Slashdot Mirror
Mobile Phones and Lightning a Lethal Mix
An anonymous reader writes "In a letter to the British Medical Journal, doctors wrote that people should not use mobile phones outdoors during thunderstorms because of the risk of being struck by lightning. Usually 'when someone is struck by lightning, the high resistance of the skin conducts the flash over the body in what is known as a flashover, but if a metal object, such as a phone, is in contact with the skin it disrupts the flashover and increases the odds of internal injuries and death.'"
And this information is useful because we are always using our mobile phones out in thunderstorms.
Odd, my cellphone practically has no metal surfaces
...I no longer need a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electrical power I need?
Damn rivets! Catching my doo hoo willy on fire!
You can then say "at least I was not using my mobile phone" ... duh!
I am no expert, but I would say:
1 - the risk of being hit is quite small if you behave with common sense (for one, stay inside!)
2 - if you are hit, the consequences are quite severe anyway (die or very bad injury) so wether you carry a mobile or not should be a minor difference in the whole picture...
It would be one thing if they said it is more LIKELY to be hit if you used the mobile, but that I cannot deduct from the statement, or?
The plastic cover doesn't have any significant insulating properties. This is /. and I can't draw a diagram, but the insulation probably can't withstand more than about 10kV. For an analogy in relative terms, would you feel safe if the mains wiring in your house was insulated with nothing but a fine layer of dust?
Pining for the fjords
What does the BMJ have to say about body piercings, such as multiple earrings/studs?
This is another of those disgusting Slashdot pseudo-science articles. Slashdot editors apparently spent their entire childhoods playing video games, and didn't learn anything about the real world.
Edited paragraph, without the nonsense: "The Australian Lightning Protection Standard recommends that metallic objects... should not be used (or carried) outdoors during a thunderstorm..."
The warning about metal and lightning has nothing particularly to do with cell phones. A tiny cell phone is not the biggest hazard. Don't use metal umbrellas during lightning storms.
Don't fly kites with metal string. (Or any kite. Lightning travels on non-metallic paths sometimes.)
I really thought this was an established old wives tail..
We (as in the general population) have better odds at the planet being hit by an asteroid or comet capable of causing catastophic global changes in the environment than being hit by a lightning while on a mobile phone.
I wonder how many people besides cowboyneal have been hit by lightning while posting to slashdot?
-ac
Can't wait till the mythbusters bust this one.
The decrease in liklihood of a fatal injury not using you phone causes is insignificant compared to the decrease you get from removing metal jewelery?
Ditch the mobile and don a Tinfoil hat. The lightning won't be able to get a lock.
"Odd, my cellphone practically has no metal surfaces"
but it is a metal object
Imagine holding a cell phone (to your ear) with all the metal parts freshly liquefied.
Wouldn't many other objects be worse? Glasses? metallic inked novelty contacts (ouch)? aluminum (jock strap) cup!
The only metal-bodied phones I've seen are the boutique ones like a Motorola V3. Everything else is firmly plastic, although most seem to have some kind of metal shielding inside when you open them up.
Does it have to be metal in contact with the skin?
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
Don't hold up umbrellas, large metal spikes or TV antennae. Jury is still out on iPods and tin foil hats maybe OK.
Doctors find that prolonged submersion under oceans can cause suffocation, and that walking into an active volcano can result in extensive burn damage.
It is suspected that some natural forces can be injurious to human health. MORE FUNDING is needed to study these phenomena.
Seriously, every slash-dotter must be aware that conductive objects on or near the body - jewelery is the obvious and most likely candidate - will act as a focus for energy transmission during a lightning strike. Belt buckles and shoe nails used to be the problem in earlier times.
This can turn a survivable accident into a fatal accident. But should we all buy plastic-mounted diamond studs? Do we want to live forever? Or do we want to welcome our new insulated overlords.....?
I'm in a thunderstorm!
No, its crap!
*ZAP*
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
The best way to insulate oneself from lightning is to be _inside_ a metal object, such as an automobile.
Anyone who has seen the Electricity Show at the increasingly unchanging Boston Museum of Science knows that.
Lightning Safety tips, for the uniniated:
1. Do try to not be the highest thing around.
2. Don't stand under the highest thing around.
3. Don't lay flat on the ground if you are at a golf course or open field. Crouch.
3a. Some country clubs splurge and buy lightning detectors. Pay attention to the warning.
4. Seek freakin' shelter
5. 4 may conflict with 2.
6. Cell phones are the least of your worries.
7. Geeks should be more concerned whether the insurance covers the electronics.
8. The rubber soles of your shoes won't protect you.
9. If you are talking on your cell phone in the middle of a field during a lightning storm, Saint Darwin will announce "You! Out of the gene pool!" and take your soul.
and lastly...
10. **"The Australian Lightning Protection Standard recommends that >>metallic objects, including cordless or mobile phones, should not be used (or carried) outdoors during a thunderstorm," Esprit added.** So drop your pants and toss your belt buckle when the storm hits.
