Lightning And Static Essays - Electricity, Electrostatics

Lightning And Static Lightning is a discharge of static electricity in the atmosphere, which causes a bright flash of light. When lighting goes through the air, it heats the air to degrees hotter than the sun's surface about 50,000 degrees fahrenheit. This heating causes the air to expand and contract. This causes the sound called thunder. Lightning is caused by a build up of negative ions in the atmosphere which discharges into the ground causing the negative ions to go with the positive ions in the ground. Static electricity is negatively and positively charged atoms. A static charge on the other hand is a individual atom with a negative or positive charge. There are three types of charges negative positive and neutral. Negative and positive ions attract. But two negatives repel each other, just like two positives will. Neutrally charged ions can attract to both negative and positive ions, because they have and balanced charge of negative and positive ions, this means it has the same amount of negative and positive ions. This is where the following rule is true opposites attract, and likes repel. Static electricity is generated when two different objects are rubbed together and some electrons are stolen from one object and then start to collect on the surface of the other object. The object that loses electrons becomes positively charged, because electrons are negatively charged and there is an absence of electrons and too many protons. Now because opposites attract and like repel the reason hair stands up when you rub something on it can be explained. When something is rubbed in a dry place, the thing takes electrons from your hair, leaving your hair with a positive charge it stands up as far away as possible from the other positively charged hairs. There reason there is little static electricity in areas with a high humidity, like the Virgin Islands, is because the humidity in the air is a conductor of electricity, so it helps trancfer the free electrons to an area that can accept electrons, like the earth so not many free electrons stay on any object that is saturated. Static electricity can be use to do many things, one of these things is keeping down air pollution by putting an electrode in factory smoke stacks so that the dust will collect on the electrode. Lightning and static can be hazardous. lightning is harmful, some people think it does not have any threat from a distance, like when a lighting storm is up to ten miles away. The most lightning strikes take place under the lightning storm where the rain is raining the hardest. Signs to tell if lightning is going to strike in your area are, If your hair stands up you hear static popping or crackling, and if you feel you body tingle due to ions moving through your body the static on portable electronic things increases suddenly, you smell the smell of statically charged air, or you see static sparks sparking in the air around you. Things to do inside to keep from getting hurt while in a lightning storm are, get away from doorways outside, porches, windows, and good conductors of electricity. Avoid phones that are not cordless and if it is a cordless phone avoid it if it is on the cradle. Do not touch things that use electricity unless they are unplugged. Do not stand near or lay on concrete walls. Do not use a metal building for shelter. And don't go into the basement because the electricity can travel through the ground. To not get hurt outside, go inside if you hear thunder, if the sky looks threatening, and stay inside for at least 30 minutes after the la st sound of thunder. If you are caught outside and do not have shelter close to you during a lightning storm, you should crouch to the ground, get onto the balls of your feet, put your hands on your knees, put your head between your knees, make yourself as small as you can, and try to have as little physical contact to the ground as you can. Static electricity has been known about for some time. Some time around the year 600BC the Greek Mathematician