This kinda just shows that if youre gonna get hit by lightning, youre gonna get hit by lightning. Your best bet is to just not go outside in lightning at all.
And this is why i haven't gone outside in 13 years. Really makes it easy now that covid introduced drones to ship my food and other deliveries back and forth. Ain't gonna find me out and about until we find out how to eliminate lightning once and for all, even space lightning!
Mr Pan's Crouching Dummy is far from a good representation of a human being... also not crouched the proper way... also not meant to prevent the strike, he didn't do his research well enough on this one at least.. which makes me doubt all the others.. :/ Crouching could save your life.... it's about making sure the lighting strike does not go through your heart.
@@Aftekyes exactly It seems like you should put your hands and feet on the ground next to each other so you were grounded and the lightning doesn’t cross your body. Sure you’ll get melted flesh and a scar.
In a seminar, a lightning physicist (yes they exist) said we know less about lightning than we do about supernovas. I think this video demonstrates why, it’s highly unpredictable and any model we try to fit to its behavior, ends up being unreliable at best.
Yeah lightning and the path it's going to take is extremely hard to model mathematically. We know exactly how lightning works. We know what it is, how it happens and why it happens. As a phenomenon we have it locked down. What don't we know about lightning ?
yeah this guy tried to model lightning with a tesla coil, without even understanding how tesla coils work. this video is extremely misleading esp now that I've watched it a second time. Let me explain, the way a tesla coil creates lightning isn't just by ejecting high voltage electricity, but its a coupled effect between the primary and secondary coils. So the real ground his tesla coil lightning wants to flow to is NOT the floor or a car, but back to the secondary coil at the tesla coil. This is 100% completely different from the circuit in weather lightning where the source and drain actually are separated by a distance (cloud to ground) and not just making a bubble. One could build a device that works similarly to a tesla coil to simulate lightning, but it would not be the setup used in this video. The actual potentials would need to flow to ground, and not just backwards up towards the coil.
As a demonstrator at the Boston Museum of Science said: Air is a much more effective insulator than rubber, and it travels through miles of it to get to the ground. Rubber shoes aren't going to do anything
Air is definitely not a better insulator than rubber. The insulation would be from the material withstanding a larger voltage before breaking down. This is the Dielectric Strength and is measured in volts per meter. The Dielectric strength of air is around 3 MV/m while rubber is around 15-25 MV/m. Maybe the person was thinking of thermal insulation?
@@forrestgentry7599 Rainwater is most certainly not distilled. It carries the particulates that were in the air, and most infamously can be acidic due to pollution.
@@pseudonymous1382 That makes sense. I had a suspicion it would be so. I wonder if there would be any sort of correlation then between pollution and lightning strike frequency.
If anybody is wondering, real lightning will most definitely break your car, at least sometimes. My neighbor had lightning hit his tree and arc to his car and it completely fried everything. Not sure if this was the straight volts or something else, but it will most definitely make your car inoperable in certain conditions.
1:03 IT DOESN'T. i don't know where this myth started, but i know that Mythbusters made it a thousand times worse. ballistics gel was NEVER meant to simulate human flesh!!!!! It is simply a very reproducible medium that slows down bullets enough to be able to compare different bullets to each other. if you make 10 different batches of gel using the same recipe 100 years apart, you should get 10 batches of gel that behave the same way. this allows people to compare various characteristics. if you want a simulation of human flesh and bone, USE A PIG CARCASS. Pig tissue is so similar to human tissue that you can literally have pig heart vales sewn onto your heart and your body will happily use them. same for pig arteries. my uncle lived with pig parts in his body for over 20 years. but here comes adam savage saying over and over that "ballistics gel has the same properties as human flesh." think about that statement for even two seconds. NONE of the properties are the same unless you are a jello man with no bones or blood or muscle or skin.
Same properties as human flesh.... so we're pretty safe from bullets doing damage to internal organs... with 8 inches of flesh around us, hmmmm I've know of bullets to hit people in places that are half that thick but it never got more than an inch n' a half deep, Huh? Oh that's right it hit the bone turned into a first century coin in a mess of shattered human framework. The cascade of cellular embolism from energy impartment through the gel IS NOTHING LIKE reality, the true resistance and capidence of a human body ranges so much that even testing on a real person, especially in this electric bug zapper experiment, shows nothing! I feel your frustration.
6:02 the reason you want to crouch low is because if you get struck the lightning takes a far more desirable path through your body. It’s more likely to hit your legs or back if your crouched You crouch if your hair raises (it means your about to get struck by lightning
Yeah I was looking for if someone had already said this. It's going to be bad news but if you can give it a path through you that doesn't involve your heart you've got a better chance of survival.
Feet together is even more important because it mitigates step voltages, which can extend from the strike a lot further than local arcs (step voltage being a significant difference in the voltage on the ground closer to the strike than further away, if your feet are at different distances that voltage difference across the gap winds up applied to you)
I had a tour recently in a high voltage lab. The high voltage specialists said the following: - 80% of the lightnings happen in clouds, only 20% hit the ground From the 20% that hit the ground: - 80% of these are negatively charged, and negatively charged lightnings are more attracted to tall objects than flat surfaces (like the ground) - the remaining 20% are positively charged, and positively charged lightnings are more likely to struck in flat, short surfaces (like the ground, or a person standing next to a tree). They advised the following: - a car is the safest, but the radio antenna could potentially conduct the high voltage into the car electric system, so stay away from the radio and other electronics - even a cabrio can be safe (mesh-like structures are used as lightning protection on buildings, and the meshes are often 5-10m wide) - but you need the roof on of course - if you stand in a field with no trees, maybe laying down is better - if you have a tree nearby, stay 5-10m next to it (closer could result the lightning to travel through the tree, and also you, farther could result that you are the highest object) - you have about 4/5 odd that a lighning is going to hit a tall object (so it is 1/5 that it will not) - chance of surviving a strike is 40%, and it can be even 60% if you can get medical help immediately, the remaining 40% is unfortunately fatal (most likely your brain melts lol). Quick sidenote: high voltage is not always dangerous, there are Tesla coils out there that you can even touch. But lighnings are high voltage and high current, which is dangerous! Also, is air conductive? Yes, and no: a lot of ions are in the air, which can create a so called avalanche reaction that results in ionising the air and making it conductive. Nice video!
