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Electricity: It's A Killer—Or Not?

A

Anonymous

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I've been wandering round electric websites (to do with Van De Graaf generators), but rather horrifyingly I also found this link.

It's a guy surviving a powerline encounter (but its still fairly shocking... shouldn't joke), but its shows how some people can miraculously survive.

ELECTROCUTION​

16,600 VOLTS!​


In Approx. Feb 1996,This person who is high on PCP was trying to kill himself. This situation lasted for about 45 minutes. This being toward the end of the situation,the person had already walked from A previous power pole by means of walking on the low voltage wire and hanging on to the other wire that was around him. The Power Company had denergized the low voltage wire at this point. What you see now is this person on PCP accending the the level of HIGH VOLTAGE. The wires above him at this point are energized at 16,600 volts WYE system. "for all you overhead junkies"

The person who was on PCP at the time. Reached out his hand and grabbed the conductor! At that instant 16,600 volts shot through his body. If you can belive it, the guy is inside of the ball of fire that you see. He did not fall at that moment. The air surrounding him becomes ionized and begins to conduct and actually burn. The small ball of fire that you see towards the bottom near the street lamp is where the arc went to ground through the secondary conductors. Notice the whipping action of the wire he is holding onto. You might find it interesting to compare all the pictures with one another to try to see if you can pick out all the changes as massive amounts of current try to reach ground !
As you can see, The ball of fire has started to subside. If you look closely you can see his legs at the bottom of the fire ball he is still standing on the crossarm. A flash of eletrical power of this magnitude would kill most all people. If you can believe it , this guy survived the contact with the high voltage and to this day is still alive! If you made it to this point-- YOU GOT GUTS!!!

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A special thanks to Ben of the L.A. Power & Water Dept in California for providing me with this information!​

Marc Staves, [email protected].

Source:
http://members.tripod.com/~StormTrooper_2/index2.htm
 
IANAEE, but, as I understand it : the VDG itself is reasonably safe -- it produces high voltage but low current. Generally, that tends to travel the surface of objects -- the "skin effect". Likewise, things like properly construced Tesla coils are fairly harmless unless you're talking very large ones.

I read something on Bill Beaty's site about VDG designs that have a wall-plug source of current. And how that could be a safety issue since you have a large current source involved. He seems to think that a normally innocous high voltage low current could arc over to another improperly isolated source which could then follow the arc back. In other words, don't charge yourself up on your VDG and then draw sparks from your wallsocket.
 
errr i wil bear that in mind.... i was thinking of all my Vg experiments being in the kitchen too, away from the telly and computer....
 
David Swenson of 3M Corporation describes an anomaly where workers encountered a strange "invisible wall" in the area under a fast-moving sheet of electrically charged polypropelene film in a factory. This "invisible wall" was strong enough to prevent humans from passing through. A person near this "wall" was unable to turn, and so had to walk backwards to retreat from it.

This occurred in late summer in South Carolina, August 1980, in extremely high humidity. Polypropelene (PP) film on 50K ft. rolls 20ft wide was being slit and transferred to multiple smaller spools. The film was taken off the main roll at high speed, flowed upwards 20ft to overhead rollers, passed horizontally 20ft and then downwards to the slitting device, where it was spooled onto shorter rolls. The whole operation formed a cubical shaped tent, with two walls and a ceiling approximately 20ft square. The spools ran at 1000ft/min, or about 10MPH. The PP film had been manufactured with dissimilar surface structure on opposing faces. Contact electrification can occur even in similar materials if the surface textures or micro-structures are significantly different. The generation of a large imbalance of electrical surface-charge during unspooling was therefore not unexpected, and is a common problem in this industry. "Static cling" in the megavolt range!

On entering the factory floor and far from the equipment, Mr. Swenson's 200KV/ft handheld electrometer was found to slam to full scale. When he attempted to walk through the corridor formed by the moving film, he was stopped about half way through by an "invisible wall." He could lean all his weight forward but was unable to pass. He observed a fly get pulled into the charged, moving plastic, and speculates that the e-fields might have been strong enough to suck in birds!

The production manager did not believe Mr. Swenson's report of the strange phenomena. When they both returned to the factory floor, they found that the "wall" was no longer there. But the production workers had noticed the effect as occurring early in the morning when humidity was lower, so they agreed to try again another day. The second attempt was successful, and early in the morning the field underneath the "tent" was strong enough to raise even the short, curly hair of the production manager. The "invisible wall" effect had returned. He commented that he "didn't know whether to fix it or sell tickets."

