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knees,” he said. “The process of doing that makes your back a curved surface and lightning doesn’t like curved surfaces.”
Only your feet should be touching the ground, he added. Do not lie down on the ground. That position doesn’t give the curved body effect that dicourages a lightning bolt from hitting you.
The safest places to be during thunderstorms are in an automobile or building. A car is safe because the metal body acts as a “Farraday cage,” said Marvin Frydenlund, managing director of the Lightning Protection Institute in Woodstock, 111. That means lightning that hits a car will be diffused through the metal frame of the car and there should be no sideflashing, he said.
Many people think a car is safe because of its rubber tires, Hetzel said, but that’s really not a safety feature. Rubber tires also contain carbon, which is a very good conductor of electricity.
Most buildings are safe places to be in a thunderstorm.
Buildings that are more susceptible are very tall structures or those out in the open. Owners of these buildings should take precautions to “lightning-protect” their homes, Mr. Hetzel said. A lightning protection system consisting of several lightning rods grounded somewhere on the property typically costs several hundred dollars.
Lightning protection systems are getting more popular, Mr. Frydenlund said. People want to protect the many electronic devices now common in the home.
Some people may think that if their home is near a tall tree that the house is not a target for lightning. But the idea that lightning always looks for the highest point is not necessarily true, Mr. Hetzel explained. Sometimes lightning is concentrated
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