Africa Surge Protection

Numerous people will mistakenly call a surge protector a lightning protector. Understandably we see lightning as the cause of the devastating surges that damage our electronic equipment. However from a technical perspective, the moment lightning hits the ground, building or any object, it generates an electrical surge.

When this surge hits the ground, building or tree outside, it creates a ripple effect in the ground, that weakens the further away from the flash point it gets. Similar to the ripples on a still pond when a drop hits and breaks the surface of the water.

This powerful "surge ripple" permeates the ground and enters any cables that cross its path. This then enduces an electrical surge into the cable and sends a power surge through to your equipment.

Since telephone lines have smaller and less earthing protection around their cables, they are more susceptible to lightning surge induction. This is why we typically hear people say that their telephone lines, modems etc are damaged more often during a lightning storm.

Therefore, we must remeber to ask for the correct surge protector when purchasing surge protection for your electronic equipment.

So, ultimately, what is Lightning Protection? As you can now well image, due to a beter undertanding of the above, a typical lightning protector will be similar to the lightning rods that you see outside most thatched houses. The rod attracts the lightning in order to lessen the chances of it hitting the thatched roof and causing a fire. Due to this fact, it is a standard insurance requirement that all thatch homes have lightning rods installed outside.

So what happens to the electronic equipment in the home when you are using a lightning rod to protect the thatched roof of that home? You guessed it, they are more susceptible to surge damage, due to the fact that the lightning surge has been attracted to that lightning rod. This also means the intensity of the surge is very high becasue the lightning rod is so close to the house.

What do we mean by lightning flash density? This is the number of times a lightning bolt strikes the ground in a particular square km radius. The map below shows the Flash Density for South Africa. South Africa has the second highest flash density rating in the world. This is according to research done by NASA, which can be found on their website. Singapore is known to have the highest lightning strikes per square km. Sadly for them, they are more heavily popluated per square km than we are. Since we have much larger open spaces we are less affected by these flash densities as compared with the poor Singapore residences.

Something else you may find interesting and also obtained from the NASA research website, it that a lightning strike 32 kms away can cause surge damage to equipment. So that means someone who lives in Fourways can still receive a damaging surge to their equipment when a lightning storm is going on in Alberton.

Hmmmmmm, so those of us that say we will just unplug our equipment when we see a storm coming, will simply be too late!

Please remeber that switching your equipment off does nothing to protect the equipment from electrical surges. This is because the equipment is still connected to the socket or cable that the power surge will travel along.

NASA has done loads of research on lightning and here's a fun fact for you.... Did you know that men are struck 4 times more often by lightning than women? Do You Know Why?????