Tires will protect you from lightning strikes. NOT!!!

[Brad Johnson]

A tragic way to disprove a longstanding myth.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,200608,00.html

Brad

[Desertdog]

I was always told that it is the steel shell around you, when you are in an automobile, that protects you from lightening and fallen power lines, not the tires.

[zahc]

That's correct. The car acts like a Faraday cage.

[engineer151515]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightning_safety

An automobile of most sorts is generally the safest place to be during a lightning strike. This is explained by the idea of a Faraday Cage - the bulk of the current of the lightning stays on the outside surface of the car and the interior remains (relatively) current free (however, care should be taken to avoid touching the frame of the car as much as is possible as there will still be some voltage difference due to the car not being a superconductor). Contrary to one popular belief, the rubber tires do not provide any protection since a lightning bolt can and does easily bypass the tires by jumping the short distance from the car body to the ground (having jumped at least thousands of feet from the cloud to the car body). Any possible protection might be due to the car not acquiring the charge on the ground, but in the presence of rain, this is unlikely to remain the case for long.

[Antibubba]

Are you serious???


Did you really think a MOTORCYCLIST, riding exposed to the elements, would be protected from lightning?


Well, let me tell you a story about America's greatest big-game hunter, John F. Kerry....

[Harold Tuttle]

Lightning Strike Kills Colorado Motorcyclist
Thursday, June 22, 2006

WESTMINSTER, Colo.  A motorcyclist died after he was struck by lightning while riding in rush hour traffic between Denver and Boulder, police said.

Witnesses reported seeing a flash of light shortly before the motorcyclist struck the center divider on U.S. 36 Wednesday, police spokesman Tim Read said.

Gary Missi, 46, of Longmont was pronounced dead at the scene.

A coroner's investigation was under way to determine whether the lightning bolt, the collision or something else caused his death, Read said.

The lightning blasted a 4-inch-deep hole in the highway and sent chunks of asphalt hurtling across the highway.


yeah, but was he wearing a helmet?

[brimic]

Yeah, like a lightning bolt that has travelled through miles of air which happens to be a pretty good insulator is going to going to look at a 1/2" of rubber and run the other way.