Nothing can save you from a direct hit!!

[Crossy]

Yesterday afternoon we had a direct (or very close) lightning hit on our power supply. I came home to the gates wide open and the genset running (rest of the village had power).

 

Madam reported "mini lightning" from one of the light switches, so evidently some rather large volts had been going where they shouldn't.

 

The score so far:-

1. One LED ceiling light.
2. Two light switches, nice and black inside (the electronic fluorescent ballasts seem to have survived).
3. Ethernet switch (the fibre router needed resetting but lived).
4. Gate controller ($$$), this is the second controller we have lost to lightning, even with local MOVs (fitted after the first loss) didn't save it.
5. 12V power supply for the doorbell.
6. The under / over voltage trip (it did its job but died in the process).

 

We are dosed to the eyeballs with MOV surge arrestors which probably saved us from more technology death.

 

Such is life.

 

 

[wgdanson]

Shocking!

[tifino]

 

wow! you didn't lose any UPSs?? 

 

 

anyhows the list of damages pales, when compared to see what happens to an 18Kw HF Transmitter, when it cops hit a Direct strike on it's 30 meter beam Log Periodic Antenna 

[Crossy]

6 minutes ago, tifino said:

wow! you didn't lose any UPSs?? 

 

UPSs are all fine 

 

The NAS rebooted but (for a change) didn't lose it's configuration. All the TVs and computers appear to have lived.

 

We had a hit on the roof a few years back which blew off some tiles and fried a lot of kit. There's now a lot more protection:-

• Big MOV on the incoming supply.
• Small MOVs all over the technology.
• Over / under voltage trip (not really relevant to lightning damage).

There's also a 20kVA AVR feeding everything except the water heaters and Madam's irrigation pumps.

 

I'm intrigued by the light switches and the "mini lightning" reported by Madam, no others were damaged but these are nicely blackened and one is welded "on" (it was off at the time).

 

 

[tifino]

yeah, pretty impressive to actually see all the 'fireballs and lightning flashing over between contacts.

One time in particular had it happening between equipment racks... the racks, on plinths, were all earth connected between with 1 inch copper straps... yet even with that, we had LEDs exploding and becoming  projectiles

- which complemented the flash overs quite well.

This was in an Air Traffic Control Tower equipment room, but the concept is all the same   

[Dmaxdan]

We got hit a couple of years ago. A lightning strike hit a big tree over the road cutting it in half which then brought down the power cables that run along that side of the road. It cut off everyone's electricity up the road but not us. The guy from the PEA who came to have a look said that the cables that run across the very top of the poles carry 1000 volts. He reckons that they somehow shorted out with the cables that supply us with electric. We got hit twice. The first on fried the main trip switch, and blew out most of the lights. The second one accounted for both our electric showers and a few of bits. Luckily, all the major appliances survived. The PEA were excellent. They returned and helped us free of charge to replace everything, some of which they supplied. They also gave us 5000 baht towards the cost. I genuinely felt lucky we weren't killed!




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[ezzra]

Nothing can save you from a direct hit!!....

 

Have you tried to say the lord's prayers? him being a saviour and all,

sometimes it help you know...

[Crossy]

2 minutes ago, ezzra said:

Have you tried to say the lord's prayers? him being a saviour and all,

sometimes it help you know...

I reckon he's aiming at me.

[Crossy]

3 minutes ago, Dmaxdan said:

The guy from the PEA who came to have a look said that the cables that run across the very top of the poles carry 1000 volts.

Actually, it's more like 25,000 volts. And it does look like that got to places it shouldn't have, nasty.

[Fruit Trader]

First thunder we shutdown and isolate the power. Almost every day in the past week.

[bankruatsteve]

1 hour ago, Fruit Trader said:

First thunder we shutdown and isolate the power. Almost every day in the past week.

That might help if the strike far enough away.  With a direct hit, it doesn't matter if things are plugged in or not - anything sensitive will fry.

[Fruit Trader]

24 minutes ago, bankruatsteve said:

That might help if the strike far enough away.  With a direct hit, it doesn't matter if things are plugged in or not - anything sensitive will fry.

There no might about it.

We have had the full everyone's hair stands up hit 5M away from the yard transformer all cables and insulators blown off the pole. We have also had a taste of what happens when you do not isolate.

 

Isolation is a life saver when you have an expensive packaging machine to protect.

[zlodnick]

Bankruatsteve,

 

 Could you please explain what you mean by, "anything sensitive", and also, how can something fry when not plugged in?

 

I always unplug the laptop, television, and refridgerator, thinking at least those will be safe.

[bankruatsteve]

Static sensitive  - like integrated circuits.  The air is so highly ionized from lightning strike it will take out phones, remotes, computers, just about anything with IC's whether plugged in or not.  

[zlodnick]

Huh, I'll be damned.

 

Thanks Steve

[55Jay]

I'm typically home for the afternoon thunderstorms this time of year, run around doing the unplug routine then wait it out.   The main breaker box and the hard wired air cons would probably be toast if we took a hit, but at least the refrigerators and other appliances and tech I can unplug, would be ok.  

 

Glad you came away with minimal loss.  Another nod for being prepared.

[csabo]

Hit my moms underground dog fence wire and ran back to the house through it and fried the socket there. Unfortunately my Harley was on a trickle charger in the same socket. Won't start now. Gotta go assess situation next month. 

