REFLECTOR: Thunderstorms and composite airplanes

[Scott Derrick]

Well,  I question the veracity of the authors estimate in distance to the 
source.  If he was really 15 miles from the clouds I'm sure he would have 
enough visibility to se if it was a CB or not.   It was more likely 5 
miles.   He is a lucky man.  It almost sounds like he wanted to blame FSS 
for telling him it was forcasted VFR and dang if during the flight there 
wern't clouds in the sky!

There is a great article about a strike in a 
LongEZ   http://www.ez.org/cp53-p10.htm  This guy was in the soup though.

If I could only fly my Velocity when it was severe clear, I think I'd just 
sell it instead.

Scott

At 12:36 PM 8/7/2004, you wrote:
>Below is a recent post to the AeroElectric List that seems applicable to
>Velocity pilots as well.
>Keith
>
>
>Date:  8/04/2004
>Time: 04:51:52 PM PST US
>From: "Paul McAllister" <paul.mcallister at qia.net>
>Subject: AeroElectric-List: Lighting strike
>
>--> AeroElectric-List message posted by: "Paul McAllister"
><paul.mcallister at qia.net>
>
>Hi all,
>
>At the prompting of Eric Jones I thought I would share my experience
>yesterday
>of a lighting strike.  I published a similar note on the Europa forum.  For
>those
>unfamiliar it is composite construction.
>
>I departed yesterday from KUES up to Canada.  About 90 minutes into the trip
>I
>took a lightning hit.  The weather was forecasted VFR clear, however about
>70
>minutes into the trip I began to suspect all was "not as advertised".  I
>noticed
>a cloud about 15 miles of my port side this looked ominous so I diverted
>away
>from it.  I was about to call flight service when suddenly I saw a bright
>flash
>on the tip off my starboard wing.  The starboard side was clear blue sky
>and the port side was at least 10~15 miles from any clouds.  No obvious CB's
>were
>visible, however at 9000' it can be difficult to tell.
>
>The main contactor dropped off line so things went pretty quiet until I
>kicked
>in the "E Buss" circuit. (Thanks Bob!!)
>
>Damage is as follows:
>- The paint is blistered on the starboard wing tip and the port side is only
>blackened.
>- The wing tip lights (Eric's design) are destroyed with some of the screws
>melted.
>- My Narco 122 VOR/LOC/GS is destroyed
>- Wing leveler is destroyed
>- Electronic fuel gauge.  This is a microprocessor based device.
>- Main battery contactor (Kilovac EV200 AAANA) , which has an electronic
>power
>conservation circuit.
>- Manifold pressure sensing input to the EIS engine monitor.
>
>The Apollo GX 60 GPS/NAV/Com and transponder survived along with the EIS and
>electronic propeller controller. Internal inspection of the wing tips
>revealed no
>sign of burning and nothing was evident when I removed the instrument panel,
>or rear bulk heads. There appears to be no structural damage to the aircraft
>or welding of the control elements.  It appeared that  the lighting entered
>the
>starboard wing tip, traveled along the common ground between the LED wing
>tip
>lights and exited the port wing tip.
>
>Lessons learned?  Well it's hard to say.  I called for a standard briefing
>90 minutes
>before take off and was told "clear VFR, a nice afternoon to go flying".
>I called Flight Service an hour after the event and they told me that the
>convective
>activity that subsequently moved through was completely unexpected.
>I normally always file IFR, I think if I had done so this time I might have
>been
>warned.  I also think that I should have acted sooner on my hunch, a call 10
>minutes sooner might have saved me a whole bunch of grief. Given that the
>conduction
>path was via the wing tip light ground I would probably increase the
>wire size to 14 gauge and do something similar for the conductive path down
>the
>back of the aircraft.  Bottom line, stay a long, long way from black looking
>clouds;
>20 miles isn't enough in a tempting target like a composite aircraft.
>
>Paul
>
>
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