REDUCE RISK: ON THE TRAIL
The best way to stay safe from lightning on the trail is to avoid getting caught out there when storms roll through. One way to accomplish that is to download a reliable weather app to your smart phone, says Jamie Zito, also known as “Cactus Jack” of Cactus Jack’s Trail Rides in Ocala, Florida, a region that has one of the highest rates of lightning strikes in the nation. Zito always carries his phone with an app that shows the weather radar in gradients of colors from green to yellow to red, indicating possible nearby lightning activity. “If we see red, we don’t go,” he says.
He also checks his weather app periodically while out on the trail, a habit that he says has made it possible for his stable to conduct 5,000 public rides last year without incident. “If we see a system move in, we head back,” says Zito. “And we certainly don’t stand under a tree waiting for it to pass.”
Another option is to carry a portable weather radio, permanently tuned to a series of radio stations that broadcast continuous weather alerts in your local area, including tornados and other hazardous conditions as well as thunderstorms. Most of the United States is covered, except for more remote areas of the West and Alaska. Also, when possible, to try to schedule your rides in the morning, rather than the afternoons when storms are more common.
If, despite your planning, you encounter a thunderstorm while you’re out on the trail, your best bet is to ride back to the trailhead or find a nearby barn where you can take refuge, if there’s time. However, if you cannot get to a vehicle or building, you can take some steps to reduce your risk of a strike.
• Don’t be the highest thing around. Dismount, and move toward cover if you’re in an open field. If you’re on a hilltop or ridgeline, head downhill as soon as you hear distant rumbles. The leeward side, sheltered from approaching winds, is a better choice assuming the footing is safe in that direction. Try to get into a deep, dry ravine or canyon to wait out the storm. (Do not, however, take cover under a rocky overhang or in a cave. Lightning that strikes higher up the cliff will travel downward along the face---the electricity can arc across the entrance to a cave, and the current may jump to someone who is near the entrance. You may be OK deeper inside a dry cave, but the NWS reports that people have been struck while standing in water as far as half a mile inside a cave.)
• Stay away from tall objects. Standing under or near a lone tall tree or utility pole is just as dangerous as sitting on a mountaintop---the electricity traveling down the structure is likely to spread over the surface once it reaches the ground. A better choice is to take cover in a copse of trees of uniform height. Any tree in the area might still be struck, but the odds that it will be one near you are much less.
• Keep your distance from conductive materials and objects. Stay at least 15 feet away from wire fencing, metal structures, running water, wet ropes or other objects that could conduct electricity. You do not, however, need to remove any metal you are wearing. Contrary to popular belief, metal and water do not necessarily attract lightning, but they are excellent conductors. Distant strikes can send current traveling long distances through water or wet or metal structures, until it finds a path to the ground.
• Separate the group. If you’re with other people, spread out at least 15 feet apart as you head toward cover. That way, if one person is struck, the current is less likely to travel to others as well. (And someone will be available to administer first aid.) Once you’ve reached the area where you will take cover, tie your horses off to smaller trees and spread out away from them, too.
• Lower your profile. Your best bet, if you have a backpack or large saddlebags, is to sit on them with your feet not touching the ground. If you don’t have anything nonconductive to sit on, your next best option is to crouch, with your feet together. Keeping your feet close together can greatly reduce the impact of ground lightning, current that travels along the surface of the ground after striking a nearby object. Crouching also limits the effects of side flashes and streamers. Do not lie down; this greatly increases your risk of serious injury or death should a nearby strike send ground current toward you.
Note: The NWS stopped recommending the “lightning crouch” in 2008, for an interesting reason, according to its website: “Promoting the crouch gives people the false impression that crouching will provide safety…. [This belief] could cause people to become apathetic
and not seek a safe shelter before the lightning threat becomes significant.”
Always remember that you can follow all of the precautions listed above and still be struck by lightning. The NWS recommends that you consider these actions, not as ways to decrease your risk, but rather as ways to avoid increasing your risk: “There is no safe place outside in a thunderstorm.”
After the storm has passed, wait at least 30 minutes after you hear the last rumble of thunder before moving on.
REDUCE RISK: IN YOUR PASTURES
Horses in pasture are pretty good at seeking shelter during rough weather, and chances are they will go to low, protected ground. But if thunderstorms are common in your area, you might assess your turnout areas to see if you can find ways to reduce the hazards.
Wire fencing on wooden posts is one of the biggest threats to turned-out livestock. “Search Google images and just about every image you see are of livestock dead along a fence,” says Gookin,
Wire fencing on wooden posts is one of the biggest threats to turned-out livestock.
A typical lightning flash is about 300 million volts and about 30,000 amps. Standard household current is 120 volts and 15 amps.
Source: National Weather Service
who is also a committee member of the Lightning Protection Institute. “And if you look, you will almost always see that it’s a wire fence that has wooden posts.” A lightning strike anywhere along the fence can send millions of volts traveling horizontally along the fence, seeking a path to ground, and if a horse is standing too close, all that energy can easily jump into his body to run down his legs.
But, Gookin adds, one simple fix can make the fence safer---by grounding it: “An occasional steel post added to that fence is a really effective, cheap way to add insurance to that pasture.” Wire fences need to be grounded at 150-foot
intervals, or less if possible, so that the charge from a lightning hit is confined to just that span of fencing.
Tall trees are another hazard in some pastures. When electricity from a lightning strike travels down the trunk, it also spreads out through the ground around the tree. Any four-legged animal lying or standing in this area is likely to receive a fatal shock: The electricity will run up the leg closest to the trunk, pass through the body, then down the leg farthest from the trunk, and the greater the distance between ground contact points, the greater the potential for death or serious injury. “Because their feet are so much farther apart, there is a greater difference in voltage, and that is what drives current,” says Gookin.