[Paddlewise] OK, here's how lightening works

A couple weeks ago, I posted a request for explanations about how
lightening works.  The Discovery Channel just aired a great program.
I'll relate what I can remember.  Rafael, I don't get as much comfort
from your 45-degree umbrella theory anymore.

First, understand that a strike victim suffers both cardiac and
respiratory arrest.  If the heart begins beating again, the victim may
still suffocate without breathing assistance.  So, the first aid
strategy is to work on getting the heart going while supplying the
victim with oxygen.  A doctor whose first aid saved the life of a victim
at RFK Stadium said her heart didn't resume beating on its own for 10
minutes.  That person was seated in a dense crowd of 60,000 at a benefit
rock concert where nearly everything around her was higher, including
the stadium superstructure and the performers onstage with electronic
gear, ... and she was wearing thick rubber soles.  Strikes typically
leave fractal-shaped patterns on victims' flesh.

Lightening comes down from the negative charge in the cloud and picks
its strike location from among electric streamers which rise from the
ground.  As the bolt approaches the ground, it coaxes streamers up from
prospective strike locations, selects one and makes contact.  A picture
of a bolt striking a tree in a farmyard showed a second streamer, which
wasn't selected, rising from the same tree.  Another unselected streamer
rose from a light pole fifty feet away.

Years ago, General Electric performed studies of lightening strikes on
the Empire State Building.  Pictures showed that some struck lower than
the top and some missed altogether, striking the ground alongside the
building.  The explanation is that weaker bolts may be unable to coax
streamers from the ground until the bolt is close to the ground.  Hence,
the bolt had passed the top of the building before a streamer from the
ground presented itself for contact.

A ranger at Shenandoah National Park, whose duty at Loft Mountain was on
the high ground along the Blue Ridge Parkway, was struck seven times
over many years.  It was presumed he developed the propensity to attract
it, but nobody knows why.  Subsequent strikes occurred in places where
one shouldn't be hit, such as inside his pickup truck while driving and
inside a park building, after which his cap caught fire.  He finally
made a habit of keeping a pail of water with him in case he caught fire
again.

Lightening can kill without hitting a person.  Of four golfers caught in
a storm, the three who ran under a tree were hit but survived when the
tree attracted a bolt.  The fourth wasn't hit but apparently absorbed
the charge which the bolt sent out through the ground.  He suffered a
heart attack and died.  Apparently, there's a time during each heartbeat
when the heart is very vulnerable if struck.  Little Leaguers hit in the
heart by a pitch have suffered cardiac arrest this way.  An electric
charge absorbed through the feet can apparently have the same effect.

One researcher discovered that strikes generally enter the body through
openings like eyes, ears, or nostrils, which are all proximate to and
linked to the brain, which basically sits in salt water.  Hence, the
propensity for brain damage in survivors.

A bicyclist in Vail was struck on a clear summer day on a wide valley
floor with no thunderstorm in sight.  The investigation concluded that
the bolt, the only one to strike within 20 miles that afternoon, had
come down from a cloud ten miles away that was obscured from view behind
a mountain.  Although it appeared from the bicyclist's vantage point
that there were no storms, lightening comes from an existing storm.
This bolt traveled horizontally for ten miles and then selected a
target.  (Be careful if you use Call Forwarding.)

OK, let's get out and take one for the Gipper.

Electric Bob


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