Construction activity and the Code

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T.M.Haja Sahib said:
I do not see about the inapplicability of air terminals on munition bunker other than when the bunker is buried in the ground.For golf course rain shelter,the problem is already solved:see
http://www.lightningguardian.com/resources.html under Golf Course Shelters.
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Interesting site. We now should see the rate of golfers being killed by lightning drop considerably.

We have combined the beauty and elegance of our White Cedar Gazebos with a lightning protection system, which can be UL Certified.
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The 'parent company' is Maine Cedar Log Homes and coincidentally has the very same address.

I dunno.....call me skeptical.....but I don't think a log home builder qualifies as an authority on lightning hazards and protection. I think they are just out to sell their little white gazebos to the nice rich golf course owners.

Might I remind you of the bolt of lightning that passed through one of my friend's breezeway, melting a hole through a pane of glass as it did so. After seeing that, it's going to be pretty tough to convince me that a log home builder in Maine has invented a lightning proof white cedar gazebo. If that gazebo is in the path of the least impedance between two charge centers it's going to be hit, just like the breezeway. That bolt came from the north side of the house, blew through glass in the storm door on the north side of the breezeway, traveled across the five foot or so wide breezeway, exited through the south door and split into two parts. One leg hit the neighbor's house to the south and the other turned and went east for about 80 feet and hit an out building on the property, severely damaging it. No amount of lightning protection would have stopped that bolt as it was only four feet off the ground and traveling horizontally.

Kind of a side note.....I have been in this area for over a half century and I am used to many storms each year and many very severe electrical storms. For some reason, there has been virtually no electrical storms at all here in the last two years. Typically, we would have an electrical storm on the average of about 15-20 days each year or more. I don't think we have had 10 electrical storms in the last two years.

But I'm still not going fishing, and I am definitely not going golfing. :D
 
K8MHZ said:
Interesting site. We now should see the rate of golfers being killed by lightning drop considerably.



The 'parent company' is Maine Cedar Log Homes and coincidentally has the very same address.

I dunno.....call me skeptical.....but I don't think a log home builder qualifies as an authority on lightning hazards and protection. I think they are just out to sell their little white gazebos to the nice rich golf course owners.

Might I remind you of the bolt of lightning that passed through one of my friend's breezeway, melting a hole through a pane of glass as it did so. After seeing that, it's going to be pretty tough to convince me that a log home builder in Maine has invented a lightning proof white cedar gazebo. If that gazebo is in the path of the least impedance between two charge centers it's going to be hit, just like the breezeway. That bolt came from the north side of the house, blew through glass in the storm door on the north side of the breezeway, traveled across the five foot or so wide breezeway, exited through the south door and split into two parts. One leg hit the neighbor's house to the south and the other turned and went east for about 80 feet and hit an out building on the property, severely damaging it. No amount of lightning protection would have stopped that bolt as it was only four feet off the ground and traveling horizontally.

Kind of a side note.....I have been in this area for over a half century and I am used to many storms each year and many very severe electrical storms. For some reason, there has been virtually no electrical storms at all here in the last two years. Typically, we would have an electrical storm on the average of about 15-20 days each year or more. I don't think we have had 10 electrical storms in the last two years.

But I'm still not going fishing, and I am definitely not going golfing. :D
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No more diversion tactics please.From now on talk about the cases of ordinary structures where side flash took place in spite of lightning protection system designed and maintained per NFPA 780.This is my challenge to you.
 
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T.M.Haja Sahib said:
No more diversion tactics please.From now on talk about the cases of ordinary structures where side flash took place in spite of lightning protection system designed and maintained per NFPA 780.This is my challenge to you.
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How about the original story?

What were the NFPA 780 violations that contributed to the fatality? You are one that diverted to the cute little gazebos. I located the site the fatality took place at, provided different views to see just where the workers were, showed you pictures of the equipment and researched the events of the day leading to up to the fatality. I even found out what locals the workers belonged to. Short of driving there, I gave you all the info I could yet you have told us nothing that would have prevented the fatality.

I did.

That was to have left the job and got out of harm's way, just like the other workers did.

Back to the casino. How about a sketch of what type of lightning protection would have stopped that bolt from hitting the concrete pouring bucket? How about a list of NFPA 780 'violations'.

FWIW, NFPA 780 is not an installation requirement. Local building codes decide whether or not to require lightning protection. NFPA 780 is just a standard for lightning protection. It is not a law.
 
K8MHZ said:
How about the original story?