--
BMO
This is really shocking news, I must call my boss on his cell phone and warn him. Wait, let me check the weather where he is on vacation, clear and sunny, guess it can wait.
you can call for an Ambulance.
Summation 2
Lighting information week...
http://www.lightningsafety.noaa.gov/week.htm
Safety.
http://www.lightningsafety.noaa.gov/outdoors.htm
Check out the line of dead cows near the metal fence.... I didn't see a single cow with a mobile phone in it's non-opposable-thumb hoof.
GrpA
Enjoy science fiction? "Turing Evolved" - AI, Mecha, Androids and rail-gun battles. What more could you want?
shocking
Once I locked myself outside in the middle of a lighting storm. Fortunately I had my wits about me so I grabbed a big piece of sheet metal and sheltered under the biggest tree I could find. In retrospect it was a good thing I had the metal as the tree was hit and a whole branch fell off. Something told me this was a special piece of wood, wood I could make a base ball bat out of.. Well long story short I called it wonderbat and used it to help my company baseball team win!
In the not too distant future, next Sunday A.D.
or so says the National Safety Council. About five times more likely than dying of a lightning strike. Or 92 times more likely to die from getting hit by a car as a pedestrian. Me, I'd worry about talking on your cellphone crossing the street.
I mean, getting struck by lightning is a pretty freak event in itself. What are the chances of you being on the phone while it happened?
Surely there are other, more important things to be worried/afraid of? Isn't this just another one of those slow news days? Or the media trying to give people something else to be scared of?
Build a man a fire and he'll be warm for an hour. Set him on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
About your term "botique" about the V3, I have one, and I love it. Its not a 3G phone, and only vga camera, but I strongly reccomend that everyone should get one! I love my V3 like I love my iPod, I get a kick when I see someone else with a V3, in my town of 60K, there are only a couple, I know its an old phone, but its still great!
It is interesting, the lower half of the V3 is plastic to help with the signal and what have you. Wonder if this helps dissipate a current through your arm?
---
"Mobile Phones and Lightning a Lethal Mix"
In other news: Drinking and Driving Ill-Advised
and: Standing in Plain Sight and Being Shot At Found to Be Dangerous
Are you kidding? Some people seem to not even have a life that doesn't involve screaming into a mobile phone. Yay for sitting next to the guy who's just got to tell everyone in his phone book that he's on a train, across from the codependent chick wanting to do everything together with her boyfriend and god forbid that they're not in contact at every hour (actually, she sounded so obsessed, she sounded more like "stalker" than just "codependent"), and a few other such specimens which can't just shut up for at least 5 minutes of a 5 hour train trip.
Frankly, when I saw this Penny Arcade comic strip, I thought I had actually been around people like that.
What makes you think that that kinda people would stop talking in a thunderstorm? I can just see the same specimens under some crude picnic/fishing/bus/whatever shelter, screaming into the phone, "YES, I'M IN THE WOODS! CAN YOU HEAR ME? IN THE WOODS! WHAT WAS THAT? THERE'S A THUNDERSTORM HERE! CAN YOU HEAR ME? THUNDERSTORM!" Or I can just see the girl mentioned above shivering under some tree in the rain, but unwilling to stop being in contact with her boyfriend even then.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
"In a letter to the British Medical Journal, doctors wrote that people ... outdoors during thunderstorms ... risk being struck by lightning. Usually 'when someone is struck by lightning, it ... increases the odds of internal injuries and death.'"
Since that seems to be all that matters... I sincerely doubt a bolt of lightning has a much greater chance to hit me when I'm holding a few ounces of metal close to my head.
This is silly, what about a watch?, a necklace?, a ring?, a metal button on your jeans... brain dead article.
I wonder if there is anything that, along with lightening, couldn't be a leathal mix... Lightning and a cat could be leathal...
*''I can't believe it's not a hyperlink.''
...I know, I know, I really shouldn't be doing this. But hey...
Is it just me that finds the 'flashover' principle slightly improbable? Now, I'm not a physics PhD (but then again neither were the *doctors* who wrote the letter to the BMJ, presumably!) but this was a notion first suggested by Nikolai Tesla. He hypothesised that he was able to pass the enormous voltages of his Tesla Coil across himself without feeling pain because it was so fast it 'crawled across his skin'. It has since been shown by far greater physicists than I that this was little more than a theory; it has no basis in Physical fact.
In actual fact, the reason he felt no pain was that the potential difference across his body and the floor (voltage to thee and me) was so high, and of such high frequency, that the AC current was oscillating faster than the nerves can respond - in much the same way as we like our CRTs to refresh at a faster rate than our eyes can, we just don't see it happening. As a result, his nerves never responded to the high frequency arc of electricity. If it was sustained, he would certainly feel his skin burn, and death would ensue (as continued high current has a nasty nasty tendency to do!)
