So, my car was hit by lightning at the Grove City, OH supercharger...

[Cyclone]

$300 with electrician? What's the brand? Great idea.

$99 installed by a licensed electrician. This is the specific one they installed is a Eaton CHSPT2MICRO. You can buy it yourself at Home Depot here: http://www.homedepot.com/p/Eaton-Complete-Home-Surge-Protection-CHSPT2MICRO/202800798

 

[brianman]

Another interesting fact. The difference between 1955 and 1985 is the same time as between 1985 and 2015. :scared:

Nitpicker's corner: Isn't this incorrect because of the behavior of leap year w/r/t the year 2000?

Not really...according to the Gregorian calendar, 1900 was not a leap year, nor will 2100 be a leap year, but 2000 was a leap year just like the other years divisible by 4 in the spans you ponder. The difference is the phase of the 30 year spans with leap year cycles. 1955 to 1985 had 8 leap years, and 1985 to 2015 had 7 leap years because of where leap years fall relative to the 30-year spans.

This was my point. One span has an extra day relative to the other.

Yes, it is.. in years. I didn't say "exactly, to the hour". Sheesh,

Well, "day" not "hour", but who's quibbling.

 

[HankLloydRight]

Well, "day" not "hour", but who's quibbling.

Well, a "day" is just 24 hours (generally speaking).

 

[pmadflyer]

I drive a soft top convertible currently. Is it true that this car does not offer the usual lightning storm protections due to the top?

Yes, this vehicle will not provide protection to the same extent as some other surfaces, however, the body of the vehicle will still provide a more optimal path to ground than the interior materials. Also, depending on the dampness of the surface, the material may provide more conventional protection.

 

[mitch672]

$99 installed by a licensed electrician. This is the specific one they installed is a Eaton CHSPT2MICRO. You can buy it yourself at Home Depot here: http://www.homedepot.com/p/Eaton-Complete-Home-Surge-Protection-CHSPT2MICRO/202800798

likely will NOT help. not all Electrostatic Discharge is through power lines. See my post above, my house was hundreds of feet from the lightning strike, and has a "whole house surge supressor" on the main panel. Nothing was damaged via AC wiring, however, the phone/network CAT5 in the house acted as a giant antenna/amplifier, I had over $2,500 in damaged electronics via network wiring... I have since installed LAN wiring protection as well.. and my furnace zone controller was destroyed through the houses thermostat wiring. As you can see, it's difficult and likely impossible to protect everything from a nearby strike.

link to 16 port network wiring protection:
Emerson Network Surge Protector Cat6 16R GD RM Cat6 16POE F | eBay

you put this at the LAN switch, and loop everything through it (each port has an
IN and an OUT), it get's grounded of course as well, that's how it bleeds off overvoltage.

 

[Barry]

I had a strike come into my house via the phone line about 15 years ago. If you want to be protected, every line coming in needs to be protected and they all need to be bonded together to ground with a large conductor with minimal bends.

 

[tga]

To add to what mitch672 said above, I have a Leviton whole house surge protector, but I had a surge come in through my cable TV coax. It took out the cable box and the HDMI port on the TV that the box was connected to.

Luckily, the cable modem and downstream network equipment was fine.

 

[Brian@Vossen]

This is a crazy incident! Awesome that Tesla was so helpful with the situation.

 

[Electricfan]

I did not post the video to be malicious. Just because some people are reading into it wrong doesn't mean that I should remove it. I'm just posting my experience for other owners. Censorship is bad, ok.

Agree completely. Great post! Very helpful to all Tesla owners and potential buyers and anyone interested in EVs and/or storms/lightning! Two thumbs up!

- - - Updated - - -

This is a crazy incident! Awesome that Tesla was so helpful with the situation.

Agree completely. GM or Ford would have said - your car was damaged by lightning - tough luck - we can help you out for about $10k.

(or am I speaking too soon - is Telsa going to fix it? Or dump it on you and your insurance?)

 

[scoots]

Lagann,

Thanks for posting this experience, and please keep us updated. I have great confidence in Tesla service.

In May I drove my 85 from Charleston SC to Phoenix and back. On the way out, I was trying to avoid tornadoes and on the way back, flash floods. Many times I had to charge under ominous clouds in the rain, and I wondered about lightning, which we saw daily. But lightning was less of a risk than the deteriorating weather forecasts we faced in getting through Oklahoma and Texas, going both ways a week apart.