"if you;re a small business owner, you know that nothing;s worse than being a small business owner" is the most small-business-owner vibe ever seriously though, this is genuinely helpful. not as helpful as prosthetic limbs, but i;m more comfortable now.
Electric cars existed before gasoline cars did. The first electric car was made well over 100 years ago. They were more popular than gasoline cars for a good while, until petroleum infrastructure caught up.
@@antonliakhovitch8306 Electric cars had been released 2 years before gasoline cars, sure, but the petroleum infrastructure wasn't the main driving point why the electric car had disappeared from the 1920s to the 2010s, instead it was the energy-density and technological developement of the batteries in said cars that was the issue. In the early 1900s, they were also marketed toward women due to it being simpler to operate than a gas-powered car, and there wasn't really a need to go more than ~50 miles from home, so they rose in popularity. But then, as cars began being simpler to operate and became faster than electric cars, they were phased out for about 90 years before partialy reappearing in the 90s and 2000s, and then fully reappearing in the 2010s Due to modern battery-powered devices having accelerated battery developement, the batteries were now fit to use to power a modern, heavy car; hence why so many EV cars sprung up in ~2010s TLDR: you're right but i dont want to admit it
I think a lot of the lighting "survival tips" come from people having miss-understanding how electricity works. It statistically takes the shortest or easiest path, but actually takes all paths just because it can. It doesn't know ahead of time the environment, it has to travel through it first, because it can't go faster than the speed of light.
The reason for that crouching is not to be protected against direct hits. Its so, if there is a strike near you and the electrons are dissipating into the ground, you have a minimal "footprint". You are basically just a part of a voltage divider. With spread legs a lot more voltage (thus current) would flow through ya body than if you were just crouching.
The only misunderstanding here is that a Tesla coil and a static charge behave the same way. In the experiment, the potential is fully on the side of the Tesla coil. In a real lightning, charges are on both sides and equalize through a breakout point, which could be a person standing upright. You could replicate this in the experiment by gluing a nail to the sphere of the Tesla coil. While a nail on the ground won't affect the lightning much, a nail on the sphere will make the electricity come primarily from that point.
@@dasjulian3 "In a real lightning, charges are on both sides and equalize through a breakout point, which could be a person standing upright." Are you implying that Tesla coils magically generate charges without opposites? The arcs from primarily on sharp objects because of the geometry of the electric field. I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about.
I’ve worked in fire towers for a few years. They give us a wooden stool with glass feet to stand on during a lightning event. The problem is, they built those aluminum towers for the average 1956 height of a man, and our heads touch the metal roof when standing on the stool. They also say to close the windows. One time I had lightning within a quarter mile. I just climbed down the tower, and hung out in my vehicle with a handheld radio to stay in contact with dispatch.
I'm pretty sure the 'avoid using the phone thing' is actually about landlines phone, as it's (supposedly) possible for the electrical charge to hit the landline cable and ultimately zap you in the head.
I have a 2003 Chevy 1500 with a GIANT burn hole through the front seat that says you would NOT be alright if sitting in your car when lightning strikes. You could see how it brushed the dashboard as it went straight through the roof, the seat, the floor, and into the ground. Amazingly, it still drives fine! Happened right in our driveway about 10 feet from our 2 story house that was 15 feet from a forest with 40'+ trees... I thought it would have struck the highest object but it wanted our truck.
EV tech here. No guarantee a car will be fine after being struck by lightning. The electronics that share the ground plane is a potential exit path for the lightning via the harness or other electronics, and that is known to kill modules.
True, there's no guarantee, but car manufacturers do run their vehicles through tests like this to make them at least somewhat resistant to damage, and most importantly even when that damage does occur it's much better for the car to take the hit than the occupant
There's been a ton of heat lightning and storms around here lately, I was standing outside one night and felt my hair stand on end, it clearly was and ever since I've been terrified of getting struck, thanks for this video, very cool
Squatting guy is literally the shortest, easiest path lol. Maybe it’s a surface area probability vs height? Standing dummy is taller but narrow, squatting doofus is splayed out all spread eagled taking up twice the amount of space. The chaotic laughter has me rolling. Great video and channel! 😂
8:22 Is nobody talking about the Jamie Walrus Plush and how adorable that looks. Not sure if it is available for merch or anything, but I would love to buy that in a heartbeat.
allen as far as im concerned, this video proves that even though mythbusters rejected you, they shouldnt have because you're carrying the torch with this video by disproving common lightning myths, i learned a lot from this vid, and i also learned that you are the true modern mythbuster of youtube :cheer:
I like how I watched this video, went 'what would I do different after watching this video', and the answer was 'nothing'. If I'm outside during a lightning storm, I die.
I always wondered why people said lightning always takes the path of least resistance to the ground. If it did that, it would look a lot more like a straight line
"I would rather literally die than be wrong on the internet" If there isn't merch of this, there needs to be. Or your slogan. This is the entirety of Allen Pan in one sentence.
Important thing to note about the boy scout/lightning crouch is that it's not designed to save you from a direct hit but from when it hits nearby and run through the ground. As your feet are touching it will just pass right through them instead of your body
Also a note on shelters, those big open sided picnic table shelters are usually also bad, because they are made of, and roofed with metal. So basically just a big conductive tent.
5:16 Wouldn't this test be non conclusive with the materials used? Since the lightning follows the path of least resistance, it would prefer hitting the wood rather than hitting the metal and then having to jump to the wood from the metal?
