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Plane hit by lightning!

Looks like that put lightning rods on both the front and backend of the plane.

As a passanger I would of crapped my pants from the bright flash and loud bang shortly after.
 
At that distance, I don't think your body is going to perceive the "shortly after" - your senses are going to indicate simultaneous.

Although, would they really see that much of the flash? The lightning doesn't go through the plane, but is rather conducted around it on the skin.
 
Originally posted by: DrPizza
At that distance, I don't think your body is going to perceive the "shortly after" - your senses are going to indicate simultaneous.
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The sound comes from the rapid heating of the air from the lightning. So I would only assume the sound comes directly after the flash.
 
Originally posted by: new2AMD
Originally posted by: BUTCH1
Found this too, plane
ingests bird during takeoff and loses an engine!
Click to expand...

its scary yet relieving to see they can recover from that.
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What's scary is that a bird can do that to our million-dollar equipment :Q
 
Originally posted by: Regs
Originally posted by: DrPizza
At that distance, I don't think your body is going to perceive the "shortly after" - your senses are going to indicate simultaneous.
Click to expand...

The sound comes from the rapid heating of the air from the lightning. So I would only assume the sound comes directly after the flash.
Click to expand...

Yep, but you're not going to perceive it. I'll elaborate. The rapid heating of the air is just that: rapid. Rapid as in a few millionths of a second (this, I had to google; I wasn't sure of the magnitude, but knew it was less than 1/1000 of a second) So, while it's not exactly simultaneous, you'll never be able to perceive the difference. There is, however, a more significant difference: the speed of light is roughly a million times faster than the speed of sound. It takes thunder roughly 5 seconds to be heard a mile away. 33 meters would take 1/10th of a second. (Speed of sound is 331 meters per second at STP - this I didn't have to google.) 33 meters is more than 100 feet; I don't think that on that jet anyone was more than 100 feet away, thus the difference between the flash and the sound would be less than 1/10th of a second. If two events unexpectedly occur involving two different senses 1/10th of a second apart, I don't think you're going to be able to differentiate which happened first.


Incidentally, something new I learned that amazed me:
The longest lightning bolt measured to date was 118 miles long!!! (may be longer by now.)
 
Originally posted by: crab
This happens everyday.
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A plane being hit by lightning, videotaped, converted to computer format, posted on the internet for years, and then reposted on ATOT happens every day? Gee, I must be blind as I'm missing a lot of those videos. 😉
 
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