have the car seat and other non condictive materials to help shield you some what from the medal body.(Still no garentee there)While on your tractor all you have is your comfie seat and a pad under your feet.Now how much painted metal are your sitting next to? remeber how we have mentioned how lightening likes to supprise us with how well and far it can jump...?It comes down to how it makes you feel when you know it's lightening and your odds.I will addmit I don't typically jump off the tractor and go in side(ya I know it's stupid).IF it isn't a close storm. Being on a Mtn I can see them way off. So I've kinda learned to count in the back of my head while working outside.Close by 5mls or less.Gotto pick some #.I head toward the cassa...ALL in ALL it's still a judgement call...What do you feel safe doing...Or at what point do you feel unsafe? ONLY YOU KNOW...I do know you can trust lightening to do what ever,when ever, How ever it wants to....no matter how well we gaurd against it.

Laziness is the Father of invention.../w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif
Lil' Paul
Proud owner of TC21D

 

[patrickg]

I hate it when I know better but won't act on my knowledge. Sure, a lightning hit on the tractor can be fatal. Lightning has been known to strike from as far as 10 miles away with no clouds in sight and hit people (documented by lightning researcher). So to be really lightning safe you can't ride a tractor out of doors. Unless you have some sort of ionization detection or Kilivolt meters with remote sensors and alarms. (A team of spotters with radios would be handy.)

OR like Paul and I, just do it but rely on dumb luck to preserve us while we pretend that we will be safe enough if we quit when our pucker factor gets to some subjectivly variable threshold.

As a young lad in Ohio I didn't know any better and used to like to ride my bike in thunderstorms. I thought since there were power and phone lines on poles way above little ole me that it was safe.

Life is uncertain, eat dessert first, then go tractorin'.

Patrick

 

[Anonymous Poster]

When I was a kid my grandmother had ball lightning come in one window of her house and exit out another window. No damage to anything as I recall.

PitbullMidwest

 

[ERNIEB]

Re: Lightning

SHF, Sounds like it was. Here is a site on ball lightning
http://www-bprc.mps.ohio-state.edu/~bdaye/balligh.html No photos. In fact I can't find any photos of it period, I guess none exists.

Ernie

 

[ERNIEB]

Re: Lightning

Had the same thing here Bird. A few drops fell, but not even enough to settle the dust. I guess some areas did get some rain.

Ernie