Hit By Lightning......almost

earico

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So the wife and I just went to NM to visit her parents last Friday. Just outside of Plains, TX we came up on a storm. I took one look at it and said to the wife, "It's gonna get rough." She thought I was being over cautious. Well before we entered that storm it was 101 degrees outside according to the display in the truck. At the center of it the temp had dropped to 63 degrees and it was raining sheets of rain sideways. Visibility was surprisingly good though. and you could see about a mile fairly easily. I told the wife to keep her eyes open because it felt like a tornado type of situation and looked similar to those storms you see on TV where those fools chase tornadoes. Man it wasn't a minute later and shit went full retard. @James Snover remember that conversation we had about ionizing air in the spark plug gap under boost vs lightning? Well I got to see that shit in person!

We were travelling at about 50 mph down this 2 lane road. Out of nowhere this bolt of lightning that was probably 8"-12" wide came down and veered at an angle. It started at our right, crossed the road in front of us and hit the wooden poled, low power lines on the other side of the road. We were about 25-30 yards from this strike when it hit. You could hear it cracking thru the air. Sounded like you were splitting a piece of wood in a log splitter. About 20' or so above the lines the bolt split into 2 bolts with each hitting the same line. Upon impact you could see these 2 large grapefruit size bright blue fireballs burning around the lines!!! 1/2 a second after it hit we were then side by side where it hit. My wife was driving and as we went by the hair on her left arm stood straight up. It sounded like fajitas sizzling mixed with the sounds of buzzing electrical noises. 3 seconds later I'm looking out the back window and I can see the fireballs finally get smaller and go out. There was zero sound of thunder this close to the strike. Then the wife says the truck is acting funny and the CEL was on. I had noticed it was bumpy but I thought she had gotten too close to the shoulder and it was just the warning grooves in the pavement. Nope the truck was bucking pretty hard. I had her pull over and I popped the hood. I knew lightning could give off an EMP but wasn't too sure the range and how strong. I checked to see if anything was smoking under the hood. I was especially concerned with the battery but everything looked fine so I hopped in and limped it to Plains.

I figured it must have hit a coil pack because it felt like it was running on 5 cylinders. Everything else was working fine. So we had it towed 100 miles to our final destination. I had the CEL code pulled at Vatozone and it said misfire #4 cylinder. Looked up what was #4 online and sure enough it was the one closest to the strike, driver's side front. Pulled that coil and whoa. Look how it hit the winding of the coil but didn't the connector. The one on the left in the pic is the new replacement. That outside casing is very hard plastic insulation and it made it look like rubber. I assume it hit the coil, went into the plug, thru the head and block then down chassis ground. Makes perfect sense the EMP was drawn to the tight windings in the coil.

Truck is fine now. New coil and all is good but it could have been a lot worse! It's still surreal to us that we saw this happen. We went back thru there yesterday on the way back home. Well they had 2 boom trucks and a pickup out there repairing a transformer about 3/4-1 mile from where it happened. LOL. I should have stopped and ask them how much damage it caused and that we saw it happen!
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Kiohtee

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Dude, that's epic! What a story you have! Glad everyone and everything is safe, that's all that matters.
 

7998

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Wow that's crazy. Two months ago I was standing on my deck admiring a T-storm when it hit my roof 20' behind me. The sky went pure white. I jumped 5 feet in the air and ran inside. I'd post the video but no one wants to see a middle aged man jump like a retard flailing his arms.
It took out my TV, my internet, & burnt a splitter. 3 seconds later it hit my pole and burnt cable wires and a bunch of cable stuff. I got that on video too, it was cool how it lit up the wire bright blue and stayed lit for a second.
 

tones_RS3

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Man, that is crazy!!! Look at that coil.
Thank God you made it safely. I bet you never forget that trip! lol
 

Revvv

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So the wife and I just went to NM to visit her parents last Friday. Just outside of Plains, TX we came up on a storm. I took one look at it and said to the wife, "It's gonna get rough." She thought I was being over cautious. Well before we entered that storm it was 101 degrees outside according to the display in the truck. At the center of it the temp had dropped to 63 degrees and it was raining sheets of rain sideways. Visibility was surprisingly good though. and you could see about a mile fairly easily. I told the wife to keep her eyes open because it felt like a tornado type of situation and looked similar to those storms you see on TV where those fools chase tornadoes. Man it wasn't a minute later and shit went full retard. @James Snover remember that conversation we had about ionizing air in the spark plug gap under boost vs lightning? Well I got to see that shit in person!

