Re: REFLECTOR: Re: Lightning strike

["David M Parrish" <dmp@radbsd.mcg.edu>]

From:           	"Simon Aegerter [KPIE]" <100256.3710@compuserve.com>
> I have been shown a winglet that was struck on the ramp. Makes me shudder to
> think that this happened inflight. The sight convinced me to spend the money
> for a Strike Finder.

Now the question becomes, are most lightning strikes on flying 
aircraft an equalization of charge between the aircraft and the 
cloud, or is it a strike through the aircraft, on to the ground? What 
happened to you was the second case, where there was an 
enormous amount of energy passed through the structure. But if 
the first case is the norm, then the damage would be minimal. (An 
airplane, especially a fiberglass one, doesn't hold a heck of a lot of 
charge.)

What's interesting is I've never heard of a fiberglass airplane going 
down due to a lightning hit, even though there are a bunch of Ez 
type aircraft out there with the same style of comm antenna as the 
Velocity uses. Are lightning strikes that rare or fiberglass flyers 
that cautious?

---
David Parrish