Shaking hands with the Grim Reaper

[Richard]

Setup: Yesterday had outside faucet on watering lawn. Lightning, thunder, then all heck broke loose.

While storming AND raining, I went downstairs, opened garage door (I was barefoot) walked outside onto gravel and stepped onto a (huge) rock that is the base of our retaining wall (rock was soaking wet). I leaned over to turn faucet off when off in distance was a lighning bolt in the sky and JUST as I was turning it off.. I got shocked. It clearly seemed to be timed with the lightning. My reaction made me jump back several feet and was thinking twice about turning water off again (though I did)

I'm trying to figure out what may have happened. No lightning "seemed" to hit ground nearby, certainly didnt' hit house. If it hit ground elsewhere, why was "I" shocked? I mean, if it hit the ground, wasn't it already grounded?

How was I the conduit from the faucet to (evidently) the rock?
Was this a potential lethal situation?

What if I or someone else was in shower? Would THAT person have been burnt toast?

Washing hands in sink?


In the future, is there anything I can do to minimize or avoid this rather unpleasant "tingling" happening?

There was comment said once about grounding straps bridging ACROSS from either side of the plastic water filter housing I have... that strap is not there... would THAT have prevented this? (btw, Home Depot..here I come for grounding strap)

I'm curious as to any thoughts anyone might have. The jolt I received seemed much more "biting" than a 110 volt that I've had on occasion. Once it was over though, no real tingling sensations or other.... just me, mouth agape wondering if I'd just (luckily) yanked my hand OUT of a handshake with the Grim Reaper.

 

[BB_TX]

<font color=blue>How was I the conduit from the faucet to (evidently) the rock?</font color=blue>
As I understand it, the polarity and potential of the surface of the earth is constantly changing near a thunderstorm as the polarity and potential of the clouds above it change.
For electricity to flow, there must be a potential difference (voltage difference) between the two objects. Since the rock was on the ground and wet, it would be grounded to earth. That would mean the metal faucet was at some voltage difference from ground. If your plastic filter housing isolates your metal plumbing from the earth, then it is possible for that to happen. Could be just static electricity. Could have been the potential of the earth changing. Could be from some other in-house circuit. Is anything in the house grounded to the any metal pipes? You could try connecting a meter from the facet to your ground rod and see if there is a voltage difference there. Also measure across the filter. I think the ground strap is a good idea.
<font color=blue>What if I or someone else was in shower? Would THAT person have been burnt toast?</font color=blue>
Short of a direct lighting strike, I don't think you would feel anything in the shower. The water is in droplets rather than a continuous stream and the electricity would have to jump (arc) across the water drops.

My $.02.

 

[ronjhall]

Richard
Glad to here you were not injured by a lightning strike.
Here is a site that has a lot of information about lightning and it’s potential to cause injury even when not hit by it directly. <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.lightningsafety.com/nlsi_pls.html>CLICK HERE</A>.
There is a public service ad here in the Detroit area that recommends that you not use your phone or touch a water faucet during a lightning storm. /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif/w3tcompact/icons/tongue.gif

 

[Mrwurm]

Richard, every time there is a thunder storm with lightning, my circuit breakers trip for the lines running out to my barn. The breakers are in the garage and are the ground-fault type. They run about 100 ft to the barn. They must pick up inductive current in the gound.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

<font color=blue>There is a public service ad here in the Detroit area that recommends that you not use your phone or touch a water faucet during a lightning storm.</font color=blue>

Unless it's a cordless of course! Then you're perfectly fine. The reason they don't want you to touch the POT (plain old telephone) is you have a direct copper link to the lightning if the fuses don't interupt it.

 

[MossRoad]

In our area you can't have multiple circuits running to an outbuilding. You can have one. If you want more than one, you have to put in a sub panel put in the outbuilding. This eliminates the possibility of multiple paths.

 

[MossRoad]

I like the idea of putting a meter between the ground and the faucet. Could be nothing related to the lightning at all.

We had a relative that was having his house re-sided. The contractor called him outside and put a meter between his water spigot and the aluminum siding. It had voltage on it. The entire side of the house was 'hot'. Seems that when the original siding was put on, they drove a nail into a wire in the house.

 

[PitbullMidwest]

<font color=blue>Unless it's a cordless of course! Then you're perfectly fine</font color=blue>

Unless you're the phone /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

About 10 years ago we had one of the old type cordless phones with the pull up metal antenna on both the base and handset. During a thunderstorm I was on the phone when lightening struck close to the house and a BIG blue bolt shot out of the top of the base antenna /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif. I was all right but the base was toast. I've often wondered if I had been closer to the base unit if it might have arched across to the handset antenna.

Maybe they're safe to use during a thunderstorm, but I choose not to.