We were travelling at about 50 mph down this 2 lane road. Out of nowhere this bolt of lightning that was probably 8"-12" wide came down and veered at an angle. It started at our right, crossed the road in front of us and hit the wooden poled, low power lines on the other side of the road. We were about 25-30 yards from this strike when it hit. You could hear it cracking thru the air. Sounded like you were splitting a piece of wood in a log splitter. About 20' or so above the lines the bolt split into 2 bolts with each hitting the same line. Upon impact you could see these 2 large grapefruit size bright blue fireballs burning around the lines!!! 1/2 a second after it hit we were then side by side where it hit. My wife was driving and as we went by the hair on her left arm stood straight up. It sounded like fajitas sizzling mixed with the sounds of buzzing electrical noises. 3 seconds later I'm looking out the back window and I can see the fireballs finally get smaller and go out. There was zero sound of thunder this close to the strike. Then the wife says the truck is acting funny and the CEL was on. I had noticed it was bumpy but I thought she had gotten too close to the shoulder and it was just the warning grooves in the pavement. Nope the truck was bucking pretty hard. I had her pull over and I popped the hood. I knew lightning could give off an EMP but wasn't too sure the range and how strong. I checked to see if anything was smoking under the hood. I was especially concerned with the battery but everything looked fine so I hopped in and limped it to Plains.

I figured it must have hit a coil pack because it felt like it was running on 5 cylinders. Everything else was working fine. So we had it towed 100 miles to our final destination. I had the CEL code pulled at Vatozone and it said misfire #4 cylinder. Looked up what was #4 online and sure enough it was the one closest to the strike, driver's side front. Pulled that coil and whoa. Look how it hit the winding of the coil but didn't the connector. The one on the left in the pic is the new replacement. That outside casing is very hard plastic insulation and it made it look like rubber. I assume it hit the coil, went into the plug, thru the head and block then down chassis ground. Makes perfect sense the EMP was drawn to the tight windings in the coil.

Truck is fine now. New coil and all is good but it could have been a lot worse! It's still surreal to us that we saw this happen. We went back thru there yesterday on the way back home. Well they had 2 boom trucks and a pickup out there repairing a transformer about 3/4-1 mile from where it happened. LOL. I should have stopped and ask them how much damage it cause and that we saw it happen!
View attachment 1594174
View attachment 1594175 View attachment 1594176
I'm surprised that it only killed one coil. Did you check any of the others?

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Double"O"

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Wow that's crazy. Two months ago I was standing on my deck admiring a T-storm when it hit my roof 20' behind me. The sky went pure white. I jumped 5 feet in the air and ran inside. I'd post the video but no one wants to see a middle aged man jump like a retard flailing his arms.
It took out my TV, my internet, & burnt a splitter. 3 seconds later it hit my pole and burnt cable wires and a bunch of cable stuff. I got that on video too, it was cool how it lit up the wire bright blue and stayed lit for a second.

But we do...
 

apex svt

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That’s a crazy story man! Can’t believe it just melted one cop and nothing else.
Only because I’m curious, did you go temporarily “blind” from the bright bolt crashing in front of you? Assuming it was dark out.
 

James Snover

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I'm surprised that it only killed one coil. Did you check any of the others?

Sent from my [mind] using the svtperformance.com mobile app
EMP effects are crazy-random, like that. The business you see in the movies where there is a big EMP and suddenly all electronics die is not how it works in real life. An EMP, as soon as it finds a path to ground, "collapses" into that path to ground and is pulled from the immediate surrounding area. As soon as an ionization trail is formed, it no longer even needs the original object around which it formed, the ionized gas is now the path to ground and that is where all the energy goes. This makes EMP very unreliable as area electronics-denial weapons. Yes, some will get fried, but also a lot won't; you get a lot better bang for the buck just making a regular bomb.

There is one qualification, however: the sun. When the sun spits out a big EMP, such as the Carrington Event in the late 1800's, forget everything I just said, because, well, we're talking about the sun, the literal hammer of God. The EMP is so large there's plenty to go around, and just hold on to your butts and pray, because yes, everything electronic is going to get fried. Shielding? First thing to go.

Ironically, the EMP from the sun never actually touches Earth. What it does is compress Earth's own magnetic field, and that compression, and consequent re-expansion, of Earth's own magnetic field is what does the damage.
 

James Snover

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So the wife and I just went to NM to visit her parents last Friday. Just outside of Plains, TX we came up on a storm. I took one look at it and said to the wife, "It's gonna get rough." She thought I was being over cautious. Well before we entered that storm it was 101 degrees outside according to the display in the truck. At the center of it the temp had dropped to 63 degrees and it was raining sheets of rain sideways. Visibility was surprisingly good though. and you could see about a mile fairly easily. I told the wife to keep her eyes open because it felt like a tornado type of situation and looked similar to those storms you see on TV where those fools chase tornadoes. Man it wasn't a minute later and shit went full retard. @James Snover remember that conversation we had about ionizing air in the spark plug gap under boost vs lightning? Well I got to see that shit in person!