In case it wasn't obvious...the arcs of electricity produced by a Tesla Coil are almost identical to lightning, in that they require a high enough potential difference to ionise the air to arc. He essentially shot (small) bolts of lightning across himself in the process of demonstrating his new-fangled AC.
So what am I saying? Well, I don't really feel the 'flashover' idea holds its own weight. Finally, who wouldn't expect a lightning strike to demobilise a person? If you ask me, she's frightfully lucky to be alive at all...
They reported the case of a 15-year-old girl who was using her phone in a park when she was hit during a storm [...] "This rare phenomenon is a public health issue, and education is necessary to highlight the risk of using mobile phones outdoors during stormy weather to prevent future fatal consequences from lighting strike injuries,"
In other news, some dude has been hit by a lightning while having a boner. Education is necessary to highlight the fact that an erect penis will increase your odds of being struck by a lightning... </trolling>.
More seriously, "The doctors added that three fatal cases of lightning striking people while using mobile phones have been reported in newspapers in China, South Korea and Malaysia.", so, there is a correlation between the increase in the number of people being struck by a lightning while using a cellphone and the increase of the use of cellphones while outside, but,, if you multiply the ratio of people using a cell phone while outside by the number of people being struck by a lightning, you will obtain the number of people who should get struck by a lightning while using a cell phone. Does the actual number differs significantly from the calculated number?
Anyways, they're talking about it happening while using a cell phone, but doesn't their explanation also work for when your cell phone is in your pocket? When I saw the title of this article, I assumed it would talk about how emitting radio waves increases your odds of getting struck, but no, it's all about holding little piece of metal in your hand.
Nothing to see here, move along
You just got troll'd!
...and tin foil hats maybe OK.
Wearing a tin foil hat in a lightning storm is a win/win situation. If it works you are protected from lightning, if it dosen't work the lightning will melt the tinfoil and fuse it with your skull creating a permanent mindsheild to protect you from those cosmic mind rays plus the lightning will probably also fry all those alien implants.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
I wouldn't trust any report citing tinfoil hats as a risk, since it's probably a government ploy.
In general, it is safe and legal to kill your children. -- POSIX Programmer's Guide
That's great! Can I use this effect to recharge my batterys? With the useof some BIIIG resistor or something, maybe? And what if I hook up my Cellphone, Laptop, iPod and a kitchen appliance, like umm... A toaster, in line? This could save ives!!! Think of crashed airplanes, and campers, that got lost!!! Just wait for the next storm, and ``ZAP you're back online!
EOF
I would rather be worried about the acid contained in the battery.... because of the massive heat output that it would do to it, i guess it would explode..... so after being electrocuted, you're gonna be burned by acid, what a nice way to die ^_^
p.s. this is coming from my personal logic and haven't been researched in any way...
God doesnt want people to marry... Why else would a metal object such as a wedding ring increase the chance of internal injuries and death in case of a lightning strike?
Did I understand right or did evolution equip us with anti-lightning-mechanisms. Since skin creates "flashover" does this mean our ancestors got hit by lightning often? Do other animals have it?
Here is from wiki: "In a direct hit the electrical charge strikes the victim first. Counter intuitively, if the victim's skin resistance is high enough, much of the current will flash around the skin or clothing to the ground, resulting in a surprisingly benign outcome. Splash hits occur when lightning prefers a victim (with lower resistance) over a nearby object that has more resistance, and strikes the victim en route to ground. Ground strikes, in which the bolt lands near the victim and is conducted through the victim via his or her connection to the ground (such as through the feet, due to the voltage gradient in the earth, as discussed above), can cause great damage."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightning
Damn interesting...skin resistance..who would have thought of it...
--gks
So what can we find that increases the odds of internal injuries and death when they are using a phone in enclosed public places like restaurants and commuter busses?
My old man taught me never to stand in a bucket of water and put your hand in a light socket. Without this sound advice I mightn't be here today.
davecb5620@gmail.com
... that if you're in an area prone to lightning, you should make sure you have a 1-iron in your bag.
When it gets dicey hold it up in the air - because as every golfer knows, even God can't hit a 1-iron.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Nobody has other metal on them, such as rings, watches, metal buttons (Levi's), etc, the real risk is only cell phones? The fact that metal increases risk is one thing, equating it to only having cell phones is quite a streatch.
Should have said, lightning is sometimes guided even on non-metallic paths.
Remember when Lee Trevino would stroll casually with a 1-iron over his shoulder during thunderstorms? Oh wait, this is Slashdot...nevermind.
So your saying if I get hit with lightning while holding my cell phone, I won't turn into National Security Man and be able to listen in on American phonecalls? Well there goes my weekend.
_NEVER_ use your mobile phone when you are about to be struck by lightning. Let lightnings strike you safe and clean.
