On June 27, 2010 I was sitting in my upstairs home office at my computer. There was a thunderstorm outside which was pretty common for summertime in Chicago (Skokie).
Suddenly there was the loudest CRACK of lightning like an explosion. Looking out my window I could see that the largest tree in the backyard had been hit by lightning. A large part of the upper portion of the tree had been split off and was lying in the yard and out to the street.
Running downstairs to investigate I found some major damages besides the tree itself: our in-ground sprinkler system and our outdoor lighting system were both destroyed.
I was amazed that even though these were both low-voltage systems with very low capacity wiring, the wires were somehow able to carry the enormous voltage surge of the lighting conducted through the ground. Moreover, that surge of electrical energy got translated to physical energy when it reached any control points. As the photos (taken and annotated for insurance) show, the control boxes for both systems were physically blown off the building! And in the case of the sprinkler control, the box was blown open, wires ripped, and components flung as far as 20 feet!
The photos show the damages, and effectively illustrate the amazing power of electrical energy. I remain surprised that the fine wires didn’t just melt and act like a fuse, but rather delivered this huge surge of energy.
Afterwards, I found that in my office an external disc drive had its electronics destroyed and also a small battery-operated clock had its time reset! The clock was intriguing because it was not connected to anything, so it was simply the electro-magnetic pulse from the bolt of lightning that affected it!
The photos that follow are annotated for insurance claim purposes.
