[TheForge] Weathervanes and Lightening

Sun Feb 1 21:50:00 2004

The amount of energy in a lightening bolt depends on whether it's a cold or
hot bolt. A cold bolt has more energy and is called cold because, should it
strike a tree, the tree splits or splinters without being set on fire. A hot
bolt will set the tree on fire. A typical hot bolt runs about 1 to 2 million
amps at approx 100,000 volts. A typical cold bolt runs approx 4 million amps
at about 100,000 volts.

Mark
Snow Hill, Maryland
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "DillonCo" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, January 31, 2004 4:37 PM
Subject: Re: [TheForge] Weathervanes and Lightening

> Andy Vida:
> > pitbull wrote:
> > >
> > > That was the thought back when lightning rods were sold, however they
> > > determined that it actually made the likelihood of a strike greater
and
> > > caused numerous fires. That's why lightning rods where basically
removed
> > > from the market.
> >
> > Makes sense, at least when one considers that the rods were invariably
> > mounted directly on the housing structure, which never really made that
> > much sense to me.  How's about on a tall pole nearby, but not too near?
>
> I recall hearing that lightning can only be moved by about 4 feet in any
> direction (a conservative estimate).  So if it strikes a rod on a house,
> it'd probably stike the house without the rod.  As someone said, it's
better
> to have most of it go where you want rather than all of it go somewhere
you
> don't.  The rod will vaporize (or maybe not if it's tungsten!), but metal
> vapor would still be somewhat more conductive than air ;).
> Does anyone know the current, voltage, and duration of the average
lightning
> strike?
>
>
>
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