What happens when skyscrapers are struck by lightning?

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Lightning strikes they say and indeed it does. The problem is when it strikes our cities’ tallest skyscrapers.

Why the tallest? Because the taller a building is, the more chances it has to be struck. For instance, the Empire State Building is struck by lightning about 25 times a year.

Luckily, tall buildings have built-in protectors against lightning as it can cause unforeseen damage to a building’s system and infrastructure.

These protectors are called lightning protection systems or LPS. Pretty straightforward, right? An LPS consists of systems that have three components: air termination systems, conductor systems, and Earth terminating systems.

The first catch incoming lightning bolts, the second redirect the current, and the third sends this current safely into the ground, where it can dissipate.

Air termination systems consist of lightning rods. Although these usually come in a variety of designs, they are mostly made of conductive metals such as copper or aluminum.

They are generally placed at the highest point of a skyscraper and they serve as a ‘terminal’ for lightning bolts to pass through, allowing the current to be directed along a safe path.

What happens once lightning strikes them? What do the other two LPS components consist of? How effective are these measures at protecting buildings from lightning? What is the science, technology,
and engineering behind these LPSs?

We answer all these questions and more in our video.

#engineering

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As someone that has designed lightning protection systems for over 28 years, most of this video is absolute nonsense. The clip of the stream exploding is fake, it's not a lightning event at all, it's "Blast Fishing". The description of the 'device' on the Burj Khalifa is an "Early Stream Emitter" or ESE & they are not recognised at all by the international standard (IEC 62305) and even illegal in some countries. It's a shame that such nonsense is spread as "Interesting Engineering".

seanpassant

Why not capture its power and convert it to useable electricity?

VeganTruk-yvnn

Awesome work on your videos recently. Your narration, the fact you quote video sources, and seem to cover a variety of subjects. It's nice to see :)

Hobble.

The fact that this creator uses a blast fishing clip as "lightning hitting water" suggests there's prolly other inaccurate "information" throughout ur video.

datguynate