Thunderbolts and Lightening very very frightening

[border-rider]

... footballer, ice-climber??  What about SPDs?

(assuming the problem is metal-to-ground contact?)

... tap-dancer? ...

metal spikes.

[Wowbagger]

My great aunt Hannah was killed by lightning, aged 10, on 27th August 1898.

[Salvatore]

... footballer, ice-climber??  What about SPDs?

(assuming the problem is metal-to-ground contact?)

... tap-dancer? ...

metal spikes.

John White was a Spurs footballer who was killed by lightning.

While playing golf.

[CAMRAMan]

My MiL was electrocuted when lightning struck a larch tree  next to the house. She had her hand on the kitchen tap at the time, current must have passed through the tree roots and the ground and along the pipe. She was not badly hurt, and the tree lived on, too, though with a nice zig-zag pattern burnt into its bark.

Do you have any idea how this can be replicated? Purely out of scientific interest, of course...

[Greenbank]

Lightening? "a sense of decreased weight and abdominal tension felt by a pregnant woman on descent of the fetus into the pelvic cavity prior to labor "

Oh, lightning!

Lightning jumps many miles from cloud to ground. A 1" detour around a rubber tyre isn't going to stop it.

I'd've let you off your pedantry but for labor.

Puh-lease.

It was a quote from the (American) dictionary. It wasn't my choice to spell it that way.

[Cudzoziemiec]

My MiL was electrocuted when lightning struck a larch tree  next to the house. She had her hand on the kitchen tap at the time, current must have passed through the tree roots and the ground and along the pipe. She was not badly hurt, and the tree lived on, too, though with a nice zig-zag pattern burnt into its bark.

Do you have any idea how this can be replicated? Purely out of scientific interest, of course...

I imagine you'd have to tap into some incredibly high-powered scientific research equipment to replicate a similar voltage. Something used for discovering new subatomic particles, maybe. But I'm sure there's someone on this forum who could rig you up something appropriate...

[RJ]

... footballer, ice-climber??  What about SPDs?

(assuming the problem is metal-to-ground contact?)

... tap-dancer? ...

metal spikes.

John White was a Spurs footballer who was killed by lightning.

While playing golf.

A good walk truly spoiled 

[border-rider]

My MiL was electrocuted when lightning struck a larch tree  next to the house. She had her hand on the kitchen tap at the time, current must have passed through the tree roots and the ground and along the pipe. She was not badly hurt, and the tree lived on, too, though with a nice zig-zag pattern burnt into its bark.

Do you have any idea how this can be replicated? Purely out of scientific interest, of course...

I imagine you'd have to tap into some incredibly high-powered scientific research equipment to replicate a similar voltage. Something used for discovering new subatomic particles, maybe. But I'm sure there's someone on this forum who could rig you up something appropriate...

Rub a cat very hard with a bit of lignum and get MiL to stroke it

Our old cats used to spark from the nose on dry winter days when stroked.  They didn't much like it.

[Chris S]

It was a favourite game with the young'uns. They'd shuffle around the house in plastic slippers on nylon carpets, then stroke the cats - usually starting with their ears.

The cats seemed to get used to it eventually, and the kids would come after me instead.

[Biggsy]

It was a favourite game with the young'uns. They'd shuffle around the house in plastic slippers on nylon carpets, then stroke the cats - usually starting with their ears.

That's outrageous!ly funny.

[Philip D]

Yep.  This mostly why cows die from lightning - the ground current sets up a hefty potential difference between the relevant pairs of legs and the current flow through their bodies electrocutes them.

That's where we've been going wrong, obviously. We just need to invent cows with an odd number of legs and the problem of cow electrocution will be solved.

Or perhaps a cow with one leg. After all, a cow with 3 legs could be half-electrocuted - "medium-rare", so to speak.

[spesh]

It was a favourite game with the young'uns. They'd shuffle around the house in plastic slippers on nylon carpets, then stroke the cats - usually starting with their ears.

The cats seemed to get used to it eventually, and the kids would come after me instead.

That reminds me...

Dilbert comic strip for 01/09/1990 from the official Dilbert comic strips archive.
Dilbert comic strip for 01/10/1990 from the official Dilbert comic strips archive.