Woman killed by lightning strike on motorbike in Pathumthani province

[Brian Robson]

I have been hit twice, once in Kenya and once in South Africa.

In Kenya the lightning hit the powerline, and on it's way to earth, I was handling an electric switch for my tape deck. A 10 cm bolt hit my hand and muscle contractions threw me across the room. Air has a breakdown voltage of 50,000V/cm, so I took and estimated half a million volts. What saved me was I was covered in a sea spray driven under the roof and the resultant 'flashover' luckily earthed the main charge!

In South Africa I was closing a metal framed window in a storm when lightning hit the house. The thatched roof is equipped with foil to stop fires starting, but anything metal becomes live under such conditions! Thrown down again!

As for the unfortunate lady on the bike, even with the insulating effect of rubber, the flash can jump this barrier if the voltage is high enough. Cars with much thicker tyres can be hit, but as someone said, the Farraday Cage effect protects you, unless you are cooling your hand on the roof! (PS. A good idea to do this to prevent static igniting gasoline vapours before you fill up)

[Tonawatchee]

Riding in the pouring rain as a passenger with a small child on a motorbike. Silly me, standard operating procedure.

[MW72]

Of all the things that frighten me in this world and there are millions of them, lightning is way up near the top of the list.

You should probably read up on some statistics. You won't worry about lightning strikes so much then but you'll probably be $hit scared of cars and buses and loads of other things that are more likely to kill you.

Why live your life in fear?

[GOLDBUGGY]

It would seem unlikely, as the rubber tires would not provide a path to earth.

Crashed after a lightning strike nearby maybe?

Yeah! I was thinking the same thing. The Lightning probably had a different target and she got in the way of the line of site in that split second.

Just recently I too was almost hit by lightning sitting in my house. I must say this was a very shocking experience.

But I wasn't the target. Turns out that a wall plug-in about 4 meters away was, and it then came out of another one, that was only 1 meter away from my face. A Bright as White Light you can only imagine if you haven't been there before..

[Brian Robson]

It would seem unlikely, as the rubber tires would not provide a path to earth.

Crashed after a lightning strike nearby maybe?

Yeah! I was thinking the same thing. The Lightning probably had a different target and she got in the way of the line of site in that split second.

Just recently I too was almost hit by lightning sitting in my house. I must say this was a very shocking experience.

But I wasn't the target. Turns out that a wall plug-in about 4 meters away was, and it then came out of another one, that was only 1 meter away from my face. A Bright as White Light you can only imagine if you haven't been there before..

As already explained the discharge does not pass through the tyres but jumps from the metal wheel rim to earth.

You can see this in this picture, and yes I've 'been there' and was the target!

[JohnThailandJohn]

A cloud to ground lightning bolt travels miles through the air to get to the ground. Not sure why anyone would question why it couldn't arc across a couple inches of rubber on a tires especially considering the goal of the lightning is to reach the ground.