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Does Lightning Strike Twice in the Same Place?

VIDEO: Lightning strikes a Chinese lamppost a 12 times in a row | Daily Mail Online

 

Z.

  • I cannot beat that, but recently while walking across my yard I saw a flash of lighting and was thinking “that's close” when the thunder hit me and I had to stop walking, it was like a sonic weapon. It had, I think, hit a pylon about 300 yards away. My wife complained that our wireless phone had stopped working. I could only get a dial tone occasionally but did not have a wired phone to test the master socket.

    A couple of hours later while in the house I saw another flash of lighting with an immediate clap of thunder. My wife shouted that the phone had flashed and sparked and the dog that had been lying in its bed next to the phone charged past me. This time the base station had been zapped and it would not even charge the phone. The broadband also stopped working. I am told this strike came down in a field on the opposite side of the house to the pylon. 

    Total damage, wireless phone written off, Broadband router written off, I have not checked the surge suppression adaptors to see if they are still suppressing. The next day I spoke to a Openreach engineer down a hole on the road outside and he said he was repairing the lighting damage and was surprised when I said my master socket had survived as his colleagues had replaced a lot locally.

    I am now considering if i need surge protection on the mains but as it is a three phase supply it is not cheap. As this is the first such event in 45 years of living here perhaps the risk is acceptable given the main damage appears to have come via the telephone cable.

  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member

    Some years ago a preserved railway I volunteer at had two strikes locally, approx 500 yards away (on different sites) within minutes. The EMP didn't cause any issues to the mains supply except for one 240V fuse feeding a supply to the signalling system which blew. The 110V system feeding the point machines suffered a single blown diode and one fuse and the 12V system feeding the signal machines had 7 fuses blow. All signal wiring is standard Railtrack-type rubber cables run in surface concrete troughing for about 80 yards. We also had one platform phone expire, the only phone on site which didn't have a gas discharge capsule on the line (these bleed off any excess voltage over 70V to earth from the phone system).

    About 30 years ago an amateur friend of mine had a direct hit on his bungalow. He described how his neighbour saw the whole house glow blue and how the current even blasted some of the domestic wiring out of the plaster! Needless to say pretty well everything electrical in the house was toast.