The problem with being the tallest building in Manchester

[Griswold]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTCCkXtFS34

The video also aptly demonstrates a little know fact :wink:

[Bionic Man]

Lightnings great it kills pratts that play golf in the rain !! :D

[Griswold]

Lightnings great it kills pratts that play golf in the rain !! :D

It always rains when I play golf.......................... :wink:

[Seabadger]

Good little video. By "little known fact" do you mean that lightning initially travels from the ground upwards, which is surely a well known fact - or have I missed something?

Is the Beetham Tower the one that hums in the wind?

[Griswold]

Good little video. By "little known fact" do you mean that lightning initially travels from the ground upwards, which is surely a well known fact - or have I missed something?

Is the Beetham Tower the one that hums in the wind?

Indeed, though if you ask most people they don't know that.

[mickylall]

it was an unknown fact to me :? .i'm going to show my ignorance here but how can the lightening go up first before it comes down :?: my brain hurts too much if i try to work it out myself

cheers,mick

[Bionic Man]

Good little video. By "little known fact" do you mean that lightning initially travels from the ground upwards, which is surely a well known fact - or have I missed something?

Is the Beetham Tower the one that hums in the wind?

Indeed, though if you ask most people they don't know that.

What exactly does it hum ? oasis tunes or something ?

[Parabola]

Ha I was at work about 400yds from there at the time... Sounded close :D

[hogthrob]

Last week, there was a lightning strike in next door's back garden, about twenty feet from where I was sitting with the window open [1]. The flash was blinding, and the bang awesomely loud. As it was so close, there was no warning delay after the flash - the boom was instant. I jumped and dropped my book. Surrounding car and house alarms were set off. It was a quite extraordinary experience, and I now have a little more respect for thunder storms.


[1] Fortunately, I was sitting on the loo at the time.

[Bionic Man]

Last week, there was a lightning strike in next door's back garden, about twenty feet from where I was sitting with the window open [1]. The flash was blinding, and the bang awesomely loud. As it was so close, there was no warning delay after the flash - the boom was instant. I jumped and dropped my book. Surrounding car and house alarms were set off. It was a quite extraordinary experience, and I now have a little more respect for thunder storms.


[1] Fortunately, I was sitting on the loo at the time.

Are you positive it was lightning and not just your neighbour farting ?????

[lysanderxiii]

Being struck by lighting is a rather common occurrence with tall buildings, the Empire State Building gets it about 100 times a year.

[Bionic Man]

Being struck by lighting is a rather common occurrence with tall buildings, the Empire State Building gets it about 100 times a year.

Shit , and i thought it was the bi-planes that took out kong !

[Parabola]

[1] Fortunately, I was sitting on the loo at the time.

:lol:

[Griswold]

Last week, there was a lightning strike in next door's back garden, about twenty feet from where I was sitting with the window open [1]. The flash was blinding, and the bang awesomely loud. As it was so close, there was no warning delay after the flash - the boom was instant. I jumped and dropped my book. Surrounding car and house alarms were set off. It was a quite extraordinary experience, and I now have a little more respect for thunder storms.


[1] Fortunately, I was sitting on the loo at the time.

You really do need to get a spell checker Gordon, it has a 'h' in it. :wink:

[ktmog6uk]

maybe i am wrong but lightning DOES strike down from the cloud. the electricity flashes down and what we see is the air burning back up its path from the ground up. the thunder is caused as air rushes into the ensuing vacuum, and is instananeously created, and delay between strike and thunder is a consequence of distance and i seem to remember as a rough guide is works out approx 1 second delay per mile. of course this might all be bollocks and someone with superior knowledge may shoot me down in the next post!
:diabloanifire:

[Dave E]

... works out approx 1 second delay per mile...

Can't comment about lightning in general and whether it goes up or down, but it's about 3 seconds per km or 5 per mile (speed of sound at sea level is about 330m/s).

[ktmog6uk]

:shock:
wow won't be quite as blase about how far off instant death is next time!

... works out approx 1 second delay per mile...

Can't comment about lightning in general and whether it goes up or down, but it's about 3 seconds per km or 5 per mile (speed of sound at sea level is about 330m/s).

[hogthrob]

Well I know I don't want to get near it again. It wasn't raining much or anything, bit of thunder here and there, then BAM, with great vengeance and furious anger, God smote a small patch of grass in my neighbour's back garden.