You can't treat lightning like dc. Lightning is a very fast pulse. As such the frequencies involved are quite high. That gives rise to the skin effect. The current could pass through the thin layer of moisture near the surface of your skin. Also remember that a Tesla coil generates RF. The skin effect applies.
On the other hand, if all the factors don't align just right, it is possible to get a really nasty burn from rf.
An example of the rf nature of lightning was discovered in an experiment at the CN Tower in Toronto. They ran a cable from the top of the tower to ground so they could measure the energy of lightning strikes. They found that virtually no energy reached the bottom of the tower. It was prevented from doing so because the energy was rf and that length of wire had enough reactance to totally flatten the pulse.
For some people I've been around, I'd say the two probabilities are almost equal.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
I'm alright, my tin foil hat unrolls to complete my Faraday cage.
In a letter to the British Medical Journal, doctors wrote that people should not use mobile phones outdoors during thunderstorms because of the risk of being struck by lightning.
Nice one, God - smite the loud-mouthed bastards.
Hehehe.... ALL YOUR... what was that again?
80% of people who get hit by lightning recover and "lightning often flashes over the outside of a victim, sometimes blowing off the clothes but leaving few external signs of injury and few, if any, burns."
Now, I won't presume to try to explain exactly why that is because, not knowing much about biology, I don't understand the composition of the human body enough to even make an educated guess. However, considering it is observed to happen you can't argue that flashover doesn't exist.
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
You're arguing that tales of mobiles interfering with devices etc is an old wives tale. You counter with...wait for it...another old wives tale.
Way to go.
I'm sitting here next to a commercial ECG telemetry system. By taking a call with my cell phone and walking around near the telemetry transmitters, I can *see* the interference on the monitor screen. I can also *see* the interference as I walk near clinical trials subjects with holter ECG recorders on. I'm doing it now: the disturbances are also present in the electronic data captured from those ECG machines.
If I were to go to our sister site and make a call within earshot of the coronary care unit, I'd get punched for using one because it *visibly and demonstrably* fucks up the readings and traces which are used for live, safety-critical monitoring.
Sure, there are areas of hospitals where it won't affect anything, but there are areas where it will, and it's safer and easier to ban the use over a wider area rather than trying to enforce a policy of allowing it in one room but not the one next to it.
Banning mobile phones in certain areas is just common sense - it's all about whether you can prove, beyond all doubt, that it *doesn't* interfere. If there's any doubt, or you just can't prove it, don't do it.
Originally Levis' had a rivet in the crotch, but it was removed in 1942.
Legend has it that it was because cowboys squatting next to a fire would find that the rivet had become quite hot when they stood up.
But it actually had more to do with war time rationing of metal than over heated rivets burning cowboy scrotum.
I want to shoot the messenger!
This whole story is based on a letter (not a peer-reviewed article) describing essentially anecdotal evidence that using a mobile phone increases your risk of injury given that you have been struck by lightning. The letter does not say that using a mobile phone increases your (negligible) chances of being struck by lightning.
This story says a lot about the inability of people (including doctors, it would seem) to evaluate risks. I'm surprised the British Medical Journal decided to publish the letter.
The title suggests that there is something uniquely dangerous about cell phone usage during a lightning storm, as if it had something to do with radio waves, when in fact it is all about being in contact with metal. What an annoyingly misleading story. I guess they knew it would generate a lot more readers than the rather obvious "Metal Objects & Lightning a Lethal Mix".
The way the flashover priciple works is quite simple:
If you're out in a thuderstorm or somesuch, we're going to assume it's raining. Ergo, you are soaking wet. When lightning hits you, instead of travelling *through* your body, it takes the fastest path to the ground, namely through the water, hence flashing over you. Now, this will, among other things, still burn away all your clothing and potentially cause arrythmia, but still, more survivable than lightning actually passing through your body
I was a the Tibeten Freedom Festival at RFK stadium (washington DC) several years ago. It was a cloudy, overcast day... but dry.
Midway through the day, lightening struck a woman one section over from where I was sitting. She was talking on her cell phone at the time.
She wasn't at the highest point in the stadium, and in no other way seemed to differentiate herself from those around her.
About 15min later the rest of the thunderstorm moved into the area. But the bolt that hit her was the first hint a storm was coming.
I'm still pissed I didn't get to see radiohead that night. At least I read a couple weeks later that she did survive.
--ST
http://www.theMediaBunker.com
Two words summary: duck and cover.
May Peace Prevail On Earth
They have done several "lighining related" tests.. going by some of the tests they have done.. a cell phone is NOT going to increase your chances of being struck my lightning.
In fact.. to get the lighning to always strike a head with a piercing on it they had to have about 5lbs worth of metal on or in the head target, and rarely did it actually HIT the metal in the head (untill they added the 5lbs or so.. the big metal door knob in the head finally did it).
Statisticly.. the metal you wear or a phone is not going to make you more of a lightning magnet than no metal / cell phone.
