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Herman R. Prospective Patient

Risk of lightning

Mon, 05/20/2019 - 12:39PM

Can anyone tell me what the risk is of being connected with external electric power in a thunderstorm?

Is it advisabel to connect the batteries instead, when there is lightning around?

 

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Larrie T.

Mon, 05/27/2019 - 6:15PM

Hi Herman,

I can only speak for myself but yes, I would definitely switch to batteries when lightning is nearby.  There's no downside to doing so, and in the event that lightning hits the power lines (all too common in areas with overhead lines) there might be a significant advantage to not being connected to wall power at that time.  Medical equipment is among the most robust of all AC powered electronic equipment with significant thought and design toward best grounding practices and isolating the patient connections, but nothing can be expected to survive a good blast of lightning.  We had lightning hit a pole transformer about a mile away a few years ago and it destroyed most of the electronics in the house.  Anything connected to both AC power and a good earth ground got it especially bad.  That could be you if you happened to be touching a water tap or a grounded appliance at the time. 

We discussed this briefly in this episode of Life on Batteries:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1bxaNI-FQ8

In short, I see a lot of reasons why you might want to switch to batteries when lightning is near, and really not a lot of reasons why not to.  

Stay safe,

Larrie