Why being in a car during a lightning storm is the safest place to be
As watcher of weather, both as as a one-time storm chaser as well as a person who gets sent email about weather of all kinds, I’ll have to say I’ve never seen anything like this video. The National Weather Service lighting safety page reports that a person’s odds of being struck by lightning are around 1 in 775,000 at any given time with 1/10,000 in an 80 year lifetime. Capturing the event live on video has to be even higher odds.
A police car dashcam captured footage of a direct lightning strike the roof of a Toyota Landcruiser carrying a senior Russian official on a rainy Russian day – while driving down the freeway.
I was even more struck by the odds of the lightning hitting the SUV while there are taller light poles along the freeway and taller buildings in the vicinity. It was just a case of being in the wrong place and the wrong time.
While the internal electronics for the SUV are possibly fried, the occupant wouldn’t be.
So why is being in a car during a lightning storm is the safest place to be? Two words – Faraday Cage. From Wikipedia:
A Faraday cage or Faraday shield is an enclosure formed by conducting material or by a mesh of such material. Such an enclosure blocks external static and non-static electric fields. Faraday cages are named after the English scientist Michael Faraday, who invented them in 1836.
A Faraday cage’s operation depends on the fact that an external static electrical field will cause the electric charges within the cage’s conducting material to redistribute themselves so as to cancel the field’s effects in the cage’s interior. This phenomenon is used, for example, to protect electronic equipment from lightning strikes and electrostatic discharges.
A Faraday cage is best understood as an approximation to an ideal hollow conductor. Externally or internally applied electromagnetic fields produce forces on the charge carriers (usually electrons) within the conductor, generating electric currents that rearranges the charges. Once the charges have rearranged so as to cancel the applied field inside, the currents stop.
If the cage is grounded, the excess charges will go to the ground instead of the outer face, so the inner face and the inner charge will cancel each other out and the rest of the cage will retain a neutral charge.
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Note: The SUV has steel belted radial tires, and thus is essentially grounded as lightning easily jumps that dielectric gap.
h/t to WUWT reader Newton Love
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What are the dangers in a convertible (top up) It’s just a frame with fabric over it.
Broadband EMI susceptibility-testing by the automakers weeds out all but perhaps the ‘keying’ of a 5 watt hand-held transceiver (HT or walkie-talkie) right next to the engine-control computers; the ham community discussion ‘reflectors’ also discuss this, because, some operators run 500 to 1,000 Watts output from amplifiers and they *do* on occasion see strange indications on the dash, but none have reported ‘instantaneous, uncommanded acceleration’ to my knowledge (one tends to remember such events and #2 for such an event word spreads like wildfire thru the ham community …)
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TomRude says:
September 27, 2012 at 8:22 am
OT: The Wikipedia page of Marcel Leroux is under attack by some zealots.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Marcel_Leroux
To those here who have read his work, help would be appreciated.
Thanks Tom for posting that. Actually it is Leroux’s Global Warming skepticism that is the reason why he should be deleted from Wikipedia:
They say they want to clean out bad articles here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Association_of_Wikipedians_Who_Dislike_Making_Broad_Judgments_About_the_Worthiness_of_a_General_Category_of_Article,_and_Who_Are_in_Favor_of_the_Deletion_of_Some_Particularly_Bad_Articles,_but_That_Doesn%27t_Mean_They_Are_Deletionists
Why is the article about Marcel Leroux bad? Because of his “fringe theories” !:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard
“Non-notable scientist that seems only to have an article because peopl like his fringe views on climate — Preceding unsigned comment added by xxx (talk • contribs)
Looks like warmista-zealot with an agenda to me.
My clothesline was hit by a lightening strike some years ago now. It hit near the metal joiner/tightener was located. I did not see it but I heard it, because I had my windows open at the time. The whole house shook with the intensity of the sound after it hit. Where my clothesline is placed is just a foot and half away from my back door. The poles holding the clothesline is wood, so we didn’t have any fires except for charring, and cracking on the plastic coating of the line itself. Some of the braided wire also separated where the coating disappeared, but it was still up and still usable afterwards.
