Flash! Bang! (NA but WX)

[RotaryWingBob]

About 5:30 this morning:

FLASH/BANG

like, simultaneously... I mean really big FLASH/BANG

Two big lines of thunderstorms moved through this morning. We lost power after each one...

After it quit raining, I went out to see what had gotten hit. Turns out it was a dead tree about 75' from the house, and 30' from the hot tub.

Luckily, the only damage was a couple of tripped GFIs. And the roasting of the tree.

 

[HPNFlyGirl]

Bob, I am glad it wasn't your house that was hit and it was just a dead tree.

Sounds like you had a morning like Raleigh had Sat. Morning:

RALEIGH, N.C. -- Lightning, high winds and reports of hail accompanied a thunderstorm that moved through Wake County early Saturday afternoon, bringing multiple reports of accidents and lightning strike fires.

The most severe fire destroyed 24 apartments in Raleigh's Brier Creek community. Residents of the Carrington Apartments at Brier Creek managed to escape the flames, but many lost their homes and even their pets.

Video: Stormy Weather Ignites Blazes Throughout Raleigh Area
Photos: Eyewitness Photos of the Carrington Apartments Fire
Related: WRAL WeatherCenter
Related: WRAL Weather On Your Phone
Carrington resident Ernie Paschall said he thought lightning had struck his building about 11:30 a.m. But about 10 minutes later, he noticed smoke coming from another building in his complex. He grabbed his camera and caught more than 60 images of the fire. Her later wrote in his blog about the fire and posted the photos to the Internet.
Firefighters were busy with several other fires around the area. Two homes caught fire on Ladish Lane in southeast Raleigh. The fires melted siding on one home and burned it down to the studs on the second floor. Fire investigators are checking whether lightning started the blaze.
Flames poured out of an attic at another house fire in North Raleigh early Saturday afternoon. Fire crews quickly got the fire under control. There's no word on the extent of damage inside the home or any injuries.

​

Ernie Paschall​

Carrington Apartments resident Ernie Paschall snapped images of the large fire at the Brier Creek complex minutes after he heard a very loud clap of thunder about 11:30 a.m. Saturday.


The National Weather Service recorded about 1,200 lightning strikes around midday as a thunderstorm brought high winds and reports of hail through Wake County.
The storm dumped a lot of rain in just a short period of time, and some storm drains just couldn't keep up. There was minor flooding on Duke's west campus Saturday afternoon. About a foot of water slowed drivers down, but didn't cause too many problems.
Unfortunately, that wasn't the case near I-40 in Cary, where a tree fell across the eastbound exit ramp to Harrison Avenue. It didn't damage any cars, but motorists had to slow down to maneuver around the mess.
Wet roads might have played a role in an early-afternoon accident on a Beltline exit ramp. The car was heading from Glenwood Avenue onto the outer beltline when it flipped over on the exit ramp. There's no word on any injuries or charges.
Quarter-size hail was reported about 12:30 p.m. in Garner near the White Oak Shopping Center on U.S. 70. The storm also toppled trees in Wake, Warren, Johnston, Franklin, Northampton and Columbus counties, according to damage reports logged by the National Weather Service.

 

[RotaryWingBob]

Bob, I am glad it wasn't your house that was hit and it was just a dead tree.

Thank you! We learned our lesson when we had a lightning strike at our old house that did about 20K worth of damage.

Our new house is quite near the top of a hill, and we designed a lightning rod system into it and an outbuilding. Plus surge protection and emergency power (which came on twice this morning).

 

[HPNFlyGirl]

My friend who is a meteorologist for NOAA & the NWS said that he had a long day at work on Saturday. He had planned on working on his speech/presentation for NC Wings Weekend at GSO, but he had the storms to deal with.

He also writes TAF's.

 

[mikea]

Thank you! We learned our lesson when we had a lightning strike at our old house that did about 20K worth of damage.

Our new house is quite near the top of a hill, and we designed a lightning rod system into it and an outbuilding. Plus surge protection and emergency power (which came on twice this morning).

You should also put gas discharge surge protectors on your power panel and on the phone lines where they enter the home.

http://www.smarthome.com/prodindex.asp?catid=348

Be sure to connect to a GOOD ground - an actual 10 foot copper pipe going into the ground or your copper water pipes if they go directly into the ground. You also need to connect it with HEAVY solid wire. Lightning can be high frequency like RF so it will only travel on the surface of the conductor.

 

[gismo]

You should also put gas discharge surge protectors on your power panel and on the phone lines where they enter the home.

http://www.smarthome.com/prodindex.asp?catid=348

Be sure to connect to a GOOD ground - an actual 10 foot copper pipe going into the ground or your copper water pipes if they go directly into the ground. You also need to connect it with HEAVY solid wire. Lightning can be high frequency like RF so it will only travel on the surface of the conductor.

AFaIK, lightning rods actually protect by preventing strikes rather than conducting them to ground, so the heavy wire isn't all that important (most of the time).

 

[mikea]

AFaIK, lightning rods actually protect by preventing strikes rather than conducting them to ground, so the heavy wire isn't all that important (most of the time).

