On Tuesday 29 July 2008 11:21, John Andersen wrote:
On Tue, Jul 29, 2008 at 10:44 AM, Randall R Schulz wrote:
...
I've had ligntning blow the chips completly off a NIC in the server and leave EVERYTHING else in the network running. The same strike fried a motorized pencil sharpener (it started smoking) in the building next door, and harmed nothing else in the building. Mind Boggling.
Out of curiosity, did these things happen in Alaska? I wonder if there might be added phenomena or properties of lightening in areas where geomagnetic and solar effects are sometimes stronger (sometimes much stronger).
Yes, during one of exactly 4 occurrences of Lightning I've ever seen in Juneau in 30 years.
Closely ringed by mountains, Juneau seldom ever gets lightning.
Solar effects happen much higher than lightning if my rudimentry understanding of the atmospheric model does not fail me.
Most of the time, yes, but during solar storms the flux of ions in the solar wind can attain magnitudes that deflect and compress the geomagnetic field to the point where it induces huge currents in power distribution lines (at high latitudes) and that can cause power transformers to overheat and even explode. There are also bizarre phenomenon associated with lightening that occur on the tops of and / or above the clouds. They're called Red Sprites and Blue Jets. High-voltage, high-current electrical discharge in gasses and in the presence of large-scale magnetic fields can be pretty funky things, it seems.
----------JSA---------
Randall Schulz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org