In fairness, I assume your car can go further than 30 miles without completely dying (the first gen Leaf had some design flaws that mean it's not terribly worthwhile repairing it for a busted battery)
There are safety boots that are made to be electrically insulating. They are required in some industrial workplaces, like factories with high power machines. I wonder if they would protect from lightning strikes
There is merit to at least keep your feet close together if you are in the vicinity to a potential lightning strike position, i.e. a shelter or a roof with a lightning rod, which is connected to ground via wire. Around the entrypoint of the lightning into the ground it will create an electric field inside it, which will have different potentials depending on the distance to the strike entry. If you now stand on two different potentials with your feet, there will be a voltage and subsequently a current flowing through your body from one potential/foot to the other. The killer in this situation is current going through your heart. So since your body has a set impedance you have to reduce the voltage to also reduce the current (I=U/R). You can achieve that by putting your feet closer together which means reducing the potential difference and subsequently lowering the voltage over your body. Also minimizing the area of contact with the ground can help (increasing resistance), laying down would actually be a bad idea because the bigger contact area with the ground would reduce the overall resistance and increasy the current. The biggest danger is a direct hit by lightning - but even if you can eliminate that it's still dangerous to be near the entrypoint since there is still danger from inderect lightning strikes through the electric field in the ground. If you want to find out more on that topic you can look up "step voltage". In Germany we started to build "potential control" to "short out" the equipotential lines in the ground to minimize danger from step voltage due to indirect lightning strike. It's especially useful in weather shelters, canopied and swimming pools.
Something to note, electricity will take the shortest and most conductive route to the ground, humans are generally more conductive than trees or wood, so wood dummies holding metal stuff won't make any difference, because the air or wood itself would be the path of least resistance. There's also a huge difference if its Positively or Negatively charged, Aswell as Positive/Negative GC lightning. One more thing to help, wearing nonconductive shoes such as rubber boots would technically decrease your chances of being hit by lightning, although the shear current and voltage typically negates that non-conductivity.
The crouching is for when lightning hits the ground near you; it makes you keep the feet together so the current can travel through the ground instead of up and through your body (i.e. up one leg and down the other). Actually _running_ from lightning would probably be, ya know... really bad, given the distance between your feet, the voltage/current potential, etc. But yeah, might want to double check that one.
It seems like the small potential survival benefit from having your legs together is pretty much wiped away by just getting out of the storm sooner and being that much less likely to get hit at all
In a tesla coil, the frequency of an inductor and capacitor creates the high voltage, all of the charges are on the coil and it will arc no matter what at that point. In lightning, there's high static charge in the clouds and on the ground that taller objects can act as a better breakout point for. It's why you're safer walking through a metropolitan area during a thunderstorm than an open field, and why higher elevations lead to increased fatalities. So making yourself shorter is advisable. Of course it does not always mean taller objects _will_ be hit instead of shorter ones, but any lightning strike is a game of chances and you don't discard a greater chance because it's not guaranteed. The scout position was also never meant to "prevent" lightning strikes, it creates a more desirable path to keep lightning from your heart. Remember, you only do it when you _know_ lightning is about to strike because the ground statically charges your body so much your hair stands up, at that point it's guaranteed the bolt is going to form in your body, unlike a tesla coil which gives no warning or time to react. You're also meant to keep your feet together because the step voltages can still kill you even if the arc doesn't. Wood and, as another commenter pointed out, ballistics gel are not similar to human flesh. Standing under a tree is dangerous not just because of the possibility of the bolt arcing to you but because it superheats the already negative pressured water in it and they tend to explode (animals typically don't.) And of course 1 test per safety advice doesn't actually prove much when again, it's a game of likelihoods (one bolt of lightning may have a close miss the statue of liberty but from what I could find it still gets struck 600 times a year.) Respect for all the effort put in by you and the team but this vid strikes me as a little irresponsible.
I'm sure others have already said this, but, wow, Allen, this is as Myhtbustier a video as any I've seen. And actually, very helpful information is clearly shown.
Its the best time to sing the entire song One, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one Uh! Runnin', runnin', runnin', runnin' Uh! Heaven, heaven He's coming Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one Ridin'-ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one Got my, got my, got my, got my eyes open (Oh, oh, oh) Got my, got my, got my eyes open Got my, got my, got my, got my eyes open (Oh, oh, oh) Got my eyes open Oh, oh, oh, uh Oh, oh, oh, uh He's coming Runnin', runnin', Runnin', runnin', runnin', runnin' One, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one He's coming Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one (They gon' feel this one) Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel-they gon' feel this one Ridin'-ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one, oh, oh I'm ridin', I'm ridin' (Got my eyes open, got my, got my, got my eyes open) Oh, yeah (Got my, got my eyes open) I'm ridin', I'm ridin', yeah I'm (Got my, got my, got my, got my eyes-eyes) Igor One Down, down, down, down, down Down, down, down, down Down, down Dow-dow-dow-dow-dow-dow-dow-down, one Yeah, ho Yeah, ho Yeah, ho Yeah, ho (One) Yeah, ho One, one, one Got my eyes open Got my-got my-got my eyes open Runnin', runnin', runnin' Got my eyes open One, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one On-on-on-on-on-on-one One, one One, one Got my-got my-got my-got my-got my-got my-got my-got my- (One, one)
I have been (accidentally) hit with a discharge from a very large DRSSTC like the one in this video. It did not kill or disable me, some combination of skin effects and the HF impedance of a human if I had to guess, while lightning is DC or DC-ish these coils typically run at 50-400khz
That's in large part because of injuries sustained from secondary arcing being counted as lightning strikes. A direct hit by one of those bolts would vaporise a significant chunk of the person it hit, it would be practically guaranteed to be lethal.
@@bosstowndynamics5488 No it wouldn't. There are survivors of direct hits where the lightning travelled through a large portion of their body. But yes, a direct hit is practically guaranteed to be lethal.
@@christiannorf1680 Lightning strikes are powerful enough to melt sand into glass, but even being near a lightning strike is enough to get hit by substantial secondary arcing which can easily travel through a human and cause those entry and exit wounds while being more survivable. I was always taught that a true direct strike would be absolutely lethal (if nothing else the power would be enough to boil you from the inside), a quick search to double check turns up no meaningful results to actually distinguish between these effects other than studies that have exactly the same limitations as this demonstration, which are using artificial electrical sources that don't even come close to the power throughout of true lightning, and general articles that seem to assume that the strike is direct just because the person wasn't inside and being indirectly shocked by touching a charged object or similar.
Something to consider is that if you get struck by lightning you’re probably falling over or your muscles are spasming, either way you’re coming into contact with the ground without control, so being closer to the ground (ie crouching) is beneficial for minimizing being struck. Also the crouched position with your heels together is more for indirect strikes, where the shock may propagate through the ground as well. Having the electricity go through one foot and out the other is preferred to having it go up your leg, through your abdomen, and back out the other leg. Doesn’t lower the chances of being struck, but keeps the first aid more manageable.