It was one of my neighbours tell me it hit the line, they thought it was an electric line, but it was just a clothesline, as most of our power and phone lines are buried here in this neighbourhood. So it was luck that it hit the clothesline and not the house. (It is still up, but will soon be changed because winters here are not kind to old clotheslines.)
Ummm … no. It begins as a chaotic process involving gas molecules in a strong static electric field, with free electrons stripped from some gas molecules which begin to impinge on other gas molecules and at some point an ‘avalanche’ effect takes over eventually resulting in a ‘plasma path’ through which the bulk of the electron ‘charge’ is transferred.
The determination of the exact path being dependent on many, many local factors including cosmic rays (they assist in creating free electrons) dust/particulates present … by and large it is the local ionization of successive air ‘parcels’ locally as the stepped leader of about 50 meters in length each that determines the ‘path’ taken.
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(Reference: Martin A Uman and his book “Lightning”)
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In an odd way that video has the same ‘script’ as the other Russian car videos on the web. Search youtube for “Russian Driver” and you’ll see.
The usual pattern is like this: Everyone is casually zooming along bumper-to-bumper at 80 MPH on a surface of glare ice. Suddenly a car flashes into the scene from an impossible angle at 120 MPH, very much like a stroke of lightning. A dozen cars spin around in a blender for a few seconds. The cars that didn’t get blended continue to proceed casually at 80 MPH.
While a car body seems to provide some lightening protection it is a long ways from being a Faraday cage, if it were a Faraday cage your cell phone would not get any reception while inside the car.
I watched some great lightning in Kuala Lumpur striking the Petronas towers. I guess they were built with a metal cladding to act as a big lightning conductor, but they were taking a real pasting with 3-4 strikes a minute.
I was in a swimming pool in a nearby hotel and I remember wondering it I was safer in the pool or out of it – does anyone have any thoughts on whether staying in a pool (where you are nice and flat) is better than getting out in a thunder-storm?
@Retired Engineer: Airplanes get struck by lightning on the ground and in-flight, damage is rare.
Depends on the planes. Commercial airliners, not so much. But I’ve seen the result of strikes on several of our 1900s and it’s never pretty- radomes with holes blown in them and the weather radar fried, static wicks blown off, and navcom antennas split open or missing completely.
Another interesting feature of lightning that is rarely mentioned is the X-ray and gamma flash that is produced. The flash can produce a latchup condition is poorly designed CMOS IC’s. It can also upset bits in poorly constructed memories that rely on a stored charge in a gate. The good thing is that the radiation drops of at 1/R*2.
The semiconductors used in aircraft and satellites are S class, which means they have been tested for ESD/latchup and have also been tested for radiation hardness, among the many tests.
We have a lot to thank Faraday for.
FYI… Commercial and military avionics lightning protection is covered by what is call DO-160 specifications, this was derived from a SAE specification and SAE is automative.
I have seen the results of indirect lightning (near field) strikes on industrial and consumer electronic devices. It’s not a pretty sight… burnt it’s cooking and soot it’s done.
Nothing is left but a pile of ash (carbon). Hardened electronic devices can withstand to a cretin degree some near field surges, but taking a direct hit, all that can be done is direct the lightning to ground and pray it doesn’t take anything with it.
I watched one storm from a truck on the Oregon coast many years back. Lightning strikes hitting power poles, trees, the ground. The thing that impressed me the most was watching a bolt hit the top of a house, bounce off, hit a barbed wire fence, run the fence and finally blow up a pump house! I stayed in my truck!
Earlier this year, ballplayers and umps were scattered by a huge thunderclap following a strong lightning strike outside the Texas Rangers’ stadium in Arlington on 7/18/2012:
http://texas.rangers.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=22970091&c_id=tex
I’ve had several close calls (c100-200 meters) while caught outdoors in the open, and I can understand the reactions of the ballplayers. The sound was overpowering, the ground seemed to jump beneath my feet as if slammed by Odin’s hammer, and my hair was standing on end. Rrrrip flash bang!