It is still wise though to bend over and grab your toes if you are out in the middle of a lightning storm, they say the ass is the safest place to get hit....
Lightning is a very fast pulse. Therefore, it is actually a form of RF energy.- December/040019.html_ techniques/skin_effect.html
https://ewhdbks.mugu.navy.mil/wavelet.pdf
http://lists.contesting.com/pipermail/tentec/2003
RF would much rather travel on the surface of an object than internally.
http://www.conestogac.on.ca/eet/courses/microwave
So, yes, the skin effect applies.
That doesn't make sense to me.
Why can't they just collide a whole bunch of little hadrons?
Please do not confuse a faraday cage with the skin effect. The skin effect is actually what is occuring. The skin effect occurs when very high frequency currents travel through conductos. This results in the current traveling around the very edges of the conductor. Hence you can in fact place your hand on the metal frame of the car opposite the side in which lighting strikes because electricity will never travel that path. I've seen this demonstrated plenty of times on a two story van da graaf generator. Now if your dumb enough to be touching the outside of the car....
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
Your gloating about an inferior phone, your irrational passion for it and your unnecessary mention of the i-word make perfeclty clear that the original poster was dead right when refering to the phone as a boutique one.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I think Jaime and Adam should check this one out. They've played with lightning and electrical shocks to bodies before...
rm
Sci-Fi Storm
...like, don't be outside during a thunderstorm?
I can see action movie style of people throw away their pants as they see lightning strikes zeroing in. The pants gone is a puff of smoke. Fade Screen.
Apparently holding a large matal aerial above your head in a thunder storm is dangerous as well.
I dont read
Don't know about you, but I'm joining the resistance
There's a Starman, waiting in the sky / He'd like to come and meet us, but he hasn't got the time.
The parent was incorrect. It is not the AC frequency is too high for the nerve, but rather the damages are restricted to a very shallow part of his skin.
Only a thin outer surface of a conductor conduct current when the frequency is high. This depth is a function of the frequency know as skin depth. Essentially 7x skin depth contains most of the currents.
If holding/carrying a cellphone/PDA/$electronic_device doesn't actually INCREASE the odds of being struck by lightning, then WHO CARES?
There are only two really important outcomes of a lightning strike on a human being:
You live and still have some control over most of your body.
Or you die (or become a very limited live person).
The degree to which you are burned will always vary. That's why people with brains come out of the rain.
The odds are still 3,000,000 to 1 (http://www.davehitt.com/april00/lightning.html) unless you carry a lightning rod of some kind.
Here will be an old abusing of God's patience and the king's English.
The only problem with your theory is that lightning is DC, not AC as in Tesla's experiments. And as a EE graduate student, the BMJ is right, these things will increase the risk. However, when speaking about such large amounts of energy, it really doesn't matter whether you have a cell phone or not. Anything touching the skin is going to cause this effect. This whole cell phone is just straining at nats. Personally, I think it is totally irresponsible to make people worry about the tiniest effect, when they should be teaching people what to do in a lightning storm.
Initially being struck by lighting would suck, I bet it would be handy if your battery was running low though.
God Be Gone
Will I didn't buy the moto razr and I don't have to worry about my phone....no metal parts touching me.
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
The article said the problem exists when metal is in direct contact with the skin. Most cell phones have plastic which prevents direct contact with metal, and while the insulating value of that plastic is only around 10kv, that's much higher than the body provides so I don't see a cell phone changing vey much.
In any event, wouldn't the metal frame of my glasses and my metal wristwatch be much bigger threats? My wedding ring?
Sometimes I'd love to be able to hurl a bolt of lightning at some cell phone users.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Most simple pagers are one-way, they are NOT in communication with the paging system, but are simple receivers on a specfic frequency. They listen to the signal and receive ALL of the pages, but only when a page "addressed" to the pager is received do they activate and display it.
Nuts and Volts had an article a few years back on how to build a pager-receiver which would watch the whole data stream. It's generally not encrypted (i.e. don't use pagers to send sensitive data, like patient IDs or Credit Card numbers) and easily intercepted.
Now, the newer generation of devices which ARE two-way (crackberries, SMS, etc) do actively transmit. They have to update the network with their location so the calls can get routed properly.
1. Don't use a landline phone while it's storming outside.
2. Don't use a cellular phone while it's storming outside.
3. Don't carry large metal objects, outside.
4. Don't carry large metal objects, inside your home.
5. Maybe just throw away all metal objects you own.
6. Avoid standing next to other people's tall, metal, objects.
7. Don't stand in pools of water.
8. Better yet, just never get wet at all. Stay completely dry.
9. Don't go outside. Ever.
10. Order all your supplies, groceries, etc. from the saftey* of your home computer!
* Do not use computer during a storm. See step 1.
VOTE!
The discharge like pattern is called "arborescent" burn. The theory is is that it is a result of a flashover from a nearby conductor or an entrance wound from the positively charged lightning. See for example Forensic pathology by DiMaio.