If the lightning chooses whatever path that has the first connection from the secondary ground-up arc, would jumping up and down repeatedly stop you from forming that secondary arc?
The one thing I will note about the crouching is that it's not just about making it less likely to _get_ struck - it's also about reducing the impact of having the lightning strike near you, which is a lot more likely than actually getting hit. The reason you're supposed to lift your heels and touch them together is so that if the lightning strikes near you, the current will run up through the bottom of your foot (or ideally shoe), then just across the connection you've made and into your other foot then back to the ground, instead of having to go up and through your vital organs. But realistically, just standing up and lifting your heels and touching them would probably provide the same protection.
I was always told if youre caught in a field during a lightning storm to lay flat on the ground. So even if you are struck somehow, the lightning has to travel less through your body to be grounded
ballistics gel has similar ballistic/kinetic properties to human flesh, not chemical or physical, so not sure how much it represents lightning going through it lol
@3:10.....wow! But yeah, the chaotic twisting ionised gas (plasma) that *is* the lightning is affected by convective forces too, i.e. the air is very hot and tends to rise. This path of plasma is actually the path of least resistance, so the strikes, esp from a tesla coil are going to be chaotic (not random though) and not necessarily conform to our expectations =) This is a great video though, nice work!
I don't think there is much you can do if you get hit directly, but if lightning hits the ground near you it might be better to have only one foot touch the ground or for them to be close together as the ground close to the impact will be at a higher potential, decreasing with distance. so you could get current to flow from one leg to the other if you are crouching with your legs far apart and happen to be positioned sideways to the impact.
This kinda just shows that if youre gonna get hit by lightning, youre gonna get hit by lightning. Your best bet is to just not go outside in lightning at all.
Seems like the safest lightning is the friends we made along the way.
And this is why i haven't gone outside in 13 years. Really makes it easy now that covid introduced drones to ship my food and other deliveries back and forth. Ain't gonna find me out and about until we find out how to eliminate lightning once and for all, even space lightning!
Not being struck by lightning is theoretically easy. Head down. Stay low. Pucker your butt lol
You’re not technically safe even in your house. lightning can definitely strike Through a house.
Just hope you’re not unlucky
I'm just not going to go outside at all.
The crouching dummy having his nuts be the connection to ground was all I needed to know. Will never crouch in a storm
Mr Pan's Crouching Dummy is far from a good representation of a human being... also not crouched the proper way... also not meant to prevent the strike, he didn't do his research well enough on this one at least.. which makes me doubt all the others.. :/
Crouching could save your life.... it's about making sure the lighting strike does not go through your heart.
@@Aftekyes exactly
It seems like you should put your hands and feet on the ground next to each other so you were grounded and the lightning doesn’t cross your body. Sure you’ll get melted flesh and a scar.
why? you don't want overcharged nuts?
@@Aftekeh I mean it's hard to say since apparently no one knows what to do if you're about to get struck by lightning
Rather have toasted nuts than a cooked heart
“Instead the gel just melted a little” as if the idea of your flesh melting (even just a little) isn’t horrifying at all
We get it you never let your intrusive thoughts win and intentionally burned yourself…
@@nitronick1220Bro’s bragging about being mentally unstable 💀
@@nitronick1220get help queen
@@nitronick1220no, I let the intrusive thoughts win and ACCIDENTALLY burned myself! …multiple times…
You would at least expect it to show some damn burn marks though
I know it's really ironic to say this, but this video has the EXACT chaotic, dangerous, educative energy of a Mythbusters episode
reminds me of when "allen" "worked" for the "mythbusters"
Allen Pan, the Mythbusters ™️ reject, has himself become the true myth buster
Was the first time I saw this facility too.
Where's the irony?
@@scottg3192 failed mythbuster allen pan
DANG IT! I should have been there with you! LOOKS HELLA FUN!
Next time!
Your eyebrows would have melted a little.
@@THE-X-Force singe all of his hair... at least the hair he has left
I was looking for your comment
@@allenpan Busting makes me feel good ;)
Allen!!!
It's the super backer
The one and only
the man the legend michael the superbacker
yoooo superbacker is here
Hello Mr superbacker
In a seminar, a lightning physicist (yes they exist) said we know less about lightning than we do about supernovas. I think this video demonstrates why, it’s highly unpredictable and any model we try to fit to its behavior, ends up being unreliable at best.
Yeah lightning and the path it's going to take is extremely hard to model mathematically.
We know exactly how lightning works. We know what it is, how it happens and why it happens. As a phenomenon we have it locked down.
What don't we know about lightning ?
yeah this guy tried to model lightning with a tesla coil, without even understanding how tesla coils work. this video is extremely misleading esp now that I've watched it a second time. Let me explain, the way a tesla coil creates lightning isn't just by ejecting high voltage electricity, but its a coupled effect between the primary and secondary coils. So the real ground his tesla coil lightning wants to flow to is NOT the floor or a car, but back to the secondary coil at the tesla coil. This is 100% completely different from the circuit in weather lightning where the source and drain actually are separated by a distance (cloud to ground) and not just making a bubble.
One could build a device that works similarly to a tesla coil to simulate lightning, but it would not be the setup used in this video. The actual potentials would need to flow to ground, and not just backwards up towards the coil.
As a demonstrator at the Boston Museum of Science said: Air is a much more effective insulator than rubber, and it travels through miles of it to get to the ground. Rubber shoes aren't going to do anything
There's also the fact that lightning usually travels with rain so likely everything including you is especially conductive.
@@PhrozenFox would rain still be conductive though it was distilled by the water cycle?
Air is definitely not a better insulator than rubber. The insulation would be from the material withstanding a larger voltage before breaking down. This is the Dielectric Strength and is measured in volts per meter. The Dielectric strength of air is around 3 MV/m while rubber is around 15-25 MV/m. Maybe the person was thinking of thermal insulation?
@@forrestgentry7599 Rainwater is most certainly not distilled. It carries the particulates that were in the air, and most infamously can be acidic due to pollution.
@@pseudonymous1382 That makes sense. I had a suspicion it would be so. I wonder if there would be any sort of correlation then between pollution and lightning strike frequency.