So thank you for filling in some details of what may happen when you make the choice to charge. Often on long trips, it's a lot less optional than the armchair generals suggest.

scoots

 

[Cyclone]

To add to what mitch672 said above, I have a Leviton whole house surge protector, but I had a surge come in through my cable TV coax. It took out the cable box and the HDMI port on the TV that the box was connected to.

Luckily, the cable modem and downstream network equipment was fine.

I guess I should be happy I don't have cable and the only telephone/network cable is up to my DSL Gateway and there to my WiFi Router. So I'd be out maybe $250. That said, I suppose I the HVAC thermostat wiring could be a problem. If the HVAC survived and the thermostat dies, well there is another $80.

That said, I agree with everyone. Nothing is going to stop a determined event. But a few simple precautions gave me great peace of mind.

 

[lagann]

Small update, an acquaintance was at the Columbus service yesterday. He said he saw my car hooked up to the 12v battery posts. He said it sounds like they are playing it real safe and slowly making sure everything is OK since this is a first. Also, apparently, I seemed to have also taken out two of the supercharger stalls, 4A and 4B. I was connected to 4A at the time. I doubt I won't hear much of anything until they've done a full investigation into all of it.

 

[Cyclone]

Small update, an acquaintance was at the Columbus service yesterday. He said he saw my car hooked up to the 12v battery posts. He said it sounds like they are playing it real safe and slowly making sure everything is OK since this is a first. Also, apparently, I seemed to have also taken out two of the supercharger stalls, 4A and 4B. I was connected to 4A at the time. I doubt I won't hear much of anything until they've done a full investigation into all of it.

Thanks for the update. I just wanted to say it is more likely that the Supercharger took out your car than your car taking out 4A and 4B. And I honestly hope that there was not actually any surge damage to your car, but actually a side effect. When we plug into Superchargers, we cannot simply yank out the cord. We press the button and the Supercharger and Car cleanly disable the charger and you can then unplug. Maybe the strike killed the Supercharger and the car acted up from suddenly having the charger "yanked" from it.

 

[beeeerock]

When you ponder how lightning damages other stuff on the ground...

- trees explode and burn
- houses have a piece of the roof blow off and sometimes catch fire
- electronics in a house often cook if they so much as hear thunder in the general area
- transformers blow up and neighbourhoods go dark
- an ICE car could burn (apparently)
- a gas station would... hmm, let's not even discuss that!
- a person is typically killed or badly injured...

It's actually quite amazing that the OP's car didn't cook completely or start driving drunkenly around the parking lot like the proverbial headless chicken.

Not to minimize her experience in any way, but I'm actually quite gratified to hear that (so far) the damage appears to be much less than I would have expected... because I would have expected the car to cook almost completely if either the car or supercharger took any part of a lightning strike. I'm sure there will be more examples of this sort of incident in the future, but so far survivability looks good. :biggrin:

 

[Cyclone]

It's actually quite amazing that the OP's car didn't cook completely or start driving drunkenly around the parking lot like the proverbial headless chicken.

Not to minimize her experience in any way, but I'm actually quite gratified to hear that (so far) the damage appears to be much less than I would have expected... because I would have expected the car to cook almost completely if either the car or supercharger took any part of a lightning strike. I'm sure there will be more examples of this sort of incident in the future, but so far survivability looks good. :biggrin:

Overall, it is amazing how well cars can handle lightning strikes. This video might be an amusing view: [video]https://youtu.be/ve6XGKZxYxA[/video]

 

[brianman]

Also, apparently, I seemed to have also taken out two of the supercharger stalls, 4A and 4B. I was connected to 4A at the time.

How many points are we giving for this?

 

[Barry]

Overall, it is amazing how well cars can handle lightning strikes. This video might be an amusing view: [video]https://youtu.be/ve6XGKZxYxA[/video]

That's because they are well grounded. Same with bridges, skyscrapers, radio/television towers, etc.

 

[lagann]

How many points are we giving for this?

There should be a special reputation level for supercharger destroyers/lightning strikes.

 

[brianman]

There should be a special reputation level for supercharger destroyers/lightning strikes.

Heh. Nice signature!

 

[Chris TX]

Heh. Nice signature!

I wonder if the engineers can figure out how many "jiggawatts" were received.

Also, I'm waiting for some online news outlet to say something like, "Tesla Motors Testing New Lightning Charging Systems!"