Posted on 01/24/2023 4:21:16 PM PST by murron
We have always been told that automobiles are the safest places to be in a Thunderstorm. What about electric cars?
Might be a good way to charge the batteries. the guberment will be telling everyone to install lightning rods.
First responders have been known to be electrocuted if the EV is in standing water. This was t case a few years ago but not sure how bad the situation is now.
No better, no worse.
The tires do nothing to protect you from lightning. Think of this: If lightning travels 1/2 to 1 mile just to hit your car, what is that last 6 inches worth?
Your car protects you because you are encased in a metal shell. The lightning conducts through and upon the outside of the shell rather than you.
It's a question born of ignorance. The protection an ICE car provides is that the chassis serves as a Faraday cage (No, it isn't the "rubber tires"). What is so different about a Tesla's chassis that it would fail to serve as a Faraday cage?
May be the quickest way to get them charged
I was in a car during the ‘80s that was struck by lightning. This was during the early days of processors in cars. The ‘check engine’ light came on, the car went into the limp home mode, and the park brake warning came on. There was no noticeable electrical discharge inside the car.
It was raining heavily, so I drove on until the rain stopped. Then, I pulled into a service station and shut the car off and restarted it. It ran OK, with no more warning lamps.
I would expect present cars to behave even better than this, even EVs.
The horror movie Man Made Monster (1941) was the first featured role for Lon Chaney , in the year he later starred in the Wolf Man and later in the Mummy. There was a funny sequence in one of my favorite comedies The Owl and the Pussycat in which Barbara Streisand explains the plot to George Seagal. Actually accurate.
Synopsis:
Dynamo Dan, a sideshow worker who does a faked electrical act is the only survivor when a bus he’s on slams into a high tension tower and all the passengers are killed by the electricity. He becomes powerful and dangerous. He ends up working with Lionel Atwill a mad scientist trying to make electrified super humans.
If it was grounded, it would light up like a roman candle.
I saw the results of a dump truck that got the box caught on a power line. They were yelling at the driver to stay IN the truck until they could get the line de-energized. He jumped and got fried.
it is safe in a car not because the tires are an insulator, in fact at those high voltages they conduct quite well. The reason cars are safe is because the body acts like at
faradays cage, just like high tension powers are washed by a person from a helicopter wearing a metal mesh suit, it acts as faradays cage.
I charged my Ioniq 5 during a severe thunderstorm last summer in Williams, Arizona. No problem.
Here, charge that MOFO off of one of these.
Watch the power cables on the left when it connects.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmXzNMoea5E
Electric, gas, diesel, or hydrogen: no “little” car is safe in any weather...
You’re right. I meant isolated from ground. My mistake. Thanks for catching it.
When JH jumped he made the connection to the ground.
They said he would have had to jump over 20 feet to get clear of the charge.
All he had to do was stay put.
Was a hell of a good guy. Never a bad word against anybody.
The tires are not the reason a car is safe during a thunderstorm. That’s a misconception.
How about just washing the car?
Headline: Entire family electrocuted washing their electric car.
I want to know how it operates on snow and ice.
Just can’t wrap my head around EVs.
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