If anybody is wondering, real lightning will most definitely break your car, at least sometimes. My neighbor had lightning hit his tree and arc to his car and it completely fried everything. Not sure if this was the straight volts or something else, but it will most definitely make your car inoperable in certain conditions.
i mean, from what allen said, lightning *is* at least a hundred times more powerful than the tesla coil.
"most definitely" "sometimes", pick one :P
its better than YOU becoming inoperable
There's enough volts that it'll melt copper wires, I've worked on boats that have been struck by lightning and all the wires are usually melted
@@raynlaze1339yes sometimes it’s most definitely
Boss: "What? Are you afraid of a little rain?"
Nope. But the high voltage rope from the sky? Maybe a lil.
1:03 IT DOESN'T. i don't know where this myth started, but i know that Mythbusters made it a thousand times worse. ballistics gel was NEVER meant to simulate human flesh!!!!! It is simply a very reproducible medium that slows down bullets enough to be able to compare different bullets to each other. if you make 10 different batches of gel using the same recipe 100 years apart, you should get 10 batches of gel that behave the same way. this allows people to compare various characteristics. if you want a simulation of human flesh and bone, USE A PIG CARCASS. Pig tissue is so similar to human tissue that you can literally have pig heart vales sewn onto your heart and your body will happily use them. same for pig arteries. my uncle lived with pig parts in his body for over 20 years. but here comes adam savage saying over and over that "ballistics gel has the same properties as human flesh." think about that statement for even two seconds. NONE of the properties are the same unless you are a jello man with no bones or blood or muscle or skin.
Hell yeah, thank you bro
Same properties as human flesh.... so we're pretty safe from bullets doing damage to internal organs... with 8 inches of flesh around us, hmmmm I've know of bullets to hit people in places that are half that thick but it never got more than an inch n' a half deep, Huh? Oh that's right it hit the bone turned into a first century coin in a mess of shattered human framework. The cascade of cellular embolism from energy impartment through the gel IS NOTHING LIKE reality, the true resistance and capidence of a human body ranges so much that even testing on a real person, especially in this electric bug zapper experiment, shows nothing! I feel your frustration.
6:47 I lost it at "is lightning stupid" 😂
12:48
6:02 the reason you want to crouch low is because if you get struck the lightning takes a far more desirable path through your body. It’s more likely to hit your legs or back if your crouched
You crouch if your hair raises (it means your about to get struck by lightning
Yeah I was looking for if someone had already said this. It's going to be bad news but if you can give it a path through you that doesn't involve your heart you've got a better chance of survival.
And on your toes with heels touching is important if lightning struck close to you and is travelling through the ground.
So the answer is to just assume you are going to get hit instead or getting to safety? Still dumb as shit to crouch.
Yeah, I wanted to see a test that was more thorough and progressed through a couple developments of theory.
Feet together is even more important because it mitigates step voltages, which can extend from the strike a lot further than local arcs (step voltage being a significant difference in the voltage on the ground closer to the strike than further away, if your feet are at different distances that voltage difference across the gap winds up applied to you)
I had a tour recently in a high voltage lab. The high voltage specialists said the following:
- 80% of the lightnings happen in clouds, only 20% hit the ground
From the 20% that hit the ground:
- 80% of these are negatively charged, and negatively charged lightnings are more attracted to tall objects than flat surfaces (like the ground)
- the remaining 20% are positively charged, and positively charged lightnings are more likely to struck in flat, short surfaces (like the ground, or a person standing next to a tree).
They advised the following:
- a car is the safest, but the radio antenna could potentially conduct the high voltage into the car electric system, so stay away from the radio and other electronics
- even a cabrio can be safe (mesh-like structures are used as lightning protection on buildings, and the meshes are often 5-10m wide) - but you need the roof on of course
- if you stand in a field with no trees, maybe laying down is better
- if you have a tree nearby, stay 5-10m next to it (closer could result the lightning to travel through the tree, and also you, farther could result that you are the highest object)
- you have about 4/5 odd that a lighning is going to hit a tall object (so it is 1/5 that it will not)
- chance of surviving a strike is 40%, and it can be even 60% if you can get medical help immediately, the remaining 40% is unfortunately fatal (most likely your brain melts lol).
Quick sidenote: high voltage is not always dangerous, there are Tesla coils out there that you can even touch. But lighnings are high voltage and high current, which is dangerous!
Also, is air conductive? Yes, and no: a lot of ions are in the air, which can create a so called avalanche reaction that results in ionising the air and making it conductive.
Nice video!
@real_vinke "survival rate 40%" except studies show survival rate 90%
everything is conductive if you try hard enough
@@STIMULAT10N And lightning is about as hard as electricity can try
@@STIMULAT10Nexactly get an electric welder and use it on just about anything. You’ll melt it fine probably
Why wasn't THIS at OpenSauce? This would've been a cool interactive exhibit!!! STRIKE ME ALLEN ZEUS I'VE BEEN A BAD WOOD CUTOUT
one idiot gets too close and suddenly their heart stops
"Come drive this car through a tesla coil"
Liability reasons
this was basically the tesla music thing
you've been a reeeeeal bad wooden cutout boy, you need a serious lesson to make you act right. *pulls out a million volt tesla coil*
"if you;re a small business owner, you know that nothing;s worse than being a small business owner" is the most small-business-owner vibe ever
seriously though, this is genuinely helpful. not as helpful as prosthetic limbs, but i;m more comfortable now.
We're living so far in the future an electric car can be "busted-ass." I suddenly feel quite old
Electric cars existed before gasoline cars did. The first electric car was made well over 100 years ago. They were more popular than gasoline cars for a good while, until petroleum infrastructure caught up.
@@antonliakhovitch8306beat me to it, and with more detail. I yield.
Just buy a Cybertruck
@@antonliakhovitch8306 Electric cars had been released 2 years before gasoline cars, sure, but the petroleum infrastructure wasn't the main driving point why the electric car had disappeared from the 1920s to the 2010s, instead it was the energy-density and technological developement of the batteries in said cars that was the issue. In the early 1900s, they were also marketed toward women due to it being simpler to operate than a gas-powered car, and there wasn't really a need to go more than ~50 miles from home, so they rose in popularity. But then, as cars began being simpler to operate and became faster than electric cars, they were phased out for about 90 years before partialy reappearing in the 90s and 2000s, and then fully reappearing in the 2010s
Due to modern battery-powered devices having accelerated battery developement, the batteries were now fit to use to power a modern, heavy car; hence why so many EV cars sprung up in ~2010s
TLDR: you're right but i dont want to admit it
electric cars were the first car invented, only gas became popular because of capitalist pressure
This is one of the most entertaining and educational science videos I’ve ever seen. I already downloaded it just in case UA-cam has a problem with it.
you downloaded it? you monster!!!