Typically, the high resistance of the skin prevents the lighting from entering the body, but any metal object including jewlery will disrupt the flow. Mobile phones are just an example of such an object. There is a more detailed discussion of injury mechanism in Int Paediatr 2000;15(3) as referenced by the British MJ article.
No kidding. Even the metal objects just act to focus the lighting at that point (increasing the chance of burns, reptures, etc., at that point). There's still the general risk of being struck. I think the overriding message here should really be: Don't be outside in a freaking lightning storm!
I also chuckle at people who think rubber or plastic or some other insulator is somehow going to protect you. Lightning is pushed by millions of volts. At that kind of potential, everything is a conductor. I've actually had lightning travel down a fiber optic line, leaving melted and burned parts.
Lightning does weird shit. The best defense is to not be there.
dragonhawk@iname.microsoft.com
I do not like Microsoft. Remove them from my email address.
This should have come from the "No shit sherlock!" dept...
at a billion volts everything is a conductor. You could hold a glass or rubber rod high in a thunderstorm and get much the same thing you would with a metal pole. and let's not hear anymore nonsense about electricity "taking the path of least resistance". it does not, MOST of a given current flow will do that, but parallel paths with more resistance will also be taken, but by less current. Even if you short your car battery holding a bus bar with two hands, there's a small amount of current going through your body too.
I think you just made a new meaning to the expression "suing their pants off"..
I think it is a good assumption that Lightning + Almost Anything Else = Lethal Mix. I saw a CNN article with video yesterday where a guy was hit by lightning on a motorcycle. Being the "Almost Anything Else" part of the equation did prove lethal to him. They showed gouges in the asphalt where the lightning had hit it!
Let's look at all of the other things I should discard in the event of a thunderstorm.
1. eye glasses
2. change
3. belt buckle
4. keys
5. ipod and ear buds.
6. umbrella
7. pda
8. blackberry
Sounds a lot easier just to get out of the storm and head indoors instead. But I suppose wearing a metal building around me with lightning rods on top of it makes me more likely to get struck as well?
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
You have less than a tenth of the risk with a cell phone than of using a landline during a thunderstorm.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
The article doesn't cliam that a cell phone increases your chances of being hit - it claims that if you are hit (incidental to using a cell phone) your injuries will likely be more severe as a result of using a cell phone. I doubt Mythbusters covered that one - but then, to be honest, I'm not sure it's even quantifiable. How would we measure without hitting people with lightning and checking on the results? (And other factors could well influence those results anyway).
"If a metal object, such as a phone, is in contact with the skin..."
Um, isn't the danger -holding METAL objects during a thunderstorm? Why do cell phones get singled out?
Seriously the real danger is driving in thunderstorm while talking on your phone while simultaneously logging on to MySpace as illegal immigrants are slaughtering avian flu infected Pit Bulls to buy crack to fund their gang activities in the kiddie porn and terrorism industry.
Here's another article about this:_ id=31&art_id=qw1151011442625B251
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http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click
Here are all the 71 articles google news finds on this topic:
http://news.google.com/?ncl=http://www.iol.co.za/
According to the first article (Independant Online), 1 girl in London and 3 people in Asia have had this happen to them. If 4 people out of the hundreds of millions of cell phone users worldwide is a big enough group to cause you concern, then I think you're on crack.
Move along, nothing to see here.
Ahem... I _am_ an EE and have some interest in physics too, and it seems to me pretty bullshit to proclaim something a-priori as in the same league as "leprechauns", "ghosts", "lucky gum", "win an ipod by punching the monkey" or "10,000 doctors hand-waving", when you just don't have the data to make that judgment. I don't know if "flashover" exists or not. But dismissing something that vigorously without even having the data, is in the same league as dismissing the earth's curvature on account that it's not in the bible. Whatever happened to keeping an open mind as an integral part of being a scientist? (Either theoretical or the engineer kind.)
E.g., how _do_ you know that skin effect can't possibly apply? Skin effect is what happens at high frequencies. Lightning is one extremely brief pulse of electricity. Depending on the wave shape and duration it could have a metric buttload of high frequency components.
E.g., we're talking about something that's not just two electrodes attached to a human, with the human being the only possible path. We're talking about something that's already ionizing its own path through the air, _without_ needing a bag of salty water in between. The very existence of the close misses you mention is proof enough that, yes, often enough it actually prefers going through 6 ft of air than through 6 ft of human. Go figure.
So how do you absolutely know it can't possibly prefer to go through the air _around_ someone than directly through them?
And should we listen to doctors instead of EEs? Well, maybe, because those are the guys who treat the people struck by lightning. And they say for example that the lesions from lightning strikes do _not_ resemble those from industrial accidents where some worker met his doom at the hands (well, wires) of some high voltage installation.
