[TowerTalk] Lighting

[RICHARD BOYD]

Many people have described observing this anecdotally, like W0UN with his 50 
to 100-mile view in Colorado, lighting strikes would cease when they neared 
his antenna farm and pick up again a couple miles on the other side.

Many of us have also observed the tic-tic-tic of static discharge coming in 
on a coax.

I doubt these things "prevent" a lightning strike, but I personally do 
believe they help discharge the atmosphere near the antenna farm, which 
helps prevent some strikes.  This effect may be much more pronounced with a 
multi-tower station than with just one tower.

On a dry winter day when you're walking on the carpet at the office and then 
touch the metal drinking fountain you get a sudden static discharge, 
analogous to a lightning strike (though micro).  Touch something metal every 
few steps and the charge cannot build up to such a size.  You are 
discharging the buildup before it gets so big.

73 - Rich, KE3Q

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Rauch" <w8ji at contesting.com>
To: "Wilson Lui" <wilsonlui at atitec.com>; "'David Robbins K1TTT'" 
<k1ttt at arrl.net>; <towertalk at contesting.com>
Sent: Tuesday, July 06, 2004 5:07 PM
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Lighting


> Thanks Dave and Wilson.
>
> > Grounding does not prevent strikes. What a proper
> grounding system does do
> > is allow for any lightning strike that does happen is
> condected safely into
> > the surrounding soil and not arc through any
> equipment/structure trying to
> > find a lower resistance path to earth.
>
> That's my opinion also, based only on the physics involved.
>
> I notice a large group of people actually think lighting
> does not hit grounded structures because grounding causes
> the charges to bleed off or dissipate.
>
> I'm curious where that idea actually came from. Does anyone
> know?
>
> 73 Tom
>
>
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>
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>
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