@@StarlordStavanger He had to take down that one video about the gun glove before
@@HoneyMikethis is unironically the reason why I try to watch his videos as fast as possible in case this happens again
@@sakarain now you can't even finish watching a video if it gets taken down while you're watching
I think a lot of the lighting "survival tips" come from people having miss-understanding how electricity works. It statistically takes the shortest or easiest path, but actually takes all paths just because it can. It doesn't know ahead of time the environment, it has to travel through it first, because it can't go faster than the speed of light.
The reason for that crouching is not to be protected against direct hits. Its so, if there is a strike near you and the electrons are dissipating into the ground, you have a minimal "footprint". You are basically just a part of a voltage divider. With spread legs a lot more voltage (thus current) would flow through ya body than if you were just crouching.
The only misunderstanding here is that a Tesla coil and a static charge behave the same way. In the experiment, the potential is fully on the side of the Tesla coil.
In a real lightning, charges are on both sides and equalize through a breakout point, which could be a person standing upright.
You could replicate this in the experiment by gluing a nail to the sphere of the Tesla coil. While a nail on the ground won't affect the lightning much, a nail on the sphere will make the electricity come primarily from that point.
@@KekTekDe Putting your feet together without crouching would achieve the same thing. So it can't be the full story.
@@dasjulian3 "In a real lightning, charges are on both sides and equalize through a breakout point, which could be a person standing upright." Are you implying that Tesla coils magically generate charges without opposites?
The arcs from primarily on sharp objects because of the geometry of the electric field. I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about.
@@dasjulian3in a real lighting, the charges you make by standing up would be so insignificant to the charges the cloud hold.
Wait a second, Arc Attack you move to a new warehouse? It’s huge! Great video Allen.
12:43 correction: if you own a cybertruck you are not safe in a thunderstorm. not because of the thunders, because of the cybertruck
Your fingers are put on notice!
I’ve worked in fire towers for a few years. They give us a wooden stool with glass feet to stand on during a lightning event. The problem is, they built those aluminum towers for the average 1956 height of a man, and our heads touch the metal roof when standing on the stool. They also say to close the windows. One time I had lightning within a quarter mile. I just climbed down the tower, and hung out in my vehicle with a handheld radio to stay in contact with dispatch.
I'm pretty sure the 'avoid using the phone thing' is actually about landlines phone, as it's (supposedly) possible for the electrical charge to hit the landline cable and ultimately zap you in the head.
Good thing I don't even have one of those
I have a 2003 Chevy 1500 with a GIANT burn hole through the front seat that says you would NOT be alright if sitting in your car when lightning strikes. You could see how it brushed the dashboard as it went straight through the roof, the seat, the floor, and into the ground.
Amazingly, it still drives fine! Happened right in our driveway about 10 feet from our 2 story house that was 15 feet from a forest with 40'+ trees... I thought it would have struck the highest object but it wanted our truck.
It burns! Ze goggles! Zey do nothing!
That drawing KILLED me… xD
2:13 You've heard of "electric chair", now get ready for "electric stand"
Love how it's just straight into it, no long winded intro, awesome!
EV tech here. No guarantee a car will be fine after being struck by lightning. The electronics that share the ground plane is a potential exit path for the lightning via the harness or other electronics, and that is known to kill modules.
True, there's no guarantee, but car manufacturers do run their vehicles through tests like this to make them at least somewhat resistant to damage, and most importantly even when that damage does occur it's much better for the car to take the hit than the occupant
There's been a ton of heat lightning and storms around here lately, I was standing outside one night and felt my hair stand on end, it clearly was and ever since I've been terrified of getting struck, thanks for this video, very cool
same bro.
My 3D printer finishes AND another Allen Pan video at the same time? Sweet!
Squatting guy is literally the shortest, easiest path lol. Maybe it’s a surface area probability vs height?
Standing dummy is taller but narrow, squatting doofus is splayed out all spread eagled taking up twice the amount of space. The chaotic laughter has me rolling. Great video and channel! 😂
Busting makes me feel good 💀 that’s crazy
real
Allen aint afraid of no bed
Ghostbusters.
8:22 Is nobody talking about the Jamie Walrus Plush and how adorable that looks. Not sure if it is available for merch or anything, but I would love to buy that in a heartbeat.
13:37 This is why the Terminators will come for you first.
@Arcattackmusic doing another great job!
NO HE DESTROYED MUMS NUG!!!!!!
NOT THE NUG
RIP Frog nugget
Hey, at least it's not Tony.
After the last two I wouldn't be even a bit surprised if this is in the plans for the poor Goober though...
@@Lizlodude true 😥
allen as far as im concerned, this video proves that even though mythbusters rejected you, they shouldnt have because you're carrying the torch with this video by disproving common lightning myths, i learned a lot from this vid, and i also learned that you are the true modern mythbuster of youtube :cheer:
I like how I watched this video, went 'what would I do different after watching this video', and the answer was 'nothing'. If I'm outside during a lightning storm, I die.
"If 40million dragons swooped down out of the sky and randomly ate 20 people every year, you would know everything about dragons!"
Awesome video. I like this educational entertainment angle you had here. Make some more!
Im really glad he mentioned the OG channel that tried this. Pretty good video
Bro you're the friggin Galileo to the Aristotle of conventional lightning common knowledge.
Thanks for the collaboration!
Allen, don't drive into lightning--your sponsors need you!
I always wondered why people said lightning always takes the path of least resistance to the ground. If it did that, it would look a lot more like a straight line
Unironically one of the most helpful UA-cam videos I've ever seen (for surviving a lightning storm).
"I would rather literally die than be wrong on the internet"
If there isn't merch of this, there needs to be.
Or your slogan. This is the entirety of Allen Pan in one sentence.
