Driving when lightning's around

[luffy]

Driving home last night in the heavy rain and thunder and lightning got me thinking as to what would happen if my cb aerial was hit by a lightning strike.  

Some of the strikes seemed to be pretty close so I stopped and removed it but what would've happened if it had been hit?

I guess the aerial and cb unit would've been frazzled but would it have damaged the LR as well (and more to the point me)?

[Bob696]

not sure anything would happen. There would be no direct path to a true earth. Planes get hit by lightning frequently and it just flows around them rather than through them.

Of course I am probably completly wrong.

[littlepow]

Top gear tried to fry a polo with a huge bolt of electricity. Nothing happened, even with the engine running.

The tyres prevented the vehicle getting damage, and the body shell acted as a cage preventing internal damage. Although if your driving the shock will probably have other effects!

[luffy]

It's good to know that I should have been ok (apart from shock).  Some of the lightning forks were huge and very close-by.

[Reaper]

You are safe inside a vehicle as long as its made of metal and not a soft top, the tyres are not the reason you are protected.  air is an insulator allmost as good as rubber and seeing as the lightning bolt has just travelled possibly 2 miles throught it car tyres are not going to be much help, infact the tyres would need to be about a mile thick to insulate the vehicle. As for thr real protection it's not produced by the Faraday cage effect as you would expect but by an process known as the skin effect.
this allows you to touch the inside of the vehicles metal frame while it is being struck without getting a shock.

[jnoshea]

I completely agree with Peter on this one.  Rubber tyres are no protection for a car from lightning. The CB antenna would probably be hit but that would only damge the CB and possible you if you were using the handset at the time.  Perhaps the most dangerous thing to do is to get out and remove the antenna because for the time you're holding it you are really asking for trouble  :D

[TimM]

Perhaps the most dangerous thing to do is to get out and remove the antenna because for the time you're holding it you are really asking for trouble

Good point!

 

[Grumpy]

You might end up with a nice spikey hair do :lol:

[luffy]

Perhaps the most dangerous thing to do is to get out and remove the antenna because for the time you're holding it you are really asking for trouble  :D

Good point - I didn't think of that :shock:  .   I was stopped under some trees at the time so wasn't in a clear line of sight for the lightning but thinking about it, that probably wasn't a very good idea either  :oops:

[jnoshea]

Perhaps the most dangerous thing to do is to get out and remove the antenna because for the time you're holding it you are really asking for trouble  :D

Good point - I didn't think of that :shock:  .   I was stopped under some trees at the time so wasn't in a clear line of sight for the lightning but thinking about it, that probably wasn't a very good either  :oops:

Absolute classic  :lol: When are they making the Horizon special about it?

[Bush Tucker Man]

I've just remembered.

We've actually got a lightening conductor on our house :shock: , and we're not on particularly high ground.

(a tall Victorian house though)

[luffy]

Perhaps the most dangerous thing to do is to get out and remove the antenna because for the time you're holding it you are really asking for trouble  :D

Good point - I didn't think of that :shock:  .   I was stopped under some trees at the time so wasn't in a clear line of sight for the lightning but thinking about it, that probably wasn't a very good either  :oops:

Absolute classic  :lol: When are they making the Horizon special about it?

:lol:    I don't think common sense played much of a part in my actions last night   :oops:

[Reaper]

I don't think common sense played much of a part in my actions last night

Not so silly if you have a DeLorean and flux capacitor and needed 1.21 gigawatts :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

[luffy]

I don't think common sense played much of a part in my actions last night

Not so silly if you have a DeLorean and flux capacitor and needed 1.21 gigawatts :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

 :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

[m0awb]

Driving home last night in the heavy rain and thunder and lightning got me thinking as to what would happen if my cb aerial was hit by a lightning strike.  

Absolutely nothing. Safest place on earth in a thunder storm is in a car or caravan... If it's an aluminium one, not glass fibre.

A car is in effect what's technically know as a faraday cage. If elctricity strikes the outside it can't get in. Same as using a mobile phone in a caravan or steel framed building, the signal can't get out unless the cell is pretty close.

http://www.lightningsafety.com/nlsi_pls/vehicle_strike.html

Point 4 on the above page is particularly relevant to your question about you CB.

http://www.answers.com/topic/faraday-cage

Just google for faraday cage and you'll see vehicles mentioned all the time.

[EvilEd]

Perhaps the most dangerous thing to do is to get out and remove the antenna because for the time you're holding it you are really asking for trouble  :D

Good point - I didn't think of that :shock:  .   I was stopped under some trees at the time so wasn't in a clear line of sight for the lightning but thinking about it, that probably wasn't a very good idea either  :oops:

So, you stopped under a wet tree to take the arial off....

OMG!!!!!!!

It's not a good idea to stand under trees when there is lightening about, a wet tree makes an "Easiest route to earth" and if you're near it, outside of the car, you are putting yourself at far more risk :)

Wet soft tops are okay too..... you can still get the faradays effect so long as the top is VERY wet....

[Range Rover Blues]

Do you know why it's so dangerous to stand near a tree in a lightnening storm?  If the tree gets struck the current flow heats up the sap so quickly that it boils and expolodes, you get struck by the shrapnel and it's as bad as when a tree is struck by a canon shell.

[Reaper]

and it's as bad as when a tree is struck by a canon shell.

That happen a lot up north then?  :lol:  :lol:

[Bush Tucker Man]

I've just remembered.

We've actually got a lightening conductor on our house :shock: , and we're not on particularly high ground.

Now having looked at it, the TV aeriels are actually higher :roll:

[Bush Tucker Man]

and it's as bad as when a tree is struck by a canon shell.

That happen a lot up north then?  :lol:  :lol:

Only when southerners venture up this way :roll:  

[Reaper]

Only when southerners venture up this way  

Thats when you start shooting trees?  :lol:  :lol:
what have they ever done to you  :lol:  :lol:

[Bush Tucker Man]

Only when southerners venture up this way  

Thats when you start shooting trees?  :lol:  :lol:
what have they ever done to you  :lol:  :lol:

It's practice  :twisted:  :twisted:  :twisted:

[Manicminer]

Next to the farm that I grew up on there was a Holiday Cottage. Next to the cottage there was a 140ft Douglas Fir.
One night a bolt of lightning hit the tree and travelled down to the base burning the bark off at about 20% of the circumference for the whole length and went into one of the large roots. The root went under the house and the lightning went into the first room on the other side and blew up the electric meter, a cupboard, a gas bottle and both the windows.
The owner turned up the next day in a bit of a panic thinking that someone had broken in and blasted the place to pieces with a shotgun. :roll: