[ADXA] Lightning Story

Mon Jul 14 10:55:55 EDT 2025

        Funny, I was talking to a good friend of mine that fishes all over the country, I was mulling over buying this last tower n antenna system and he informed me to the the cost of his fishing hobby and his last purchase of a new truck to pull it with, and minutes later I was fueling my truck when this guy pulls up to fuel so delighted about finding a used mercury motor for his fishing boat, he had just returned from Chicago to get it and was delighted he only paid 20k for this motor!!! Now I’m comparing hours of usage time comparing a boat to a radio station.  I think my hobby is much more economical $ per hour of usage than a boat.  I worked on river boats 20 years, I’m not at all interested in any boat other then taking a cruise on one on occasion. I should be worried about that cause since I’m uscg licensed carnival refuses my wife and I the full ship “paid” tour lol.  But all this to say I used boating to justify the price of our hobby.
      And a couple months ago I lost a rotor genius to lightening, the genius is at a tower, not inside, the IP side got fried as well as 2 data switches in the same enclosure , the rotor genius runs the rotors on both towers, both towers were down, the 120 ft tower has 4000 sq inches of grounding down at 8 ft, the 90 ft tower has 3 ground rods driven in the bottom corners of the foundation opening, the hole is 10’ deep so the top of those rods are down abt 9 ft. The grnd wire runs up the edge of the foundation.
      We unhook everything, including data. I also open the 50amp breaker feeding the 2 towers power…….but I am aware a direct strike on the house main will arc a breaker, all the antennas have one of array solutions surge suppressors in line, yes he calls them lightening protection but I have one that took a direct hit (not when it was mine) and while that unit is toast everything that was connected down stream is still toast. Unhook unhook unhook!!!!
73
KF5TL
Sent from my iPhone

On Jul 14, 2025, at 9:14 AM, w5znjoel at gmail.com wrote:

As I noted, that was some 30 years ago. I’m sure it may be double today but my radio insurance claim most likely would have been as well !!!!!

73 Joel W5ZN
www.w5zn.org

From: adxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net <adxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net> On Behalf Of Steven Rutledge
Sent: Monday, July 14, 2025 9:06 AM
To: adxa at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [ADXA] Lightning Story

Thanks Joel.  I think you underestimated today's cost for supreme bass boats.  Funny.

Steve, N4JQQ
On 7/14/2025 7:29 AM, w5znjoel at gmail.com<mailto:w5znjoel at gmail.com> wrote:
About 30 years ago I had a bad lightning hit. I filed an insurance claim for around $12,000 for radio equipment damage. The insurance adjuster came out, look over everything and said “What is all this stuff?” I said its my ham radio equipment, my hobby! He said “well, that’s a very expensive hobby!” So I said “Hey! Do you insure anyone that is big into bass fishing for a hobby? You MUST have a great big, fast boat decked out with all the accessories and everything known to the world of sport fishing AND……..you can’t pull up to the launch ramp towing that thing with a Toyota Corola, you MUST have a high end (Eddie Bauer, Denali, etc edition) 4-whell drive truck to pull it with. What does all that cost? Around $100K?

He thought for a couple of seconds and said “OK, you made your point!”

73 Joel W5ZN

p.s. Stan GO……I didn’t mention to him how much golf costs, I assessed he was a golfer and didn’t want to piss him off until he approved my claim !!!!!   😊

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