It's actually something that I've thought about time to time! That tesla coil is super cool as well! Awesome video as always!
laughing maniacally while witnessing a robot baby get destroyed by lightening is the most Allen Pan thing that can happen.
Babe wake up, new Allen Pan video
Fantastic video. Honestly a wonderful mix of education PSA and entertainment. Keep up the amazing work!!!
Water butt shower drink is valid
This was like an actual sciency video, more explaining and logics than the other ones. Great job!
Another successful Mythbusters episode!
Important thing to note about the boy scout/lightning crouch is that it's not designed to save you from a direct hit but from when it hits nearby and run through the ground. As your feet are touching it will just pass right through them instead of your body
This mf gonna upload at 9pm on a Wednesday. Truly optimizing the algorithm.
this video hasn't even peaked 100k views, channel might as well be dead now
How does uploading at different times change how it's put out?
Also a note on shelters, those big open sided picnic table shelters are usually also bad, because they are made of, and roofed with metal. So basically just a big conductive tent.
*What about a tent?*
Like if you are camping in the rain?
Good question. If your camping there would be no buildings around for miles
We need an answer.
11:39 The Coil actucally makes the camera glitch for a few seconds here.
Ballistics gel is really only for ballistics. It's not a good analogue for human flesh in terms of general properties.
5:16 Wouldn't this test be non conclusive with the materials used? Since the lightning follows the path of least resistance, it would prefer hitting the wood rather than hitting the metal and then having to jump to the wood from the metal?
>"busted ass car" >same year and model as my car
In fairness, I assume your car can go further than 30 miles without completely dying (the first gen Leaf had some design flaws that mean it's not terribly worthwhile repairing it for a busted battery)
how does this only have 24k likes, you make amazing videos thanks man!
There are safety boots that are made to be electrically insulating. They are required in some industrial workplaces, like factories with high power machines. I wonder if they would protect from lightning strikes
They are rated for electrical safety hazards, not Zeus and God playing a game of darts.
no, EH rated boots would not protect you
What about the 6" high platform boots, get extra rubber between yourself and ground
Not against a direct strike but they'll probably help somewhat against ground currents caused by the strike.
@@JackieBright whats stopping the lighting from just, going out the side of the boot
hey this vids better than the last one! shame it didnt get as many views
There is merit to at least keep your feet close together if you are in the vicinity to a potential lightning strike position, i.e. a shelter or a roof with a lightning rod, which is connected to ground via wire. Around the entrypoint of the lightning into the ground it will create an electric field inside it, which will have different potentials depending on the distance to the strike entry. If you now stand on two different potentials with your feet, there will be a voltage and subsequently a current flowing through your body from one potential/foot to the other. The killer in this situation is current going through your heart. So since your body has a set impedance you have to reduce the voltage to also reduce the current (I=U/R). You can achieve that by putting your feet closer together which means reducing the potential difference and subsequently lowering the voltage over your body. Also minimizing the area of contact with the ground can help (increasing resistance), laying down would actually be a bad idea because the bigger contact area with the ground would reduce the overall resistance and increasy the current.
The biggest danger is a direct hit by lightning - but even if you can eliminate that it's still dangerous to be near the entrypoint since there is still danger from inderect lightning strikes through the electric field in the ground. If you want to find out more on that topic you can look up "step voltage". In Germany we started to build "potential control" to "short out" the equipotential lines in the ground to minimize danger from step voltage due to indirect lightning strike. It's especially useful in weather shelters, canopied and swimming pools.
Honestly, a very informative video, which is unusual for an Allen Pan video!
2013 Nissan Leaf is underrrated
Something to note, electricity will take the shortest and most conductive route to the ground, humans are generally more conductive than trees or wood, so wood dummies holding metal stuff won't make any difference, because the air or wood itself would be the path of least resistance. There's also a huge difference if its Positively or Negatively charged, Aswell as Positive/Negative GC lightning. One more thing to help, wearing nonconductive shoes such as rubber boots would technically decrease your chances of being hit by lightning, although the shear current and voltage typically negates that non-conductivity.
Found this while listening to the song “Dupe - Mbappe” 😅😅
Allen! To me, you are the last remaining legit MythBusters member! Basically Grant Imahara's little cousin. Never stop
The crouching is for when lightning hits the ground near you; it makes you keep the feet together so the current can travel through the ground instead of up and through your body (i.e. up one leg and down the other). Actually _running_ from lightning would probably be, ya know... really bad, given the distance between your feet, the voltage/current potential, etc. But yeah, might want to double check that one.
It seems like the small potential survival benefit from having your legs together is pretty much wiped away by just getting out of the storm sooner and being that much less likely to get hit at all
In a tesla coil, the frequency of an inductor and capacitor creates the high voltage, all of the charges are on the coil and it will arc no matter what at that point. In lightning, there's high static charge in the clouds and on the ground that taller objects can act as a better breakout point for. It's why you're safer walking through a metropolitan area during a thunderstorm than an open field, and why higher elevations lead to increased fatalities. So making yourself shorter is advisable. Of course it does not always mean taller objects _will_ be hit instead of shorter ones, but any lightning strike is a game of chances and you don't discard a greater chance because it's not guaranteed.
The scout position was also never meant to "prevent" lightning strikes, it creates a more desirable path to keep lightning from your heart. Remember, you only do it when you _know_ lightning is about to strike because the ground statically charges your body so much your hair stands up, at that point it's guaranteed the bolt is going to form in your body, unlike a tesla coil which gives no warning or time to react. You're also meant to keep your feet together because the step voltages can still kill you even if the arc doesn't.
Wood and, as another commenter pointed out, ballistics gel are not similar to human flesh. Standing under a tree is dangerous not just because of the possibility of the bolt arcing to you but because it superheats the already negative pressured water in it and they tend to explode (animals typically don't.) And of course 1 test per safety advice doesn't actually prove much when again, it's a game of likelihoods (one bolt of lightning may have a close miss the statue of liberty but from what I could find it still gets struck 600 times a year.) Respect for all the effort put in by you and the team but this vid strikes me as a little irresponsible.
Guys, it's been 10 minutes, NOBODY should've finished it by now.
2x speed bisnatch
The Hyneman walrus finished in less than 10 minutes. MythBusting makes him feel good.
