My Uncle, Sig Sakowitz was a great conductor for the B & O Railroad-he was struck by lightning.

Thanks very much for a vivid and informative account.

The lightning stroke that damaged the oak tree and vaporized the extension cord was one of the rare (I think) high-current strokes. "High current" means that the strike produces a high current that flows through and damages whatever it has attached to on the ground. Many strikes produce no damage at all to the flagpoles or buildings or trees they attach to.

This particular account is very interesting in that it was witnessed by an educated and interested observer.

But I'm afraid that I can't agree with the precautions the writer mentions, very simply because we cannot know if they are helpful. You could stand facing a tree that you think is likely to be struck, only to find that your feet are planted firmly along the path of the ground current, which typically does not proceed along and through the earth in an orderly manner. Moreover, the odds are impossibly long that lightning will strike where you think it will.

Keeping one's feet together while crouching makes it easy to fall over into the mud and impossible to move. At least one of the many different sets of lightning safety rules dictates that one should propel one's self in this manner by hopping to safety. I challenge anyone to try this, lightning storm or not.

Lightning current typically does not travel through the earth like low-frequency substation fault current. It ionizes a trail through the earth that is similar in shape to that which it takes in air; hopping from one easily broken-down region of the soil to the next.

One note regarding the previous comment about the unfortunate B & O conductor. The retired railroad engineers who volunteer for a short tourist railway near me have many lightning stories, many concerning ball lightning.

And as always, thanks to Mr Holt for providing this newsletter.

Kinda makes you wonder how Mike can publish things like this that seem to discuss massive ground currents in a responsible manner, yet still be on the side of irresponsible swimming pool installers who thumb their noses at proper bonding methods.

Many thousands of amps flow during a lightning strike, but when a swimming pool is so poorly bonded that its users are getting shocked by a few amps of earth current, Mike's answer is to blast the local electric utility.

What a great accounting of lightning. Twice I have had the pleasure to view lightening up close and personal and my respect for >500kv is very real.

As a side note, Nicola Tesla did a fantastic amount of work on this. Its a wonder to me with this much explosive energy that our government still regards this as science fiction. Back in the 1980's there is an accounting of a mushroom cloud over the Pacific around the Aleutian islands towards the Russian side that recorded no radiation in any band. I always wonder if another government will harness the power of lightning. Any wonder why North Korea has invested in more electricity than it needs via nuclear power....

It looks to me that with a polarization like a giant capacitor that any path that is the least resistance point is where lightning will strike. The cord in the ground probably did the trick rather than the oak tree. There are certain iron rich trees in Arizona that actually attract energy and dissipate currents through its trunk and roots. Its an amazing tree and evidence is a plenty that this tree saves the forest. Magic in our midst.

The university of Florida did a study by shooting rockets with small wires attached to ground into clouds ripe with energy to simulate lightning. The key was the least resistance path that led to their success which was underground water pipes, underground electrical tubing and the wire as well. Our worst enemy with regards to this is the laying of underground wire. Our best friend is the old lightning rods which provide a near focused point that has a low impedance path to ground.

In the year 1974 I did experience a nasty shock as I was talking over telephone in Trivandrum, India. There was a lightening and all I remeber is a shark shock over to my right ear and right hand. As I was still recovering from learning what had happened, my collegue Mr. Abdul Kalam,now president of Inida, came out of his room saying that a lghtening had been all over his room. At that moment I felt glad to be left surviving by the lightening. I feel much of the energy from the lightening was dissapated inside the room wiring and I must have got a small fraction of the total enegy and that was terrific.