Payette enterprise. (Payette, Canyon Co., Idaho) 1909-1935, 1922-12-14
SAFETY IN STORM
"Skyscraper" Good Place to Be
When Lightning Flashes.
Steel Frame Conducts Electric Fluid
Harn1lcssIy to Earth-Some Places
That Arc Especially Dangerous.

Here's good news for skyscraper
folk. The safest place In thunder
storm Is a steel frame building. That
is, it's the safest place accessible to
most Of U.S. There might be slight
margin In favor of an underground
cave or a compartment completely en-
yeloped in metal network. But mod
ern office building, hotel or department
store comes pretty near making Its
occupants lightning proof.
Not that lightning never strikes such
a building. Indeed, 1t often skaters
some wooden excrescence on it, like
fagpole, and there have been thunder
storms in New York which have lit
tered downtown streets with such
wreckage.
But the modern buildings themselves
are such good conductors that when
they are struck the people inside them
never know it. Through their steel
skeletons the electric fluid speeds
harmlessly on its shortest possible
path to the earth.
More, the skyscraper actually plays
a benefcent part in a thunderstorm,
says Dr. Charles P. Steinmetz, chief
consulting engineer of the General
Electric company, since they tend to
relieve by silent discharges" the ten
sion existing at such times between
earth and sky.
If you are lightning shy, DR.. Stein
metz conclusions will encourage you. |
AT the same time he utters few I
words of warning. While the sporting
odds, based on lightning fatality sta
istics, are about 100000 to 1 against
my particular person being killed by
lightning, it's just as we'll to notice
where you're standing while a thun. i
lerstorm is raging.
1t might not be healthy for instance,
take up your station in a direct line
etween two good-sized metal objects,
UGH as steam radiator and an iron I,
ink, or between either of them and
ain spout running up the side of the
ouse That would be reckless invi-
ltion to some flash of lightning, either 4
irect or indirect, to do its worst to
gu. For lightning prefers metal con.
uctors on its journey to the ground =
nd would rather leap from one me- 4
lllic body to another than take a
rect course through nonconducting
ediums.
"A place of special danger" says
emmett, sis directly beneath hang
6 lamp or globe suspended from the =
ling by chain. Lightning may fol- :
" the chain to its end and then
mp off. The place where a wire
othesline enters house may also be
danger spot, although l think this
IS been overemphaslzed.
Golf fans will be cheered to learn
at the metal pieces on their clubs are
0 insignificant to attract the majestic
tentions Of lightning stroke. Golf
S caught In q thunderstorm have 6
en- known to fall in panic and
row away their clubs, but their fears
e pronounced groundless.
The behavior of lightning under va. la
JUS conditions has been studied SYM W
thetlcally by Steinmetz, who was N
bbed lightning tamerr when he sue. u .iss
eded in producing artificial lightning ~
his laboratory. -.
If you glory in thunderstorm as I OF
you will want to stand at window eff
on the front porch and watch It," co
said. "And there you will be Just nj
tut as safe as anywhere else. For is
all tie lightning flashes generated MI
a vivid summer storm, less than 1 en-
cent strike the earth. The rest are m'
fined to the sky that breeds them. i ~
If chances of being bitten by mad Wv ~,
are probably greater than the re-,
nee that you will be struck dead by III
timing. Only about 500 persons are the
ed by lightning In this country Sp;
~ year." gel
s for the human rabbits who seek or
in thunderstorm by cas-
ing themselves in feather beds, the use
thing tanner has nothing but mild uh'
milo for flor, lun
is