Lightning Strike

Discussion in 'General Science & Technology' started by timojin, Aug 29, 2016.

  1. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    Lightning strike kills more than 300 reindeer

    The Norwegian Environment Agency has released eerie images showing a jumble of reindeer carcasses scattered across a small area on the Hardangervidda mountain plateau. The agency says 323 animals were killed, including 70 calves, in the lightning storm Friday.

    Agency spokesman Kjartan Knutsen told The Associated Press it's not uncommon for reindeer or other wildlife to be killed by lightning strikes but this was an unusually deadly event.
    https://www.yahoo.com/news/more-300-reindeer-killed-lightning-norway-095020805.html
     
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  3. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    It's sad to see all those dead bodies. But fortunately, it's not going to make a significant impact on the country's reindeer population of roughly 30,000.

    Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) are common in the Scandinavian countries, Greenland, the Arctic regions of Russia, Canada and Alaska, the largest state of the USA. In North America we call them "reindeer," but in most other regions they're known as "caribou," which, ironically, is the Native American name. (Unless I have that backwards!)

    They are a major theme in our Christmas tradition: Santa Claus visits everyone's house on Christmas Eve to deliver presents, and his transportation is a sleigh pulled by eight reindeer: Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzen. (Many of these names were obviously borrowed from a German fairytale, e.g., Donder = "thunder," Blitzen = "lightning.")

    A ninth reindeer was added to the team early in the 20th century: Rudolph, who has become indispensable because his red nose shines in the dark, helping them find their way. Gene Autry's performance of the song "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" was the first #1 song of the 1950s, eventually selling 12 million. All the various recordings have sold 150 million. The only recording to out-sell it is Bing Crosby's trademark song, "White Christmas."

    There are numerous subspecies, some of which are endangered. The global population of the species is roughly one million, but it has been shrinking steadily for decades, as human habitation spreads into their range. Conservation measures are already in place in several regions.
     
    Last edited: Aug 29, 2016
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  5. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    What? No mention of the 10th reindeer?

    Olive!

    You know: "Olive the other reindeer - used to laugh and call him names..."
     
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  7. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    I was on the phone and lightning hit the roof and I got wacked it knocked me out for I don't know how long.
    Probably could have killed me.
    Funny thing for the next week I just had to write.
    I used up every pen and pencil all paper until I was writing in charcoal on the floor.
    Can't remember what I wrote but I could not stop.
    After s week or more went out got more paper etc but the thing passed and didn't write like that again.
    I gave all the pages to my Son.
    He has probably thrown it out.
    Alex
     
  8. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    That's fascinating!

    Do you remember anything about what you wrote?
     
  9. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    I think it was on rules on life I run by.
    It was not speculative scientific stuff because I was not into astronomy at that point.
    But the honest answer is I don't know really.
    May have been the third testament????
    Alex
     
  10. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    The most common type of lightning strike, happens inside of the cloud, itself. I've always thought that was odd.
     
  11. ajanta Registered Senior Member

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    611
    14 years ago, one day I was watching lightning in the sky and it was dangerous moment so then I thought to leave that place. But then, I feel horrible flash about half Km away from me. Next day I found my nose burnt

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  12. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    I was within 30 feet of a lightning strike. We were all on the porch. It was so close that we each saw it from a slightly different angle.
     
  13. geordief Valued Senior Member

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    I lived on an army base and the surrounding fields were supposedly used by the locals to hunt birds (the story I was told).

    One morning I was told there had been a lightning strike in the day before and a hunter had been struck by lightning (presumably,I thought the barrel had attracted the lightning)

    The 2 sons kicked up an awful commotion as the father was killed this way.

    50 years later and the thought occurred to me that the scene may have been less innocent.

    Perhaps the hunters were nationalists (or suspected nationalist) scouting out the base at the perimeter and were shot by the army .

    They may have given us (civilians and children at the base ) this story.

    It wouldn't surprise me but it is just speculation.

    1 or 2 years later Malta became independent but in the run up there was a lot of heads bashed in (I know because one of my bosses was in in the Royal Marines based in Malta around that time and went around breaking into houses.....)
     
  14. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    8,502
    I do recall I interpreted it as a "sign" to get on with life and write down what I had learned maybe.
    I have read other folk can get the writing thing after stuff.

    But twas a very strange time and I do recall thinking some would take the experience as a message from ...er you know and I can recall thinking that interpretation would be delusional and how I was together enough to understand my brain had probably had in effect a short circuit.

    But I could understand how folk could get strange ideas.

    It was so strange in that for an instant I believe every experience in my life flashed by between when I felt it and before I hit the floor.

    It was like total silence and total noise all at the one time.

    I had borrowed my Son's flash car, that's right, I remember to bring my first scope back from Sydney, I got it just after the fire cause I was a little down having lost everything...it threatened to hail so I went out in the rain to cover his car.

    I rushed back inside wet and to answer the phone I dried just my ear to answer held the phone up and bang.
    I woke up with my four dogs licking my face .. We all went and sat on the bed all very freaked out.

    The fact I was wet may have saved me enabling the current to pass outside rather than thru me.

    I often wonder if I was not wet would it have happened.

    Certainly would not have been hit if I had not answered the phone.

    There was no damage to the house and no burn marks on the phone or my ear.

    That's one of the closest calls I have had...there have been others but they were more drawn out and scarey.

    Alex
     
  15. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    It was God. He called to give you the secrets to the universe.

    Too bad you took a dirt nap - you missed it all.
     
  16. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    8,502
    As I tell telemarketer's... I don't take unsolicited calls.
    They are all just selling something I don't want or need.
    Now theres a thread...the crap you get.
    Just had one recorded voice saying it was the tax office letting me know they were about to issue proceedings..gave a number to call.
    A mate was ready to pay these scammers but I knew of the scam, before the call I just got, he was so happy.
    He had not put in a return for five years so was the perfect target.
    Alex
     
  17. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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  18. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    It would likely have been less severe. The current would have found a lower-resistance path to ground, and the amount of current that passed through you would have decreased.
     
  19. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    I think his point was that, being wet, his skin provided the lower resistance path to ground, sparing him internal injury.

    This is how it is possible to survive a lightning strike - the current flows over the surface of the body, rather than through it. Happens fairly frequently.

    If he had not been wet, the current may have found it just as easy to pass through his core, and then he'd likely have severe internal injuries, or possibly be dead.
     
  20. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    21,632
    Total conductivity goes up and thus more current flows overall. (Water makes your skin more conductive since it is readily absorbed by your skin.)
    That would be true if you modeled the bolt as a current source. It's not; by the time it hits the phone receiver itself there are many other resistive paths to ground, which means that the energy he was seeing is closer to a voltage source. And lower resistance means more current from a voltage source. (Which is why lightning protection devices work at all.)
     

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