While flying over Honshu in a “Scare America” DC-4 back in the 60s, our plane was hit by lightning. I was dozing at the time, but my recollection is that the cabin lights went out briefly, and the pilots had to restart the engines. Dark and silent is an uncomfortable set of sensations in a passenger aircraft, but the entire sequence occurred within about 10 seconds, so the fear came after the event was over. Later, the stews informed us that the bolt went in one wingtip and out the other.
vukcevic says: September 27, 2012 at 10:35 am
Forgot to mention that at the time plain was above the clouds (I would think safer) and the strike was under the wing tip. It makes me think perhaps it would be safest to fly through the cloud, in which case plane would not have surface charge different to the one of the surrounding cloud.
Any comments from pilots?
Most all of my strikes have been inside clouds, big or little airplanes. There’s always been some sort of damage, little pinholes, melted spots, etc. Never had the electronics go out.
I think what some are referring to as “streamers from the light poles” is the refractive edge of two raindrops that hit the windshield at exactly the instant before the strike.
What was most curious to me about this recorded lightning strike was the color of the lightning strike. Most lightning strikes are bright white to blue to deep purple, – ie favoring the ultraviolet end of the spectrum, because of the extremely energy intensive plasma in which the lightning’s current is traveling. Air, made up of 70% nitrogen and water (ie. its raining) usually produce deep purple to blue plasma arcs (see for instance the simultated lightning in the Top Gear video posted by Jud.) In this video the lightning appears red. Either the video camera doesn’t adequately capture the actual spectrum (most likely), or the lightning in this case lit up a higher than normal concentration of Neon, Helium or dust particles coming down with the rain containing metals or metal salts like lithium carbonate, strontium carbonate or calcium chloride.
The only close call I had was on the campus at Sacramento State in the ’70s. Crossing the library quad during what, up to that time had just been a heavy rain storm, I felt everything start to prickle, had time to wonder, “wha…” when there was a flash and a simultaneous boom so loud that my ears rang for the better part of an hour. Never did discover just where the actual strike was. I suspect the Engineering Building which was next to me.
I was at Ranger stadium earlier this year when the strike occurred. It hit across the street at Six Flags, which puts the stadium some 200-300 yards away. The sound reverberated quite well inside the stadium. It was quite jarring.
We quickly evacuated to the ramp area.
“a person’s odds of being struck by lightning are around 1 in 775,000 at any given time”: what on earth does that mean?
I first heard the term “Faraday cage” a few months ago when I rented “The Darkest Hour”.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1093357/
I should have waited for WUWT to bring it up. 🙂
“a person’s odds of being struck by lightning are around 1 in 775,000 at any given time: what on earth does that mean?
In law, the term “a given time” refers to a calendar date, unless stated otherwise. The statement would mean a probability of 1/775,000 of being struck by lightning on any particular day.
Growing up in Phoenix, I’ve seen a lot of lighting strikes hitting a lot of things including my neighbors Honda. The camera that took this video was unable to capture the true magnificence of the event. BTW, most of the electronics probably survived.
BTW, I work in a Faraday Cage within another Faraday Cage with an “Air Lock” for a door.
Glad you have reported on the Faraday cage and the “skin effect”. Too many people come to Florida to play golf and assume that the rubber tires of a fiberglass golf cart will protect them from lightning. Now, how many of you have seen lightning come out of clear skies in front of a moving storm? That is another way visitors to Florida get hit by lightning. Rule of Survival: if you hear thunder, it is time to take shelter.
It’s something of a myth that lightning strikes tall objects.
Twice is Singapore I saw lightning strike the ground next to tall buildings. Once within 5 meters of a 4 storey building and the other time about 10 meters from a 20 storey building.
While Singapore has a high rate of lightning strikes, the death rate per million population is half that of the USA. (0.35 vs 0.6). I assume because in an urban environment you are less likely to be outdoors in a thunder storm.