What were the NFPA 780 violations that contributed to the fatality?
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Please see post no.105.

K8MHZ said:
I located the site the fatality took place at, provided different views to see just where the workers were, showed you pictures of the equipment and researched the events of the day leading to up to the fatality. I even found out what locals the workers belonged to. Short of driving there, I gave you all the info I could yet you have told us nothing that would have prevented the fatality.
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Your efforts in clarifying the issue were magnificent.
I tried to create an awareness that a moving metallic object,even if grounded, such as a concrete bucket of a lift should not be brought within the bonding distance (implied in NFPA 780) to any workers during and shortly after a thunderstorm.This should be followed even during an approaching storm.
 
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T.M.Haja Sahib said:
Please see post no.105.
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There are no violations of any code shown in post 105.





I tried to create an awareness that a moving metallic object,even if grounded, such as a concrete bucket of a lift should not be brought within the bonding distance (implied in NFPA 780) to any workers during and shortly after a thunderstorm.This should be followed even during an approaching storm.
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Well no kidding, all of us have been saying the only way to prevent this would be to stay out of storms.
 
iwire said:
There are no violations of any code shown in post 105.
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I mentioned bonding concepts of NFPA 780 were violated.Please show how I was wrong.


iwire said:
Well no kidding, all of us have been saying the only way to prevent this would be to stay out of storms.
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I am all on your side.My awareness creating effort is towards those daredevil workers who never mind a thunderstorm.That awareness may save them one in thousand perhaps.
 
T.M.Haja Sahib said:
I mentioned bonding concepts of NFPA 780 were violated.Please show how I was wrong.
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Simple 780 does not address any requirements for Mobile or fixed position cranes, a tower is about the closest it gets and this doesn't address anything with a swinging load dangling by a cable that is always on the move, and this is one of the problems, how would one go about bonding this always moving bucket? even if you had a way to quickly bond and unbond the bucket as it approached the work area how wound you guarantee that it wouldn't be struck right at this time killing the person doing this bonding? we know that 780 allows the metal building structure to serve as the bonding point, and that the crane tower was all ready bonded to this structure at several points along it, and the fact that the bucket was electrically connected to this crane tower through the wire rope holding the bucket?

The unfortunate thing is lightning does not follow the fundamentals of regular electrical theory, and there are many variables that come into play that make it imposable to totally protect against any damage or injury to a person-'s that will make this kind of work place without any danger of a strike, so the only effective safe thing one could do is choose not to work when a thunderstorm is approaching or is even in the area of 10 miles or less.
 
hurk27 said:
Simple 780 does not address any requirements for Mobile or fixed position cranes, a tower is about the closest it gets and this doesn't address anything with a swinging load dangling by a cable that is always on the move,
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The code does not address such items directly.One may have to infer what is applicable from it.I just did that in post no,105.You may show how I am contradicting the code in doing so.
 
T.M.Haja Sahib said:
The code does not address such items directly.One may have to infer what is applicable from it.I just did that in post no,105.You may show how I am contradicting the code in doing so.
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Your not contradicting the code in a sense, but as applicable as a law it would not be enforceable here in the United States, remember here any enforceable code has to be adopted into law to be enforced, here we don't (well shouldn't) make a law just because someone thinks its a good idea, it has to have backing that will show that what this law is requiring will work, ( this was one of the bases that Indiana used to remove AFCI requirements) the problem with lightning is this would be very hard to do, this is why NFPA 780 is not very well accepted into law here as many of the requirements in it can not be substantiated through any experiments or test to show it will work every time to protect life and property every time, lightning protection is a hit or miss problem and because of this it would be hard to create a law requiring something that might not work which can open up legal problems when it does fail and people are killed or property is damaged, our society in todays world will want to put a blame on someone when this happens, the first thing the lawyers will say is how can you require this protection by law if it will not guaranty protection from lightning.

Sure you can in good faith try to limit as much hazard as you can but in doing so you can open yourself up to more liability as I tried to state back in post 90:

From post 90: Here in the states there is an old saying, if you remove snow from a sidewalk and someone falls you can be liable for their injuries, but if you just let the snow build up it is an act of god and you can't be found at fault, yes I know that this should not be this way as we should be protected when we act in good faith to lessen the danger for others, but in the real world this doesn't happen, we live in a very litigation world and people will sue over anything they think they can win, I know some other countries don't allow this but not so here in the US.
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I can't even start to say anything on how the law works in India, or how liability's are handled, but this accident happened here and will follow the laws here.
 
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