Statically Charged Man Ignites Office

Posted by Zonk on Friday September 16, 2005 @06:18PM from the nothing-to-worry-about-it's-just-a-superpower dept.

Call Me Black Cloud writes "And you think your coworker with BO is annoying? In this story carried by Reuters, a man wearing a nylon jacket over a wool shirt built up such a static charge that he left a trail of scorched carpet and melted plastic in his wake. After he melted plastic in his car he sought help from firefighters called to the scene, who measured his static field at 40,000 volts." Obviously, despite the fact that this is carried by Reuters, you should take some of the 'facts' presented here with some NaCl.

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I call hoax by retro128 · 2005-09-17 03:06 · Score: 1, Redundant

40,000 volts is actually not much. In fact, I'd say it's easy to build up that much static charge (Van DeGraff generator, anyone?) But Back To The Future Shoes? Come on. And what is this "40,000 volts is one step shy of spontaneous combustion" BS? First of all, it's AMPS that cause fires, not VOLTS. Second, if he was grounding out enough power to leave fire in his wake, he would have been barbequed long before he could take a second step.

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-R