We were travelling at about 50 mph down this 2 lane road. Out of nowhere this bolt of lightning that was probably 8"-12" wide came down and veered at an angle. It started at our right, crossed the road in front of us and hit the wooden poled, low power lines on the other side of the road. We were about 25-30 yards from this strike when it hit. You could hear it cracking thru the air. Sounded like you were splitting a piece of wood in a log splitter. About 20' or so above the lines the bolt split into 2 bolts with each hitting the same line. Upon impact you could see these 2 large grapefruit size bright blue fireballs burning around the lines!!! 1/2 a second after it hit we were then side by side where it hit. My wife was driving and as we went by the hair on her left arm stood straight up. It sounded like fajitas sizzling mixed with the sounds of buzzing electrical noises. 3 seconds later I'm looking out the back window and I can see the fireballs finally get smaller and go out. There was zero sound of thunder this close to the strike. Then the wife says the truck is acting funny and the CEL was on. I had noticed it was bumpy but I thought she had gotten too close to the shoulder and it was just the warning grooves in the pavement. Nope the truck was bucking pretty hard. I had her pull over and I popped the hood. I knew lightning could give off an EMP but wasn't too sure the range and how strong. I checked to see if anything was smoking under the hood. I was especially concerned with the battery but everything looked fine so I hopped in and limped it to Plains.

I figured it must have hit a coil pack because it felt like it was running on 5 cylinders. Everything else was working fine. So we had it towed 100 miles to our final destination. I had the CEL code pulled at Vatozone and it said misfire #4 cylinder. Looked up what was #4 online and sure enough it was the one closest to the strike, driver's side front. Pulled that coil and whoa. Look how it hit the winding of the coil but didn't the connector. The one on the left in the pic is the new replacement. That outside casing is very hard plastic insulation and it made it look like rubber. I assume it hit the coil, went into the plug, thru the head and block then down chassis ground. Makes perfect sense the EMP was drawn to the tight windings in the coil.

Truck is fine now. New coil and all is good but it could have been a lot worse! It's still surreal to us that we saw this happen. We went back thru there yesterday on the way back home. Well they had 2 boom trucks and a pickup out there repairing a transformer about 3/4-1 mile from where it happened. LOL. I should have stopped and ask them how much damage it cause and that we saw it happen!
View attachment 1594174
View attachment 1594175 View attachment 1594176
That is an amazing story! Glad you guys weren't hurt!
 

James Snover

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One last fun fact about lightning: at the top of every lightning bolt that is generated, there is a shower of xrays, gamma rays and positrons. We only discovered that five or six years ago, if I remember correctly. It's enough radiation that it is reflected in the rates of cancer of flight crews and frequent fliers as compared to the rest of the population.
 

Need 04 Wine

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One last fun fact about lightning: at the top of every lightning bolt that is generated, there is a shower of xrays, gamma rays and positrons. We only discovered that five or six years ago, if I remember correctly. It's enough radiation that it is reflected in the rates of cancer of flight crews and frequent fliers as compared to the rest of the population.

Interesting.
I wonder if they have to have dosimeters on while working.


Sent from my POFS iPhone in a rage cause this is the third try.
 

Revvv

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EMP effects are crazy-random, like that. The business you see in the movies where there is a big EMP and suddenly all electronics die is not how it works in real life. An EMP, as soon as it finds a path to ground, "collapses" into that path to ground and is pulled from the immediate surrounding area. As soon as an ionization trail is formed, it no longer even needs the original object around which it formed, the ionized gas is now the path to ground and that is where all the energy goes. This makes EMP very unreliable as area electronics-denial weapons. Yes, some will get fried, but also a lot won't; you get a lot better bang for the buck just making a regular bomb.

There is one qualification, however: the sun. When the sun spits out a big EMP, such as the Carrington Event in the late 1800's, forget everything I just said, because, well, we're talking about the sun, the literal hammer of God. The EMP is so large there's plenty to go around, and just hold on to your butts and pray, because yes, everything electronic is going to get fried. Shielding? First thing to go.

Ironically, the EMP from the sun never actually touches Earth. What it does is compress Earth's own magnetic field, and that compression, and consequent re-expansion, of Earth's own magnetic field is what does the damage.
I always enjoy reading your posts. I learn something new most of the time.

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James Snover

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Interesting.
I wonder if they have to have dosimeters on while working.


Sent from my POFS iPhone in a rage cause this is the third try.
There is talk about a dosimeter placed on the aircraft itself. And personal dosimeters, too. There have been a few test flights through storms on aircraft carrying dosimeters, and yes, they pick up some dose. Haven't heard any figures on how much, though.
 

72MachOne99GT

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That cracking/log snapping sound is how you know you’re in the shit zone of a lightning strike.

Heard/felt it twice in person, and it’s an unsettling sound.

I’ve also given up entirely trying to figure out how electricity works and what path it’s going fo decide to take in bulk.

Lightning is an enemy in my line of work, and something that powerful and unpredictable can kiss my ass.
 

Need 04 Wine

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There is talk about a dosimeter placed on the aircraft itself. And personal dosimeters, too. There have been a few test flights through storms on aircraft carrying dosimeters, and yes, they pick up some dose. Haven't heard any figures on how much, though.

Ya we have to have personal dosimeters in my job.
Not all the time but job specific.

Called a “NEW” (nuclear energy worker)

They count a lifetime dose for us.

Focus on 1/4ly limits. And lifetime limit of course.


Sent from my POFS iPhone in a rage cause this is the third try.
 

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