More Details:
http://www.amasci.com/weird/unusual/e-wall.html

invisble wall by static?...all very odd and star trek like
 
I was always led to believe that it's not the voltage, but the ampage which is the defining factor on how powerful a shock can be, i.e. you can get zapped with a zillion volts, and a lovely firework show would ensure, but if the ampage was nonexistant, you would be completely fine with one or two minor burns, mainly from the heat rather than the electrical current?

Feel free to correct me.. I was a biologist, not a physicist :)
 
I know that licking a battery is not nice....... (don't ask !)
 
Snowman X said:
I was always led to believe that it's not the voltage, but the ampage which is the defining factor on how powerful a shock can be, i.e. you can get zapped with a zillion volts, and a lovely firework show would ensure, but if the ampage was nonexistant, you would be completely fine with one or two minor burns, mainly from the heat rather than the electrical current?

Feel free to correct me.. I was a biologist, not a physicist :) [/B]
Click to expand...


yes well im not scientist.. ( i dont know what i am, but im sure u all have some sugestions best kept to yourselves)... but i think ur right... the spark from a motorbikes plugs wil jump at 15,000 volts but just kick ur arm but not kill cos its only 2 amps(i think).. so all this VG stuff is at low ampage but hi Volts (as any air jump must be) Electricity is trasmitted across country in huge volts cos it looses less on the way then reduced to domestic localy. ..however the heat involved in reciveing a SUSTAINED lot of volts is enuf to melt body fat and do horrible things to people....
 
Snowman X said:
I was always led to believe that it's not the voltage, but the ampage which is the defining factor on how powerful a shock can be, i.e. you can get zapped with a zillion volts, and a lovely firework show would ensure, but if the ampage was nonexistant, you would be completely fine with one or two minor burns, mainly from the heat rather than the electrical current?

Feel free to correct me.. I was a biologist, not a physicist :)
Click to expand...

I did this in physics! So long as you get less than three amps, you're fine...more or less...
 
i studied this at college for four years and the bottom line is if it "throws" you well your usually ok, if you "stick" then i hope you have friends around who don't want to hug you while your dancing.

hit the dancer with a wooden plank...they will thank you !! :)
 
Reminds me of the famous (true or UL? - You Decide) story of the woman who found her husband jittering around in the kitchen holding the electric kettle. She grabbed a handly plank of would and hit his arm to separate him from the kettle.

What she didn't realise was that he was listening to his Walkman and not electrified at all....his wrist was broken but they managed to laugh about it afterwards...
 
It's the amps, not the volts...

From 'The Man Who Invented the Twentieth Century: Nikola Tesla, Forgotten Genius of Electricity' by Robert Lomas, Headline 1999, ISBN 0-7472-7588-2, p. 102

He (Tesla) found that he could pass high voltages safely though his own body, provided he ensured that the current stayed low...Five thousandths of an ampere passed across the chest will stop the heart, but two million volts at a millionth of an ampere will just make your hair stand on end without harming you.
Click to expand...
 
oddly high volts also means the normal insi=ulation isnt efective...normal wire insulation just aint good enuf...Ina humid environment even the air transmits it away...electricity odd stuff..
 
resistance & time are more important

The principle that high voltage is okay if the current is low is not quite right, although the phrase "it's the volts that jolts but the current that kills" is widely used (in the wonderful world of health and safety anyway!).

The electrical resistance of your body and the length of time you are exposed to the current are more important. For example if your exposed to current for the duration of 1 heartbeat with an 'average' electrical resistance for the body (somebody worked this out to be about 1000 ohms when a person's wearing normal everyday clothing and not overly perspiring so this figure is VERY approximate) a current in excess of 0.08 amps could be fatal.

The amount of current flowing through the body depends on the voltage and the body's resistance, so if you come into contact with mains electricity at 240V at 'average' resistance you would receive a current of 0.24 amps, more than enough to kill you! If your working on a wooden stepladder wearing rubber soled shoes and gloves, your resistance would be very high and would probably not affect you at all. If your hot and sweaty and working in bare feet your resistance would be much lower and you wouldn't stand much of a chance.

