The Cape Girardeau Democrat. (Cape Girardeau, Mo.) 1876-1909, 1893-11-11
THREE MILLION HORSEPOWER.
About the Amount of Force Contained !
"A noIt Of 4 IuI4Iau

--~. 80 " DANT al
81 Bolt of Lightning"
1t has been stated that the cleo.
tromotive force developed by a bolt
of lightning of the regulation size was
3, 500, 900 volts, the current about H.
600, 900 amperes and the time of dis.
charge about LEO, 900 part of a second.
There is no way of measuring the ex
traordinary amount of energy thus
developed so as to give it in figures that
would be correct beyond all question,
but the best scientists and electricians
say hal it is not less than 9, 400, OOO, 900
watts, which would be equal to a
stroke of 3,2S4, 1S2 horse power, A
comparatively clear explanation of
the cause of the death from
lightning stroke is from the pen of one
the best electricians of the day: The
cause of death by lightning is the sud-
den absorption of the electric current.
When a thunder cloud which is highly
charged with positive electricity hangs
over a certain place the earth beneath
it becomes a~bnormally charged with
the negative electric current, and the
man, animal or other object standing
or lying directly beneath also partakcs
of the aforementioned influence. If,
while the man, animal, or other object
is in this condition, a discharge takes
place from the cloud above, the r~estora-
ton of the equilibrium will be sudden
and violent; or. in language hat we
can all understand, the negative cur.
rent from the earth will rush up to
join the positive cloud current, and in
passing through the object which sepa-
rates the two currents, if it be an ami
mate being, will do so with such force
as to almost invariably produce instant
death.
According to the above, which seems
a tenable hypothesis. to say the least,
a fellow is really struck" by the
ground current and not by the forked
fury from above. In this connection it
may be stated that DR.. Macaulay, an
able naval surgeon of last century edu-
cation, has left on record the history of
a man who, struck down on deck by
lightning and being entirely insensible,
was brought to consciousness and re-
covery by the rapid abstraction of over
forty ounces of blood. An experiment
of another kind bears directly upon the
value of the remedy in such cases. In
experimenting with the great Undue
ton coil at the old Polytechnic a scien-
fist tried to kill large animals-sheep
by an electrical discharge
derived from a Leyden battery set ''in
cascade" and presenting ninety-six feet
of surface. This shock is practically
of lightning, and by passing it
once through the body of a sheep
it rendered the animal instanta-
neously unconscious, to all appearance
dead, and, as l found by one line
of experiment, actually dead, if moth
ing more were done to it. But in an
other line of experiment, the animals,
as soon as they were stricken, were re-
by the butcher, and were sub
to division of the vessels of the
neck in the usual manner of killing in
the slaughter-house. At first blood
very slowly from the operation,
but in a short time the current became
freer, and, as it became free, the
phenomena of active life, previously
suspended in the animals, returned.
There was, for a moment or two, re-
turn of consciousness, of motion, of
struggle and those proofs of life that
an animal passes through, previous to
convulsion, when it is submitted to
slaughter without shock II we con-
meet the experience of those of our pre-
1ecessors who have successfully EN-
.bloodletting for the cure of
lightning stroke with the experimental
here adduced, the inference is,
rs far as inference can be, that blood
is the remedy for the effects Of
The shock of lightning, experiment.
with experience, becoming Of
value.-Boston Transcript