Comment on Would a metal gazebo be safe during a lightning storm?

• Nibodhika@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  No, in fact cars would be safer (about lighting strikes) if they had metal wheels or some metal touching the ground. Rubber is similarly insulated as air, meaning that they’re almost invisible to lightings.

  The reason why you’re safe in a car is because it’s a Faraday cage, the electricity flows around the body of the car instead of through you. That being said, exactly because the car has rubber feet it can hold quite a large charge still, so if you’re ever in a car that got hit by a lighting and the car doesn’t have a discharge (it’s common in some dry countries to have a metal chain or wire touching the ground to avoid getting shocked by your car due to static electricity), your safest bet is to touch the car against a metal pole before getting off. Because let’s say that the tires can insulate up to 10KV, the lighting might not have fully discharged and the car still be 10KV more charged than the ground, and when you touch the ground with one feet while the other is in the car you become the path of least resistance.

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