FACTS
AND FIGURES
- Number of thunderstorms
occurring at any given moment: 2,000
- Number of thunderstorms
occurring in the United States a year: 100,000
- Your chances
of being struck by lightning in the United States are 1:600,000.
- Number of lightning
strikes every second: 100
- Number of lightning
strikes a day: 8 million
- Number of lightning
strikes in the USA per year: 20 million
- A typical lightning
bolt contains 1 billion volts and contains between 10,000 to
200,000 amperes of current.
- The average
flash would light a 100 watt lightbulb for 3 months.
- The average
lightning stroke is 6 miles long.
- The temperature
of lightning's return stroke can reach 50,000°F. The temperature
on the surface of the sun is around 11,000°F.
- Once the leading
edge of a thunderstorm is within 10 miles, you are at immediate
risk due to the possibility of lightning strokes coming from
an overhanging anvil cloud. Because of this, many lightning deaths
and injuries occur with clear skies directly overhead.
LIGHTNING
SAFETY RULES
DON'T...
- Don't venture
outside, unless absolutely necessary
- Don't use plug-in
electrical equipment like hair driers, electric toothbrushes,
or electric razors during the storm.
- Don't use the
telephone during the storm. Lightning may strike telephone lines
outside.
- Don't take laundry
off the clothesline.
- Don't work on
fences, telephone or power lines, pipelines, or structural steel
fabrication.
- Don't use metal
objects like fishing rods and golf clubs. Golfers wearing cleated
shoes are particularly good lightning rods.
- Don't handle
flammable materials in open containers.
- Don't stay on
hilltops, in open spaces, near wire fences, metal clotheslines,
exposed sheds, and any electrically conductive elevated objects.
DO...
- Stay indoors.
- Stay away from
open doors and windows, fireplaces, radiators, stoves, metal
pipes, sinks, and plug-in electrical appliances.
- Stop tractor
work, especially when the tractor is pulling metal equipment,
and dismount. Tractors and other implements in metallic contact
with the ground are often struck by lightning.
- Get out of the
water and off small boats.
- Stay in your
automobile if you are traveling. Automobiles offer excellent
lightning protection.
- Seek shelter
in buildings. If no buildings are available, your best protection
is a cave, ditch, canyon, or under head-high clumps of trees
in open forest glades.
- When there is
no shelter, avoid the highest object in the area. If only isolated
trees are nearby, your best protection is to crouch in the open,
keeping twice as far away from isolated trees as the trees are
high.
- When you feel
the electrical charge -- if your hair stands on end or your skin
tingles -- lightning may be about to strike you. Drop to the
ground immediately.
MYTHS
ABOUT LIGHTNING
 MYTH: If it is not raining,
then there is no danger from lightning.
FACT: Lightning often strikes outside of heavy rain and may occur
as far as 10 miles away from any rainfall.
MYTH: The
rubber soles of shoes or rubber tires on a car will protect you
from being struck by lightning.
FACT: Rubber-soled shoes and rubber tires provide NO protection
from lightning. However, the steel frame of a hard-topped vehicle
provides increased protection if you are not touching metal.
Although you may be injured if lightning strikes your car, you
are much safer inside a vehicle than outside.
MYTH: People
struck by lightning carry an electrical charge and should not
be touched.
FACT: Lightning-strike victims carry no electrical charge and
should be attended to immediately.
MYTH: "Heat
lightning" occurs after very hot summer days and poses no
threat.
FACT: What is referred to as "heat lightning" is actually
lightning from a thunderstorm too far away for thunder to be
heard. However, the storm may be moving in your direction!
Courtesy of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
U. S. Department of Commerce
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