They also say that, pay attention: there are deep burns at the entry point (where the lightning hit the bugger, typically neck, shoulder, etc) and the exit point (typically one foot), but not much else in between. Whereas by comparison industrial accidents also destroy tissue in between those two points. _That's_ what the flashover theory is based on.
Think it was all near misses? Then how do you explain the two burnt points? What kind of leprechaun produced the burn on someone's shoulder or neck, if all they got was a jolt between the two feet, as would happen in a miss? No, seriously, I'd like some better explanation there than just handwaving it that you just know that it's been really a near miss.
At any rate, again, whatever happened to a scientiffic state of mind? What happened to the idea that if the experimental data (as little and unreliable as we have) doesn't fit the theory, maybe we need a better theory? Since when did it become proper science or engineering to just hand-wave something guaranteed to be one big lie if it doesn't fit your model?
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
I think the problem we should really be worried about is not that the person is talking on a phone during a thunderstorm. But rather that they are walking away from protective structures in an effort to get a better signal during the storm. Instant lightning rod once they walk away from the building, on the phone or not.
---Excuse the bad English, I'm American---
OMG!!!! We're all going to die!!!!!!
We may not imagine how our lives could be more frustrating and complex—but Congress can. – Cullen Hightower
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I spend 3 hours a day commuting on trains, and my most hated saying has become "NO! I'M ON THE TRAIN! I'VE GOT PLENTY OF TIME!". I always know it's going to be a long ride after I hear that.
Sit in the Quiet Car. Amtrak has them. If your public transit doesn't- start a campaign to. Wear a button or something that says "ask me about getting quiet cars on our commuter trains", and tell anyone who asks to call/write, etc.
Please help metamoderate.
Yes, Mythbusters tested this and proved that extra metal does not increase your likelihood of being struck by lightning. However, this is not what the article is talking about. The study states that you are more likely to be hurt or killed when struck by lightning if you are holding a cell phone because of the disrupted flashover.
"if a metal object, such as a phone, is in contact with the skin it disrupts the flashover and increases the odds of internal injuries and death."
Essentially, if you are holding a metal object such as a cell phone you are more likely to die from a lightning strike if you are struck. Personally, I believe this is just more silly hype from the "mobile phones will kill you" people. Not that many people are hit by lightning to make this all that significant.
Kinda like Burning Man, but without all the dust...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
>But the d(beta)/dt term in Maxwell's third equation is huge for quite a distance away from the main current path,
The other problem, and the reason you should not lie down, is that when tens of thousands of amps are flowing through resistive soil it builds up quite a potential drop.
For people who don't think in terms of potential drop, look at it this way. Suppose you're a lightning current and you run across somebody lying down. You think to yourself "why should I pound my way through another five or six feet of dirt when I can take a shortcut through this conveniently located bag of salt water?"
Not to put too fine a point on it... But the Mythbusters testing is about as scientific and reliable as say, Spongebob Squarepants.
That's just fine for ballistics gel heads mounted on poles. But ballistics gel is know for it's simulation of the ballistics properties of human flesh - not it's electrical properties. (Not to mention the mass of the head-on-a-pole and it's capacitive potential is different than a human body.)
Even if the Mythbusters testing was scientifically valid (which it isn't), it takes hundreds or thousands of tests to accurately gauge that statistical validity of given scenario - not a handful.
MD here.
The salt water sack a.k.a. "Human being" is also covered by a thick layer of insulation a.k.a. "fat", which in some countries with rampant obesity (most developped ones, specialy those were processed foods are popular) can be several centimeters thick.
Question to the EEs : Is this significant ?
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
True enough. You're right. Still, I can imagine some circumstances where she's dragged out at a family or company picnic when her bf is unable to attend. Or a more plausible scenario: I see co-workers going out on the balcony, or previously on a wide open terrace , to talk on their mobile phone. I can just see that kinda specimen out on the balcony on the last floor, one hand holding onto to the metal railing, to squeeze in a call to her bf even during a thunderstorm.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
That's all well and dandy, but except for some celebrities with platinum phones, most phones are plastic! What metal against your skin? My watch is more dangerous in that case.
If you have piercings, metal dental fillings, braces, necklaces, watches, metal zippers and get struck by lightning, in contact with the skin it disrupts the flashover and increases the odds of internal injuries and death from a lightning strike.
In other words: nothing is changed whether you're on your cellphone or not, only that if you get struck while chatting and remain conscious AND the phone remains operational, you can tell your buddy "hey dude, I just got struck by lightning. Cool!"
Either way you got zapped, and either way you probably have some metal in contact with your body anyhow.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
There's a thunderstorm, a salesman is on the phone with his wife telling her he's checking into a hotel because he can't drive in the storm, meanwhile he's walking through the rain towards the strip club.
Salesman on the phone: "If I'm lyin, let God strike me with lightning right now."
*KZZZAAAP*
1 new text-message: "God:Can ya hear me now ?"