[Fruit Trader]

29 minutes ago, zlodnick said:

 Could you please explain what you mean by, "anything sensitive", and also, how can something fry when not plugged in?

 

I always unplug the laptop, television, and refridgerator, thinking at least those will be safe.

Lightning can induce electrostatic electromagnetic surges in long runs of communication cable and damage electronic equipment connected to them. 

 

This type of damage is usually less dramatic than that caused by direct connection. Pictures in a previous post show some dramatic damage most likely through direct connection.  

 

Home modems are at risk from copper phone lines so its best pull the phone cable during electrical storms.

 

A pile of TV's sitting in boxes inside a warehouse are unlikely to suffer damage even if the lightning hit the building conductor and created a huge pulse.

[55Jay]

1 hour ago, Fruit Trader said:

Home modems are at risk from copper phone lines so its best pull the phone cable during electrical storms.

+2 points for the reminder.  I unplugged things about 3 hours ago for a T-storm passing through, but neglected that detail.  Thanks.

[Crossy]

1 hour ago, Fruit Trader said:

Home modems are at risk from copper phone lines so its best pull the phone cable during electrical storms.

Fibre is of course immune to conducted nasties.

[oxymoron]

2 hours ago, Crossy said:

Fibre is of course immune to conducted nasties.

As a Telecom Engineer I thought that to.

Until I saw the the Optic Fibre cables on TV melted from a Lightning Strike in NSW Australia that isolated all 000 emergency services last week.

ABC News has it

[johng]

The fiber cables also have a steel cable running parallel to give it strength ,whilst not as conductive as copper its probably more than enough.

[Fruit Trader]

3 hours ago, oxymoron said:

As a Telecom Engineer I thought that to.

Until I saw the the Optic Fibre cables on TV melted from a Lightning Strike in NSW Australia that isolated all 000 emergency services last week.

ABC News has it

 

Lightning strike temperatures reach thousands of degrees and are quite capable of destroying fibre cables nearby or in ground chambers. Also if a wild high voltage line breaks free and falls onto the lower comms cables there's a good chance it will burn through some fibre cables if an arc has been started.

 

The good news is that unlike copper, fibre terminations will not carry nasties into electronics further down the line.

[Crossy]

5 hours ago, johng said:

The fiber cables also have a steel cable running parallel to give it strength ,whilst not as conductive as copper its probably more than enough.

Luckily the messenger / support wire doesn't go all the way to your modem, the metre or so of single fibre will keep the nasties out of the electronics.

 

Of course, a direct hit to the fibre could well send unpleasantness into the building, but it's far less likely than with a phone line.

 

[jacko45k]

You got off lightly!

As well as my gate motor I lost 2 TVs, cable box, Home Theatre Unit, DVD player, Computer Power Supply and it's HDMI port. That was last October and cost me plenty. Had a hit in a neighbour's garden just last month that seemed to cause minor damage to anything connected via HDMI. I had bought quite a few of these power strips with surge protection but hard to say if they reduced the damage. I have become a neurotic unplugging everything when the skies leaden.

[Crossy]

16 hours ago, jacko45k said:

You got off lightly!

We've been there before, after a direct hit on the roof a few years back which fried quite a lot of kit we've been adding protection.

 

Evidently we need something more on the gate controller, it's on a pretty long cable so I'm going to add a local ground rod rather than exporting the house ground. It already has a set of local MOV arrestors.

 

 

[janclaes47]

On 05/05/2018 at 9:30 AM, Dmaxdan said:

The guy from the PEA who came to have a look said that the cables that run across the very top of the poles carry 1000 volts.

 

And my previous internet provider had tied the coaxial cable that carried my internet signal in to my house to that cable.

 

Guess what happened when there was a serious thunderstorm in the area.

 

In fact you can guess 3 times.

[Fruit Trader]

36 minutes ago, Crossy said:

Evidently we need something more on the gate controller, it's on a pretty long cable so I'm going to add a local ground rod rather than exporting the house ground. It already has a set of local MOV arrestors.

I have the gate and some other stuff  on local isolation to take them off long feed cables. We have a run around routine in heavy storms but its worth the effort.

 

[Crossy]

6 hours ago, Fruit Trader said:

I have the gate and some other stuff  on local isolation to take them off long feed cables. We have a run around routine in heavy storms but its worth the effort.

To be effective that would have to be at the gate, being cat-like I don't like the rain so it would never get turned off (or back on when the rain stops and I'm at work). We do isolate our washing machine when it's not in use, but that's a product of mega-issues we had with the previous unit.

 

Like many preventative measures you never know if they are working, you only know when they don't.

 

I hang out my used socks to keep the tigers away, I've never seen a tiger so they must be working

 

[jacko45k]

12 hours ago, Crossy said:

We've been there before, after a direct hit on the roof a few years back which fried quite a lot of kit we've been adding protection.

 

Evidently we need something more on the gate controller, it's on a pretty long cable so I'm going to add a local ground rod rather than exporting the house ground. It already has a set of local MOV arrestors.

 

 

My gate controller is also a concern, it has been tapped in upstream of my main incomer DP. There is a breaker on it but it is behind a box on my outside wall with screws on it. My Mrs suggested a lightening rod but I doubt my neighbours would want me to put one in their garden... having one in mine strikes me as attracting the problem. 

I am a bit out of my depth on this stuff.