Lightning and Surge Suppression Reports

[kelly]

Interesting stuff.

http://www.macintouch.com/lightning.html#jul31

[Gregg]

Reading that makes me feel good about the decision to have a whole house surge protector added to the specs for our house. It was only a $150 add as I recall.

Now, what should I do about a backup power source for the sump pump? Don't have a sump in our current home. I should ask one of my electrical engineering consultants... You can bail, but what if you're gone!?

  ...this thread is supposed to be about surges. Well, rising water can be a surge. Ok, not a power surge...  

[sokukodo]

The cable line to my tv and cable modem were hit a few weeks ago ... knocked them both out ... the computer was plugged into a surge protector, and it came through unscathed (although I've noticed a little slowness when launching apps now, I think this is attributable to 10.2.6's last ungrade rather than lightning. I think).

[giantmike]

I wrote an article about this a long long time ago. In a single strike, I lost two modems (when I still had 56K) and the modem port on my begie G3 was fried. Luckily nothing else got zapped. Now, whenever a large storm in coming, everything gets unplugged in a hurry.

[sandbox]

Good for you Gregg, although almost everyone around me has been whacked, right up to three nights ago, I stand as an island in the sea of burnt appliances with a hard to hide smirk on my mug.

It’s been some years since I installed the Square D Surgebreaker into my service, and I supposed it could use an update, but it’s been one of the best impulse purchases I’ve ever made!

[Xairbusdriver]

Only thing that bothers me about the messages is that absolutely nothing you plug into your house, line, computer or vice versa will protect your equipment from a direct lightening strike. Don't be fooled into thinking you are protected by any device you buy/use. The only way to absolutely protect your computer is to disconnect it from all external inputs. If you leave a cable to a hub connected, it may very well be the path used by the lightening. It is inconvenient to do all this disconnecting/connecting I know, but it the only way to protect yourself.  A slight benefit is that you will automatically remove any oxidation on those connectors!

Another 'surprise' some in our area have learned about the hard way - don't connect a computer directly to an auxillary generator!  Heard of many 'frying' their PC's (not a great loss, I know!) because they did not run this power through a UPS (a surge protector probably wouldn't have helped because of the low voltage swings [brownout] of most generators). There are still about 10% of the Memphis area without electricity. Going over to a friends house tomorrow to cut up a tree so the phone people can re-install their lines. We barely had a power outage, only a few seconds, didn't even trip the VCR clock! I mentioned that to someone last week - they said if that clock wasn't flashing, there must be something wrong with my VCR!

Jim C.