When lightning roars — go indoors. Coastal Rowing and Lightning

Did you know that it could be very dangerous to row during a thunder storm? Coastal rowing and lightning is not a very good combination

• the original post was written here:  R0wing

We all had this happening to us: Touring and bad weather? Thats ok. But what to do when lighning comes? We read a great discussion about it with this awesome photo.

Helpful advice about what to do if you’re on water and a lightning storm starts.

When thunderstorms are nearby, there are three main factors determining what gets struck, the objects: 1) height relative to other objects, 2) isolation, and 3) pointiness. But the path of least resistance (technically, impedance) from the cloud to the ground can be very convoluted, so lightning is more likely to strike tall isolated pointy objects, but there are no guarantees.

Rowers are often higher than water, isolated and sometimes pointy…. and coach boats are often metal.

Coastal rowing and lightning : When Lightning roars – go indoors!

Carl Douglas nicely reinforces this with his reasoning:

You’re out on water – a fine, flat, conductive, earthing surface.

There’s a vertical electrostatic gradient of who knows how many thousand volts per metre.

You’re the only thing projecting locally above that surface, so the charge concentration at your head can be huge.

You also hold 2 conductive carbon sculls, have conductive aluminiun riggers & every surface is damp, so you really are well connected.

Bottom line: lightning and water related activities are a bad combination. Please learn more about lightning safety and avoid becoming a statistic.