[ralphy]

Family story:
my father was stood in the utility room of his bungalow talking to my brother on the telephone when a lightning strike hit the roof. The telephone was one of those with a very long curly cord, my father was knocked off his feet and fell across the room and his arm had a 'ribbed' burn down it where the cable had been touching him. The telephone line ran through conduit in the wall plaster and it was blown out, and there was a terrible smell of burning throughout the house, so my mother called the fire brigade.

Fortunately my father was fine, apart from the burnt arm all he had was a cut to his head where he landed up against the washing machine - but my poor brother was very upset as all he heard on the phone call was (shortly after my dad telling him about the thunderstorm) was an almighty bang, followed by my mother screaming dad's name and then the line went dead. :shock:

Mind you, my dad had had a few close shaves in his life, so I guess his luck had held once again!

Oh, and the strike had also blown two of those PIR lights clear off the bungalow wall.

R

[Seabadger]

I've never had any experience as close as either of those two :shock:

I do occasionally get a little bit concerned when at my father in law's farm - it's in a particularly flat part of the world and the tallest things for a few kilometres in every direction are the five large, metal silos that cluster around the outbuildings and the copse of trees next to the house. They get larger and more frequent storms there than we do in the UK, but as far as I know nothing has ever been hit, or at least not hit so that anyone has noticed.

[chrisb]

maybe i am wrong but lightning DOES strike down from the cloud. the electricity flashes down and what we see is the air burning back up its path from the ground up. the thunder is caused as air rushes into the ensuing vacuum, and is instananeously created, and delay between strike and thunder is a consequence of distance and i seem to remember as a rough guide is works out approx 1 second delay per mile. of course this might all be bollocks and someone with superior knowledge may shoot me down in the next post!
:diabloanifire:

It goes up; otherwise how does it "know" to strike the lightning conductors?

Lightning is conducted up from ground along the conductor to the cloud/atmosphere

[Griswold]

maybe i am wrong but lightning DOES strike down from the cloud. the electricity flashes down and what we see is the air burning back up its path from the ground up. the thunder is caused as air rushes into the ensuing vacuum, and is instananeously created, and delay between strike and thunder is a consequence of distance and i seem to remember as a rough guide is works out approx 1 second delay per mile. of course this might all be bollocks and someone with superior knowledge may shoot me down in the next post!
:diabloanifire:

It goes up; otherwise how does it "know" to strike the lightning conductors?

Lightning is conducted up from ground along the conductor to the cloud/atmosphere

It's all down to ionisation and the way electricity works.

Ionisation happens up in the clouds which, in simple terms, build up a charge of electricity, (plasma), which wants to be released. Ionised air in and around the cloud sends out many paths known as Step Ladders seeking a path to discharge the built up energy. These Step Ladders are not straight, (hence the name), due to moisture and other particles in the air. As this strong electrical field approaces the earth, (there's been no lightening at this stage), objects like buildings and trees become 'excited' by the field and send up positive connecting paths known as Streamers. It is these streamers, as they reach a step ladder, that form the first visible flow of electricity upwards. As the connection is made between a Streamer and a Step Ladder the plasma discharges and the lightening Strikes downward and along that path. Thus we get the vivid jagged path of a lightening strike.

This all happens exceedingly fast, but as the downward Strike is more powefull than the upward Streamer this is what our eye records, even thoug h the upward Streamer happened first.

That's the simplified version, in reality it's a little more complex and would take several pages to explain.

Oh, and the old adage about lightening being one mile away for every second between the flash and the bang is completely wrong. Light travels at a around 186,000 miles per second, so when we see a lightening flash it's prety instantaneous; but sound travels at a miserable 1 mile in a little over 4 seconds in free air. If you've been using the 1 second 1 mile routine then the storm was nearer than you thought. :wink:

[Griff]

Oh, and the old adage about lightening being one mile away for every second between the flash and the bang is completely wrong. Light travels at a around 186,000 miles per second,

It actually travels at well over 186 million miles per second

[markc]

Oh, and the old adage about lightening being one mile away for every second between the flash and the bang is completely wrong. Light travels at a around 186,000 miles per second,

It actually travels at well over 186 million miles per second

Sorry Griff, it's 186,282 Miles per second (to the nearest mile) that's 299,792,458 metres per second (ish)

Cheers,