But surge protectors have to get rid of the overvoltage that's already where it shouldn't be. It comes down the power lines, cable TV lines, and phone lines. Your job is to give the KVs of juice a more attractive path to ground than your computer or flat screen TV.

This wisdom comes from when I was a contractor and learned along with the west coast manufacturers of the first digital panels that we get thunderstorms in the midwest. The makers had to warranty exchange so many destroyed circuit boards after a year or so that they all started putting spark gaps on every connection point and telling you to run a heavy solid wire from the board's ground bus to a good ground.

 

[Ghery]

I remember one day years ago when we lived near Denver. My wife was on the back porch (covered) turning something on the BBQ when the house behind us took a hit on the chimney. You've never seen anyone open a sliding glass door, go through it and close it so fast in your life. Oh, and it took bricks off the chimney. Neighbors on the next street took a hit and just about everything in the house that was plugged in died. Lightning is not funny stuff.

 

[fgcason]

AFaIK, lightning rods actually protect by preventing strikes rather than conducting them to ground, so the heavy wire isn't all that important (most of the time).

I think there's a fair amount of truth in that. It dissipates the charge before it builds up enough to do a full strike. OTOH, the grounded small gauge wire stuck up in the air is a lightning probe saying "strike this", just ask any frizzy haired golfer about that. Until you start talking substantial cables, a direct hit will convert a ground wire of any gage to little metal balls near instantly. They will not survive a full strike. If you ever look at actual ground wires, it won't take much energy to melt it. Some of the copper ones you can cut with a hot solder iron. Grounded or not, if you take a hit, you should always inspect for damage and hot spots that could ignite hours later.

Local terrain and objects is a major consideration in strike probability. A little thinking ahead of time about where you're going to build or install antenna's can substantially reduce the chances of getting hit. Grounding is generally good as a blanket statement but sometimes it can also be your worst enemy.

 

[fgcason]

I remember one day years ago when we lived near Denver. My wife was on the back porch (covered) turning something on the BBQ when the house behind us took a hit on the chimney. You've never seen anyone open a sliding glass door, go through it and close it so fast in your life. Oh, and it took bricks off the chimney. Neighbors on the next street took a hit and just about everything in the house that was plugged in died. Lightning is not funny stuff.

You got that right!

Chimney bricks.
How's this for pucker factor off scale high flying chimney bricks and falling metal fence pieces memory lane:

 

[terzap]

I'm glad it was just a tree, too. When I was a kid and we'd just moved into our new house, two weeks later we had lightning strike the chimney and start a fire inside the wall of MY ROOM. (IS this why I want to be OUTSIDE during lightning storms, and not in? And now chase them down so I can watch what they're doing so they can't sneak up on me? Must be.) Every nail from every stud in the walls came popping out of the sheetrock and all sorts of interesting things happened...good thing we didn't have lots of electronic things back then, since the house damage was bad enough. (It could have been worse.)

terry (and that is how I got my name "terZAP" by the way...)

 

[RotaryWingBob]

I'm glad it was just a tree, too. When I was a kid and we'd just moved into our new house, two weeks later we had lightning strike the chimney and start a fire inside the wall of MY ROOM. (IS this why I want to be OUTSIDE during lightning storms, and not in? And now chase them down so I can watch what they're doing so they can't sneak up on me? Must be.) Every nail from every stud in the walls came popping out of the sheetrock and all sorts of interesting things happened...good thing we didn't have lots of electronic things back then, since the house damage was bad enough. (It could have been worse.)

terry (and that is how I got my name "terZAP" by the way...)

Wow. Thanks for sharing -- I wondered about the "ZAP"!

 

[HPNFlyGirl]

Terry....do you chase tornadoes?

 

[jesse]

The most common mistake with grounding that I've seen is people who have their electrical grounded in one spot. Their telephone system grounded in another spot...etc.

Then you've got your computer with your phone line going into your modem. So what usually would happen...is there would be a difference in electrical potential on the modem between the phone ground and electrical ground...and ZAP.. No more modem. This was more of a problem..when dialup was the standard.

Now. I see the exact same problem pretty common in amatuer radio. They throw up their huge antenna and pound in a rod and ground the antenna and call it done. Problem is now their radio goes ZAP....because their antenna ground and electrical ground were not connected together.

 

[fgcason]

The most common mistake with grounding that I've seen is people who have their electrical grounded in one spot. Their telephone system grounded in another spot...etc.

Just curious. Whatever happened to the idea of unplugging stuff when 10+ mile long sparks start popping things around the area? Did it get relegated to the crazy OWT category?

If it's not plugged in (power, ground and antenna disconnected) when the lightning hits, it won't get blown up.

 

[jesse]

Just curious. Whatever happened to the idea of unplugging stuff when 10+ mile long sparks start popping things around the area? Did it get relegated to the crazy OWT category?

If it's not plugged in (power, ground and antenna disconnected) when the lightning hits, it won't get blown up.

Well that depends.

It's pretty common in the amatuer radio world because many operators participate in SkyWarn..so when the weather gets bad, they are on their radios reporting to the local EOC which inturn reports to the National Weather Service.