If your exposed to a very high voltage, with luck you would be thrown off the equipment quickly enough to be exposed to the high current that would flow for such a short time (microseconds or less) that you would survive.

Even this is fairly simplistic as it doesn't take charge into account but you get the idea. (e.g. static shocks can be of thousands to tens of thousands of volts but there's so little charge that current flows for a tiny length of time so all you feel is a little jolt)

Cheers

Floyd.
 
lol

sidecar_jon said:
yes well im not scientist.. ( i dont know what i am, but im sure u all have some sugestions best kept to yourselves)... but i think ur right... the spark from a motorbikes plugs wil jump at 15,000 volts but just kick ur arm but not kill cos its only 2 amps(i think).. so all this VG stuff is at low ampage but hi Volts (as any air jump must be) Electricity is trasmitted across country in huge volts cos it looses less on the way then reduced to domestic localy. ..however the heat involved in reciveing a SUSTAINED lot of volts is enuf to melt body fat and do horrible things to people....
Click to expand...

ive tryed this when i was about 12 and belive me there is ALOT of electricity passing through ht leads ok so em just dont try it ok!

if u are interested the ht lead on my bike had to be shortened and wasnt long enough, daft and idiotic.
so i tryed to start the bike to see if i needed a new ht lead,idiot.
so i thought i would just hold the 2 leads while a freind? kick over the bike
beleve me when i say that there IS alot of electricity passing through there ok
ive heard since that electric shocks are worse when you are young as your skin isnt as dry so.....
 
Personally I went for the 'pull-the-plug-part-way-out-of-the-socket (but not so far that the lamp went out) -and-stick-a-magnet-between-the-plug-and-the-socket' approach. (I was about 10. I suspect I nearly didn't make it to 11.) Blew me across the room and every fuse in the house.
 
I just stuck my thumb into an empty bulb socket on a lamp stand and found myself forcefully levitated across the room :)

I awoke.. thinking about ghosts and ufos and... hold on.. there's a pattern emerging here.. ;)
 
Zygon said:
Personally I went for the 'pull-the-plug-part-way-out-of-the-socket (but not so far that the lamp went out) -and-stick-a-magnet-between-the-plug-and-the-socket' approach. (I was about 10. I suspect I nearly didn't make it to 11.) Blew me across the room and every fuse in the house.
Click to expand...

Thank God for fuses eh! They almost certainly saved your life.
 
High-Voltage Suicidal Electrocution With Multiple Exit Wounds
Siddhartha Das, MD,* Ambika Prasad Patra, MD,* Kusa Kumar Shaha, MD,* Sarath Chandra Sistla, MS,Þ and Manoj Kumar Jena, MDþ

Abstract: Poisoning, hanging, and burning are the usual methods adopted by people to commit suicide. Suicide by electrocution and that too high voltage is one of the rarest methods adopted for the purpose. We report the case of a young man who committed suicide by climbing up a 25-ft-high electric pole. The deceased was a regular alcoholic and was under severe depression for a long time because of his personal problems. He survived for more than 2 days after the incident. His serum urea and creatinine levels were elevated, so were the creatine kinase total and creatine kinase-MB level. The method adopted and the findings make this case a rare scientific report. Moreover, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first reported case in an English scientific litera- ture of a high-voltage suicidal electrocution with multiple exit wounds. The circumstances surrounding the manner of electrocution and the features of electric injuries are presented and discussed.

Key Words: suicide, high-voltage electrocution, multiple exit wounds (Am J Forensic Med Pathol 2013;34: 34Y37)

Although it requires no profound knowledge of electricity and electrical wiring to commit suicide by electrocution and the requisite materials are easy to acquire, suicide by electrocution is still uncommon. The majority and in some studies all of such deaths in India, and those reported from abroad, are found to be accidental in nature. Suicidal electrocution has been reported from the Western countries, and Australia.

In most of the cases of suicidal electrocution, low-voltage current has been used. Direct contact with live electrical cables and electrical device immersed in bath tubs are the usual methods adopted by the deceased. However, Toro et al reported a very interesting case of suicidal hanging on a high-voltage line pylon, hanging being the planned suicidal method which was associated with unintentional electrocution injuries. Indian authors have reported cases of suicidal electrocution quoting either the newspapers or western incidents. Recently, Khandekar et al and Gupta et al, both from India, reported cases of suicidal electrocution with high and low voltage respectively.

