Reading my favorite blogs this week, I was fascinated by Interesting Facts About Lightning on DIRJournal.
The entry features some fabulous photos of lightning, including one of “ball lightning” (the odds of seeing one in your lifetime are 0.01 percent).
It includes some fascinating facts:
- After a storm, you can find strips of glass created when lightning strikes sandy soil.
Some amazing stories:
- A Bulgarian woman was widowed three times when three consecutive husbands were killed by lightning.
And some striking statistics (ha, ha):
- Ten percent of people struck by lightning were in Florida.
But here’s the statistic that startled me: your chance of being killed by a lightning strike are about the same as your chance of dying by falling out of bed.
Damn! Now I have to worry about falling out of bed too.
March 5, 2010 at 11:47 am |
I think they mean your chances of dying from being struck are very, very low.
My brother-in-law was struck in Colorado Springs while out on a training mission for the Army. He’s alive, but it changed him. He’s no longer mentally stable or really himself.
March 5, 2010 at 12:07 pm |
Yes, I’m sure that’s what they mean. My smart-alec remark was about my tendency toward worry, not about anything realistic.
I’m very sorry about your brother (and now regretting my flippant tone). It was interesting to me to read that 71 percent of people struck by lightning survive, but many (like your brother) are left with disabilities (including personality changes).
When I was a teen, I knew a man who dove thirty feet, headfirst, into two feet of water (heck, I watched it happen). It was a miracle he survived, but he suffered major personality changes. Among other things, he lost his sense of humor (I lost track of him, so I don’t know if he ever got it back). He just couldn’t understand jokes after the accident. It was a real object lesson to me on how carefully wired our brains are, and how easy it is to wipe out the ability to do specific things most of us take for granted.
March 5, 2010 at 12:51 pm |
Oh Katrina! No worries!
My ex-FIL dove into the Deschutes River by the falls in Tumwater many, many years ago. He broke his neck and became a paraplegic. I didn’t know him before that, but I understand the accident changed his life.
Yes, our brains are VERY carefully wired! Even a concussion can do real damage, altering our ability to remember or even our intelligence level.
Last fall, a grand old oak in a neighbor’s yard was struck by lightening. You can still see the scorched marks from where it branched and penetrated all the way down the trunk. It’s very interesting to look at.
March 6, 2010 at 6:09 am |
Yep, I live in FL, and lightning strikes are quite common here. We grow up with a consciousness of lightning that I think is lacked elsewhere. Does everyone else have the rules “Never talk on the phone when it is lightning”, “Never take a shower or do the dishes when it is lightning”, “Unplug the TV, computer, and other important electronics when it is lightning”, “Stay away from windows when it is lightning”, etc.? Growing up down here, we’ve all heard the horror stories of people hit in the ear by lightning when talking on the phone during a thunderstorm, or have ourselves lost TVs and such to an untimely strike.
I’d wind up being like that Bulgarian woman, who will probably now remain a widow until her death, because what man would trust marrying her now? Like her I find really unlikely things happen to me A LOT! I love odds and statistics, and things that have really low odds often happen to me. For example, I was recently in Vegas, and I won on roulette by betting on the number 28 three times in a row! Three times in a row! Everyone else started betting on 28 because of it.
I think I need to stay out of lightning storms…
March 6, 2010 at 7:27 am |
Oh, wow. You won three times in a row by betting on the same number? Wild. Maybe you should be careful not to fall out of bed!
I grew up in Phoenix, and lightning is very common there. So I knew about the telephone and TV and windows. I didn’t know about showering and doing dishes though! Weird.
March 6, 2010 at 8:47 am |
Yep, three times in a row on 28. The guys I was with (as well as everyone else who began to gather around the table) couldn’t believe it! Yep, I was also thinking that I’ll have to start being extra careful climbing out of bed!
I don’t know whether it’s a legitimate concern, or just an old urban legend. But the concern was lightning hitting the water pipes, and you know what a good conduit water is for electricity.
March 8, 2010 at 12:48 am |
For an interesting novel about the aftermath of being struck by lightning, check out *The Ice Queen* by Alice Hoffman.
Did you hear about the big electrical storm we had here in Phoenix 2 or 3 years ago? I’ve never seen anything like it in all my 52 years here. Not even close. It was so far outside of my range of experience that I didn’t understand what was happening at first. There was so much lightning and thunder than it was quite literally continuous. It was at night, but the sky never went dark even for a second and the rumble never stopped. At first I thought it was a big convoy of low-flying military planes overhead, including lots of helicopters with powerful searchlights. I had to go outside and look to understand what was happening. It went on like that for 20 or 30 minutes.
Everyone here still vividly remembers that storm and we still talk about it. As far as I know, no one got struck, but a lot of trees and power lines went down.
March 8, 2010 at 6:15 am |
The Ice Queen is on my TBR shelf. I had no idea that’s what it was about. Maybe I should move it down to my nightstand.
I had heard nothing about your electrical storm, but it sounds astonishing. We rarely get thunder and lightning here at all, much less those incredible displays. It’s probably just as well because Girly Girl is terrified of thunder. But I miss those storms.
March 8, 2010 at 4:08 am |
wow! interesting…yeah, i dont want to steal no thunder…
March 22, 2010 at 1:02 pm |
WOW!that’s so AMAZING. If you know a lot about lightning, u should post a thing to tell us what is happening 2 lightning when we see it.