I'm sure others have already said this, but, wow, Allen, this is as Myhtbustier a video as any I've seen. And actually, very helpful information is clearly shown.
0:01 Igor note
oh my god lmfao
What does that mean
IGOR
@@DinostickynotesIgor's Theme by Tyler, The Creator
Its the best time to sing the entire song
One, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one
Uh!
Runnin', runnin', runnin', runnin'
Uh!
Heaven, heaven
He's coming
Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one
Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one
Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one
Ridin'-ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one
Got my, got my, got my, got my eyes open (Oh, oh, oh)
Got my, got my, got my eyes open
Got my, got my, got my, got my eyes open (Oh, oh, oh)
Got my eyes open
Oh, oh, oh, uh
Oh, oh, oh, uh
He's coming
Runnin', runnin', Runnin', runnin', runnin', runnin'
One, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one
He's coming
Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one (They gon' feel this one)
Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one
Ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel-they gon' feel this one
Ridin'-ridin' 'round town, they gon' feel this one, oh, oh
I'm ridin', I'm ridin'
(Got my eyes open, got my, got my, got my eyes open)
Oh, yeah (Got my, got my eyes open)
I'm ridin', I'm ridin', yeah I'm
(Got my, got my, got my, got my eyes-eyes)
Igor
One
Down, down, down, down, down
Down, down, down, down
Down, down
Dow-dow-dow-dow-dow-dow-dow-down, one
Yeah, ho
Yeah, ho
Yeah, ho
Yeah, ho (One)
Yeah, ho
One, one, one
Got my eyes open
Got my-got my-got my eyes open
Runnin', runnin', runnin'
Got my eyes open
One, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one, one
On-on-on-on-on-on-one
One, one
One, one
Got my-got my-got my-got my-got my-got my-got my-got my- (One, one)
I love the premise of this video. Please keep doing videos like these. It reminds me of mythbusters.
This was an electrically charged video
Im not even past the ads yet
I have been (accidentally) hit with a discharge from a very large DRSSTC like the one in this video. It did not kill or disable me, some combination of skin effects and the HF impedance of a human if I had to guess, while lightning is DC or DC-ish these coils typically run at 50-400khz
Also remember that the survival rate of lightning strikes is 90%
That's in large part because of injuries sustained from secondary arcing being counted as lightning strikes. A direct hit by one of those bolts would vaporise a significant chunk of the person it hit, it would be practically guaranteed to be lethal.
@@bosstowndynamics5488 No it wouldn't. There are survivors of direct hits where the lightning travelled through a large portion of their body. But yes, a direct hit is practically guaranteed to be lethal.
@@christiannorf1680 Lightning strikes are powerful enough to melt sand into glass, but even being near a lightning strike is enough to get hit by substantial secondary arcing which can easily travel through a human and cause those entry and exit wounds while being more survivable. I was always taught that a true direct strike would be absolutely lethal (if nothing else the power would be enough to boil you from the inside), a quick search to double check turns up no meaningful results to actually distinguish between these effects other than studies that have exactly the same limitations as this demonstration, which are using artificial electrical sources that don't even come close to the power throughout of true lightning, and general articles that seem to assume that the strike is direct just because the person wasn't inside and being indirectly shocked by touching a charged object or similar.
Something to consider is that if you get struck by lightning you’re probably falling over or your muscles are spasming, either way you’re coming into contact with the ground without control, so being closer to the ground (ie crouching) is beneficial for minimizing being struck.
Also the crouched position with your heels together is more for indirect strikes, where the shock may propagate through the ground as well. Having the electricity go through one foot and out the other is preferred to having it go up your leg, through your abdomen, and back out the other leg. Doesn’t lower the chances of being struck, but keeps the first aid more manageable.
Not sure if midnight is the best time to drop a video, but is a great time for me. (at least it's midnight for me here in Brazil)
Nobody sleeps anymore
I thought he was in California. So it'd be like 8 pm.
If the lightning chooses whatever path that has the first connection from the secondary ground-up arc, would jumping up and down repeatedly stop you from forming that secondary arc?
0:10 i am
best video i've seen in a while that is unironically very educational
I am infertile. The
I long you
I am great. The
Love how he basically says a sword is an everyday item.
i love how modern science experiments have to be done by youtubers, what a fun life we live
The one thing I will note about the crouching is that it's not just about making it less likely to _get_ struck - it's also about reducing the impact of having the lightning strike near you, which is a lot more likely than actually getting hit. The reason you're supposed to lift your heels and touch them together is so that if the lightning strikes near you, the current will run up through the bottom of your foot (or ideally shoe), then just across the connection you've made and into your other foot then back to the ground, instead of having to go up and through your vital organs. But realistically, just standing up and lifting your heels and touching them would probably provide the same protection.
0 views 9 seconds fell off
Lame
Yes but why are you taking the time to comment about the ratio of views to time when you could just be watching the video?
@@BENBOI_1 it's called a joke
7 likes in 5 minutes? Fell off
@@BossKnight fr
I've just been watching mythbusters scrap challenge. I can't believe you and kyle Hill are in ❤❤❤❤
I was always told if youre caught in a field during a lightning storm to lay flat on the ground. So even if you are struck somehow, the lightning has to travel less through your body to be grounded
I’m glad I was able to catch one of his videos the day it released
Great video Allen! Had me chuckling alongside being informative!
this video is actually so fire why didnt it get more views? I'm sorry Allen
Love the plushie and shirt. Thanks Allen Pan Busted Merch!
ballistics gel has similar ballistic/kinetic properties to human flesh, not chemical or physical, so not sure how much it represents lightning going through it lol
@3:10.....wow! But yeah, the chaotic twisting ionised gas (plasma) that *is* the lightning is affected by convective forces too, i.e. the air is very hot and tends to rise. This path of plasma is actually the path of least resistance, so the strikes, esp from a tesla coil are going to be chaotic (not random though) and not necessarily conform to our expectations =)
This is a great video though, nice work!
I don't think there is much you can do if you get hit directly, but if lightning hits the ground near you it might be better to have only one foot touch the ground or for them to be close together as the ground close to the impact will be at a higher potential, decreasing with distance. so you could get current to flow from one leg to the other if you are crouching with your legs far apart and happen to be positioned sideways to the impact.