Injury by high-tension electric currents occurs either by direct contact or by indirect results of arcing or flash over. The high- tension injuries are usually seen in linemen working on the grid systems and occasionally in thieves stealing wires from high- voltage overhead lines. Our case highlights the plight of a severely depressed individual who was neither a lineman nor a thief, and who chose a very rare method to end his life.

Details at link or (better) in attached .pdf:
257069270_High-Voltage_Suicidal_Electrocution_With_Multiple_Exit_Wounds
 

Attachments

  • AJFMP_sid2-HIGHVOLTAGESUICIDALELECTROCUTIONWITHMULTIPLEEXITWOUNDS-FMP-12-35.pdf
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A suicide by electrocution happened in the county where I live about 20 years ago. It was a middle-aged man who was found lying on his lawn.
He'd taken the plug off an extension and run it from the house and held the bare wires agains his chest.

I knew his widow through a bereavement support group and always wanted to ask if the cause of death was general electrocution or the direct effect of the power on his heart. Thought better of it.
 
There is something called fractal burning. You run a high voltage through a plank of wood and it creates a lightning-style burnt pattern on the wood surface. Just for the aesthetics.
Apparently 33 people have died trying this method since 2016.
 
Interestingly, Mythconceptions in the current FT444 covers this area - it deals with the ability of water to transmit electricity and comes to a logical but surprising conclusion.
 
"My arm melted"

A metal thief who was seriously injured after sawing through a cable carrying 11,000 volts has been ordered to carry out 140 hours of unpaid work.
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William Durnan, 44, cut power to half of Johnstone town centre, after targeting a junction box in the Renfrewshire town on 19 August 2013.

He was given a community payback order after admitting the botched theft.

Paisley Sheriff Court heard how Durnan was left "looking like the professor from the Back To The Future movie".
Click to expand...

Full Story
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-27190345
 
Xanatic* said:
There is something called fractal burning. You run a high voltage through a plank of wood and it creates a lightning-style burnt pattern on the wood surface. Just for the aesthetics.
Apparently 33 people have died trying this method since 2016.
Click to expand...
TikTok and You Tube came under heavy fire for featuring this technique.
Some of the videos just showed the process, with warnings about doing this without proper safeguards and training. Most, however, were just clout-chasing - pretending how safe and easy it was to do by using the power system from a microwave oven.
 
Stormkhan said:
TikTok and You Tube came under heavy fire for featuring this technique.
Some of the videos just showed the process, with warnings about doing this without proper safeguards and training. Most, however, were just clout-chasing - pretending how safe and easy it was to do by using the power system from a microwave oven.
Click to expand...
I've just posted a video on Facebook demonstrating it, with my brother tagged. 'Try this! Or not as you'll blow yourself up.'
 
Let’s not forget the Marconi Scientist suicides in the 80s and early 90s iirc. A series of incidents so bizarre, it was only missing an investigation by Steed and Mrs. Peel.

  1. On August 25th 1988 the 60-year-old Marconi director John Ferry, a retired Army general, jammed stripped wires into his own tooth fillings and electrocuted himself.
    In an interesting parallel to John Brittain he was also involved in a car accident shortly before his suicide. While he was driving down a country road at night, his car was hit by a truck and was pushed off the road and started burning. While the truck drove away, Ferry was able to get out of the burning car.
  2. On August 28th 1988, only three days after the suicide by electrocution it comes to a second one. The 50-year-old computer engineer Alistair Beckham electrocutes himself. It is believed that he worked on a top-secret project related to the Strategic Defense Initiative.
    On this Sunday Alistair drove his wife to work as usual. After this he did some gardening. After he put his three daughters to bed, he locked himself in his garden shed, gagged himself, wrapped electrical wires around his bare chest and pushed the wires into a power outlet.
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According to Mythbuster, it's not when in conjunction with distilled water.
I'd rather err on the side of caution than to test this piece of knowledge.
Once my chemistry teacher did a demonstration on himself. He carefully dried his hands using tissues then poured a little concentrated sulphuric acid onto his palm. He was showing the action of the acid was started by interaction with moisture from the skin. As he was explaining it, he was edging slowly to a sink while his speech increased in tempo. He ended with "Of course, this lack of reaction will only last a minute or so while the skin starts sweating again and the acid starts to burn ..." finishing with him thoroughly flushing his hand with running water.
"Tell you what, Dave. I'll take your word for it."
 
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