[Icom] Strike

[Joe]

It could very well be that the strike went OUT the telephone line and not in. The strike may have come in the power line and looked for multiple ground paths.
 
I work for a cellular provider and we have experienced many lightning hits in the past.  Most damaging hits come in the power lines.  Suprisingly, the tower hits are not as damaging as the power line hits.  Tower hits sometime cause no damage at all (I've been at the site during a couple of these).  The power line is usually the culpret of most of the worse damage, and it is capable of handling tremendous surge currents before the breakers trip.
 
The telephone line really does not have the current carrying capability of massive damage.  It sounds like the strike came in the power line and found multiple grounds through your equipment and the telephone line.
 
The trick to having a good ground system is to ground things so that most of the strike goes directly to ground and not through your equipment.  Sometimes this is not possible in a ham shack because you cannot provide a good enough ground to absorb the entire hit.  The strike takes multiple paths.  Unles you have a near perfect ground and ground ring like a cell site should have, disconnecting the radios is the only safe way.  Sometimes people confuse a safety ground (like a 3 prong plug) with a lightning protection ground.
 
As far as damage is concerned, a poor lightning protection ground can be worse than no ground at all .
 
73, Joe, k1ike

William Diamond <wjdiamond@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
No need to get a thread started on this but the phone Co. claims that their
system is so well protected, they could not induce a strike to the inside of
a dwelling. Yea right ...........

There are 4 separate 110 and 2 220 volt lines ran to the radio room and all
four of the 110 breakers were tripped.


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