[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by TheVillageChicken

It is more dangerous to ride lightening than to ride a motorcycle.
What did I win?

You win a coupon for a free chicken sandwich at Chick-Fil-A. Enjoy!

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by rubicon

What's more dangerous , lightning or a motorcycle?

The more dangerous is a lightning fast mortorcycle Zooooooooooooooom

Here's a question: If it's thundering outside and you have a choice to ride your motorcycle or walk to the store, which should you do. You could get to the store faster with your motorcycle and avoid some of the lightning. Or you could walk: You'd be exposed to more lightning but you wouldn't have the risk of riding a motorcycle, especially if it starts raining and the streets are slippery.

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by dbanks50

I'll take my chances on a motorcycle. At least with a motorcycle, you have a little control over the event happening. We've had a motorcycle almost the entire 45 years we've been together. My theory is that my husband doesn't want to die any more than I do, so he'll be careful. So far so good, but we have moved on to a TriGlide. Three wheels are safer than two.

I agree about the control thing; you have a right to be proud of 45 years and still alive to talk about it. Thumbs up for TriGlide.

[memason]

I played golf with a guy today that said his boss lives next to the home that got hit by lightning last Saturday and burned...they have kissing lanais, according to my friend. You, like I, will have to judge if the account is factual or not.

At any rate, he said that all of the homes in that area have lightning rods installed, so this house that was hit did have lightning rods on it. However, lightning did not hit the rods...

Kinda makes you wonder...

[bimmertl]

On page C1 of todays Daily Sun there is a Q&A on lightning rods. It states "lightning rods won't prevent a lightning strike, but "might" intercept a strike and and give the electricity a conductive path. The don't guarantee a home won't catch fire." So consider that along with the fact that in the two recent storms 1 house of 50,000 was damaged in each storm and form your own conclusions if you want to spend the money to, as someone else has stated, "to produce of sense of piece of mind" whatever that is.

[TheVillageChicken]

Originally Posted by Villages PL

You win a coupon for a free chicken sandwich at Chick-Fil-A. Enjoy!

On Sunday?

[Blondie]

Originally Posted by Villages PL

Here's a question: If it's thundering outside and you have a choice to ride your motorcycle or walk to the store, which should you do. You could get to the store faster with your motorcycle and avoid some of the lightning. Or you could walk: You'd be exposed to more lightning but you wouldn't have the risk of riding a motorcycle, especially if it starts raining and the streets are slippery.

I would never ride my motorcycle when it rains because cleaning the chrome is a chore!

[Indydealmaker]

After reading lots of the lightning related posts on TOTV, I was being slowly brainwashed to think that The Villages somehow had an exclusive over this natural hazard along with Sinkholes and Alligators. Then I ran across this report on the internet. What a shock! We share the risk and the potential tragedy with others not locked into the bubble. You can read about this sad incident here:Lightning strikes in Colorado park kill 2 people in 2 days | Fox 59 News – fox59.com

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by blueash

I am not a fan of donor-cycles but I question the data you have presented. Would you please link your source? Wikipedia shows about 4500 - 5000 deaths a year on motorcycles. It does not give a denominator of the number of people who ride motorcycles. Is your figure 1/1250 riders die or is it 1/1250 Americans die? Per year or per lifetime? Everyone is exposed to the risk of lightning, some more than others, but not everyone is exposed to the risk of death on a motorcycle.

My source was, "The Handy Science Answer Book" compiled by the Science and Technology Department of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburg. (580 Pages)
It's an older book (copyright 1997) that I bought for $1.00 at the library.

NWS Lightning Safety: Understanding Lightning Introduction gives odds using averages for the last ten years, and gives the odds of being personally struck by lightning as 1/12000 over a lifetime of 80 years (struck not killed) Odds of being affected by a lightning strike in your life 1/1200 as 10 people are affected by an average event. Keep in mind that lightning events are not evenly distributed over the population. Higher risk in Florida obviously. One would also need to have data such as hours at risk to death while riding a motorcycle vs hours at risk while outdoors with an electrical storm in the vicinity. It all gets very complicated. I do agree, no matter how you do the calculation, motorcycle riding is much more dangerous than being out in a thunderstorm.

