The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1920-09-28
FEATHERS DO NOT
DIVERT LIGHTNING
OAK TREES, TALL CHIMNEYS,
METALLIC OBJECTS AND TEL
EGRAPH WIRES SHOULD BE
AVOIDED DURING STORMS.

One person in a thousand dying in
Kansas is killed by lightning, accord
ing to the report of the Kansas state
board of health, corroborated by in
designations of the>weather bureau,
which indicate the same rate will ap-
plv to Missouri also. The rate for
the country as a whole is slightly
less. but the lower Missouri valley
has more thunder showers than most
other sections. Kansas suffers prop
erty loss of more than $250,000 a
year from lightning, State Fire Mar
shall L. T. Hussey says.
No building is entirely safe from
lightning, and to be outdoors in a
thunder storm is almost as risky as
inside. The most dangerous places
are near telephone and telegraph
wires, tall chimneys or under oak
trees, and the safest place is inside
a building properly rodded, but even
then proximity to the chimney IS to
be avoided, according to S. D. Flora,
state meterologist. Beach, maple and
elm trees are noh nearly as liable to
be struck as oak, he says.
The old fashioned theory that GER
tain metals draw" lightning, or that
a feather bed is a safe retreat from
it is secuted by modern scientists,
who point out that metallic objects
are to be avoided during thunder
storm if they are in contact with
conductors which will carry shocks
from a distant point, but that cop
per bolts or plates have no power
to attract lightning like a magnet
draws iron. Feather beds, they say,
might insulate a person from an or
binary electric current, but are no
protection from the terrific energy
of a thunderbolt.
There is no use lodging or regis
tering fright at a binding flash of
lightning. 1t requires a sixth of a
second to produce the sensation of
sound and an eighth of a second for
sight, while lightning will utterly
destroy the brain in tenth of a Sec
ond, so that any one seeing a flash
may be sure it has missed him; 9th
erwise he would already be dead.
Lightning is caused by the air be-
ing heated to incandescence through
the passage of an enormous current
of electricity, and thunder by the
sudden expansion of this air when
it gets white hot. Rolling thunder
is simply the echo of the original
crash sent back from the clouds.
The ripping, smashing effect of
lightning when it strikes a tree or
building is due to the sudden expan-
sion of imprisoned air bubbles or
vaporiZation of moisture in the
wood. Shoes are generally torn off
persons struck because of the ex-
plosive effects of lightning when it
passes from the body, which is a
good conductor, through the shoes,
which are poor conductors. When
lightning strikes a building induced
currents may follow iron piping or
rods and cause electric sparks that
set fire to parts where the main
flash did not extend at all.
The electric current used for light
ing houses and running ordinary mo-
tors seldom has a flow or more than
three to four amperes and is unable
to jump across an air space of a
fraction of an inch, but scientists
say stroke of lightning has dis
charge as high as 10000 amperes
and often jumps twenty miles
through the air from one cloud to
another or mile and half from a
cloud to the ground. 1t is impossible
to produce such terrific currents or
control them by man-made devices,
but ample conductors such as proper
ly installed lightning rods will car
ry them to the ground and dissipate
them harmlessly.