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of lightning and lightnig rods


>There is a third possibility; one which relates to lightning rods. The
>purpose of a lightning rod is not to attract lightning to ground,

	This will come as a heckuva shock to the writers of professional texts
	on lighting rods, power compnaies who protect their substations with
	lightning masts, radio station operators whose masts are designed to
	take hits 'attracted' by tall masts, anyone who has watched lightning
	strike a tall object AND _experimentalists_ as far back as 1870.
	(or earlier if one counts Biblical references and Ben Franklin.)

>but to bleed off charge so that no lightning strike will result(like an ion
gun).
	Very careful experiments have shown that no practical system can bleed
	charge fast enough to accomplish this.  Rods are designed to take
	the hit, and dispose of it safely.

	However, they don;t redirect it very far.  Roughly, radius of
	protection is the height of the rod.

	For references, please see either professional or 'general' books by
	Uman, or others.

	regards
	dwp