Yes, it can get complicated. I presented the information exactly as it appeared in my book, no more and no less. It consisted of two sentences, one for lightning and one for motorcycles. There was no explanation of why they chose to put those two facts together. And they didn't give any explanation of how they made the calculations. Therefore, if our sources are not in agreement, I have no idea why.

[TheVillageChicken]

Looks like you are correct about motorcycles being more dangerous than lightning.



The above is pure fiction, dreamt up in my bored and confused mind.

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by Indydealmaker

It makes absolutely zero sense for anyone to try to sell against the use of lightning rods. It is cheap insurance if it does nothing else but produce a sense of peace of mind for the insured. Having this additional level of security has NO DOWNSIDE. Not having it has NO UPSIDE. If you consider saving $1500 (one time) an upside, then try to remind yourself that is YOUR upside, not your neighbors who just might take your advice.

You never know what reasons a person might come up with so it would be wise not to claim that it makes zero sense. I had a neighbor who bought into everything that came along. She had the extra Medicare insurance that cost $78.00 per month. She bought an expensive (outdoor unit) water softener/filter. And she had her house washed twice a year among many other services. By sometime around her late seventies, she just used up all of her retirement savings. She wouldn't have had $1500. to spend on lightning protection. I knew a couple others who ran out of money and had to get a reverse mortgage. So that's one reason - lack of money.

I can well afford to get lightning protection but I'm not sure I want workers in my attic and up on my roof walking around drilling holes and what not. I have hired all kinds of work done before moving to the Villages and I have hired work done in the Villages. I even hired a commercial contractor to build a store for me. So this is nothing new to me. And I can tell you it's not uncommon for workers to fix one thing and damage another in the process.

Having lived in central Florida for about 45 years, I know the risk of having my house hit is very low. Not just for myself but I've never had a neighbor, friend, co-worker or relative who was hit by lightning.

This is not selling against lightning protection, this is an explanation of why I personally don't want to bother with it.

There was a good article about this yesterday in the Daily Sun. They didn't advise getting "whole house" protection. They simply advised that people might want to look into it and then make up their own mind. It's not a must do item from what I gathered. And as you drive around the Villages look to see how many houses have those little rods sticking up. I don't believe I have ever seen one.

[44Ruger]

Originally Posted by thevillagechicken

looks like you are correct about motorcycles being more dangerous than lightning.



the above is pure fiction, dreamt up in my bored and confused mind.

lol

[TheVillageChicken]

I used to work at a highly ranked golf course designed by a famous course architect. I noticed that many of the trees had lightning rods at their tops. I asked about it, and discovered that all the trees with the rods on them were considered features of the hole. In other words, they influenced the way a golfer chose to play the hole. We lost a small number of trees to lightning while I was there, but never lost a featured tree. This could be coincidence as far as I know...just found it interesting.

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by TheVillageChicken

Looks like you are correct about motorcycles being more dangerous than lightning.



The above is pure fiction, dreamt up in my bored and confused mind.

And he could have been choking on a hotdog which caused him to crash his motorcycle.....

[Villages PL]

Originally Posted by memason

I played golf with a guy today that said his boss lives next to the home that got hit by lightning last Saturday and burned...they have kissing lanais, according to my friend. You, like I, will have to judge if the account is factual or not.

At any rate, he said that all of the homes in that area have lightning rods installed, so this house that was hit did have lightning rods on it. However, lightning did not hit the rods...

Kinda makes you wonder...

Thanks for the information. That's exactly what I suspected could happen. Lightning has "a mind of its own." It will strike wherever it wants to. And no matter how big the wiring is, even if it hits the rods, it won't necessarily be able to handle the high voltage which can go up as high as 100 million volts.