It's the network.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
When I seen the title, I thought it was going to say that there's an increased chance of being struck because of regulated radio waves & electricity being able to follow them to your phone & strike you.
Glad to see there's just an increased chance of dying when being struck, I've met people who got struck by lightning, there was just somthing, well, odd about them...
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
...to buy crack...
You must have missed the memo. Crack was the hand-wringer's drug of choice in the 1990s. Everyone's moved on to worrying about methamphetamine now. Also, if you're going to talk about kiddie porn, you have to work the phrases "sexual predator" and "registered sex offender" in there somehow. Get a subscrition to USA Today or turn on CNN or something...
0 1 - just my two bits
what about metal objects like watches and glasses?
do they count, or is this specifically because
the cellphone is an RF-active device?
Unless the laws of physics have significantly changed in the last few days, lightning is NOT attracted by cellular phones! It is a simple matter of the path of least resistance. This is the same kind of misinformation that prompted the 'Turn off all cell phones' signs at the gas pumps.
"blowing off the clothes but leaving few external signs of injury and few, if any, burns"
Now I understand why Zeus hurls lightning bolts. Gets the chicks naked quick. They never even see it coming.
Its true statistics do not lie. However, I would like to present to the jury conclusive evidence that you gerrysteele are in fact a liar. If it would pleas the court, I would like to direct the juries attention to the pataloons of said defendant. Notice the thin, curling stream of particles suspended in a warm updraft of a gasseous matter. These barbon based particles are more commonly refered to as "smoke". Upon further inspection, you shall notice the increase temperature around the pantaloons indicating a not insignificant amount of energy release that is confirmed by the output of light. Indeed, as we can well determine, the defendant's pantaloons are mightely engaged in a combustive reaction. Ipso facto, habeus corpus, carpe diem, et ect we conclude that the aforementioned Mr. garrysteele can be refered to thusly and I quote from the cannonical archotypal juvinille schoolyard typology " Liar, Liar, Pants on fire".
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
It is still wise though to bend over and grab your toes if you are out in the middle of a lightning storm, they say the ass is the safest place to get hit....
Dude, who told you that? Your gay hiking partner?
Aren't most cell phones made of plastic these days? My last 3 all have been. Be careful about wearing too much flashy jewelry in the rain too.
"...but if a metal object, such as a phone, is in contact with the skin it disrupts the flashover and increases the odds of internal injuries and death.'"
Last time I checked, electricity will follow the path of least resistance. Logic would dictate that the majority of the electricty local to the contact point would take the shortcut formed by the metal object, sparing the skin between. If you are going to get struck by lightning, it's going to happen regardless of whether you are talking on a cell phone (which won't increase your chances of being struck).
Here's my analogy:
Don't buy lottery tickets if there are people in your family you don't want to talk to! On the odd chance that you win, they'll all come crawling to you for money!
> Lightening is one of those non-threats that people (especially the media) like to blow out of proportion.
> There are an average of 73 people killed by lightening every year in the U.S.
Just for the sake of comparison, how many people per year are killed in the US by terrorism acts?
This is another of those disgusting Slashdot pseudo-science articles. The warning about metal and lightning has nothing particularly to do with cell phones.
The article itself is all about cell phones and lightning. From the title, "Hang up your cell or get hit by lightning. Don't use your mobile phone outdoors in a storm, doctors warn," to the very end, ""The Australian Lightning Protection Standard recommends that metallic objects, including cordless or mobile phones, should not be used (or carried) outdoors during a thunderstorm," Esprit added. " If it's silly, blame the source M$NBC and Reuters and perhaps link to a more reasonable authority.
Slashdot editors apparently spent their entire childhoods playing video games, and didn't learn anything about the real world.
They should have done like you, Futurepower, and played outside enough to know about lightning from first hand experience. What, the Gods have not struck you down yet? There is no justice.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Who was she 'phoning ? I read TFA and it doesn't say who she was 'phoning - out in the middle of a park, during a thunderstorm. TFA doesn't know much about 15 year old girls and neither, it would appear, do a lot of the posters in the discussion. Being a father, I can enlighten you. She was 'phoning God (all 15 year old girls and a number of boys of that age have the number) for the third time to ask Him to turn the rain off ; He didn't want to, and even He could not make the 15 year-old understand that the thing to do was to "get the hell inside, out of the rain".
Any father who has succeeded in teaching the lesson "when it rains, get the hell inside" and has seen the lesson learned and enacted upon can pass the teaching method along to me (for I need it) and, of course, to God (who lost His temper there).
How many beans make five, anyhow ?
The odds of surviving an asteroid field are 3720 to 1.
So one should also stop using metalic spoons during a thunderstorm, right? Wouldn't that increase the risk of being struck by lightning too? And one should not use cell phones on a public train because it increases the likelihood that, if the train were to crash, the cell phone could be rammed into one's yammering skull. Oh wait nevermind.
Bob Stein, http://bobste.in