• A_norny_mousse@feddit.org
    0·
    29 days ago

    Electrocuted, basically:

    “Lightning does not strike a point, it strikes an area,” said John Jensenius, a lightning safety specialist with the National Weather Service. “The physical flash you see strikes a point, but that lightning is radiating out as ground current and it’s very deadly.”

    • AugustWest@lemm.eeEnglish
      0·
      29 days ago

      That’s interesting. I have seen lightning split a tree and then follow wires into a house blowing out the wall all long the path of the wires. I have also seen it lift up decibels when following underground wires.

      But if lightning hits with no lightning rod and ground is equally everywhere I guess I could imagine this result.

      • pinball_wizard@lemmy.zip
        0·
        28 days ago

        I read somewhere that the induced electical field shift near a lightning strike is - while orders of magnitude calmer than the strike itself - still powerful enough to burn, maim and kill.

        I think it’s what Wikipedia calls “side splash” in the article on lightning injury?

      • A_norny_mousse@feddit.org
        0·
        29 days ago

        and ground is equally everywhere

        You make an interesting point; Lapland is known for being relatively flat, often stony and pretty much treeless. I’m sure that contributed to an increased radius.

          • A_norny_mousse@feddit.org
            0·
            28 days ago

            Oh, sorry I just assumed Lapland when I saw reindeer.

            Lapland - or Sápmi to be precise, but that’s an even larger area - is in the North of Finland, Sweden and Norway.

            • virku@lemmy.world
              0·
              27 days ago

              In Norway we don’t use the lappland term for that area. That is just the area the sapmi originates for us. I knew that lappland was an official region in Finland, but didn’t know until now that it was an official region in Sweden as well. In Norway however the outlined area roughly consists of Finnmark, Troms, Nordland and Trøndelag.

              I guess we didn’t learn Sweden and Finlands regions in elementary school here in Norway in the 90s. I didn’t at least.

              • Dasus@lemmy.world
                0·
                27 days ago

                Its just a different name for the same region.

                Lapland (Sápmi in Northern Sami, Sää’mjânnam in Koltan Sami, Säämi in Inari Sami, Norwegian and Swedish Lappland, Russian Лапландия, Laplandija) is a historical region in the northern part of Fennoscandia in Finland, Sweden, Norway and Russia. [1] The Sámi are the indigenous people of the region.

                Lapland does not form a unified administrative region

                It’s just that collectively there’s a change trying to stop using any terms with “lapp” in the due to its connotations, but since our language is very different, the connotation didn’t ever transfer and people have no idea it’s offensive in origin. So se do talk about the Sami people, when talking about the indigenous people, but anyone living in that area would be reasonably called “a lapplander”.

                Or idk, at least some people I’ve seen online have said it’s been used as an ethnic slur against the indigenous peoples at times, but I can’t find anything of that in Finnish. Which would explain why you call it Sapmi, because that’s the indigenous name for the people and the area and there may have been historical connotations with “lapp”, which we don’t have.

                I thought you we’re Finnish from the username sounding a tad Finnish and being on sopuli. And I thought Finns ought to know that despite it being also an administrative region in Finland, it also refers to the whole area.

                My mistake.

                • virku@lemmy.world
                  0·
                  27 days ago

                  No worries!

                  Lapp is a slur in Norwegian and not much used but I don’t know if it is used as an insult.

                  What does sopuli mean?

      • knightly the Sneptaur@pawb.social
        0·
        29 days ago

        Part of the problem is that we have two feet. When lightning strikes the ground nearby, it creates a difference in electric potential between the foot that’s closest to the impact point and the more distant one. If that potential is great enough, then an electric currect can jump through one’s shoe, go up into the body then down the other leg and back to ground.

        Laying down only increases the surface area in contact with the ground, so the best thing to do is get inside.

          • knightly the Sneptaur@pawb.social
            0·
            29 days ago

            Feet have non-zero surface area so there’s still room for an electric potential between the near and far side of the foot. It’d be smaller so that isn’t an entirely terrible idea, but it is by no means foolproof.

              • Soggy@lemmy.worldEnglish
                0·
                27 days ago

                “Fine”. Burns are very serious injuries prone to infection. Internal injuries are way harder to diagnose and treat. That’s a rough combination.

          • Yareckt@lemmynsfw.com
            0·
            28 days ago

            One Problem I could see with that is that your raised foot still needs to go somewhere. And if the resistance through the path up through your leg and to some part of your raised leg and then from there through the air back into the ground is lower than the one of the path through the ground from your lowered foot to the end of the aforementioned path then the lightning would still travel through your lower body.

  • Venus_Ziegenfalle@feddit.orgEnglish
    0·
    29 days ago

    Imagine in prehistoric times you and your posse are stalking a herd of those when all of a sudden ZAP and they just lie there medium rare

  • kugel7c@feddit.orgDeutsch
    0·
    29 days ago

    Incidentally the plateau is a great hiking spot, it’s obviously beautiful, not particularly overrun (compared to the Alps it’s almost comically empty), there are reasonably many dnt huts - typically self service -, and free camping is explicitly allowed in Norway.

  • kandoh@reddthat.com
    0·
    29 days ago

    That’s what they get for never letting poor Rudolph join in any of their reindeer games