Lightning just took out my PC, TV, AC, and kids Xbox! What a pain!

[JL Sargent]

I'm watching TV and then there's a big boom, bright light, and lightning blows two light switches off the wall about 5 ft from me. Scared the crap out of us. Now I've lost all kinds of electronics around here. Any chance of revived a PC from a lightning strike? 60" TV dead as a doornail. Oh boy, what to do.

 

[paul79]

Pull the hard drive out and take it somewhere. The guys that work on these things have recovery software if they need to use it, and success is very likely.

 

Dangerous stuff there man. Light switches blowing out could possibly mean massive electrical wiring issues are in your future. Just hope all your joints throughout the house are very good, and you might make it out of this with minimal damage.

 

My best man, and get everything checked out very good. Your insurance should cover most of it.

 

 

[dtel's wife]

Homeowner's insurance should cover the losses, as long as it's not just a fire and wind policy.

[billybob]

Sorry to hear that JL! Let equipment cool down and if you want to plug into another room that has working outlet just to try out in a bit. May have flipped a breaker or so...

Dang!

Edited July 28, 2016 by billybob

[dtel]

That's terrible, but glad no one got hurt, or the house catch on fire.

 

I wonder if insurance companies (or someone) has a standard way to check things like this, inspections to electrical, plumbing or even structural, that is a lot of power for the house to absorb. I was thinking plumbing because it can follow water lines just like electrical.

 

Sorry to hear this

[JJkizak]

Well when lightning hit a huge (4 ft diameter) Oak tree 25 feet away from the house it did this:

1...scared the crap out of me

2...blew the bark off the first 30 feet of the tree

3...cut the tree from top to bottom (4 feet diameter ) with a cross pattern + but the tree was still standing

4...left several 1" thick black melted carbon something trails traveling from the tree base to the septic pipe

5...traveled along the pipe to the house about 25 feet and melted the aluminum siding

6...roached out every alarm sensor on that side of the house

7...roached out the burglar alarm main control board and control pad

8...roached out the Denon AVR

9...roached out the modem in the computer

10..roached out one of the upstairs telephones

11...blew up the well pump that was 88 feet down in the well

12..took down a spruce tree (1 foot diameter trunk) about 15 feet from the big oak that got hit

13..made me drop my donut and coffee

14..blew several circuit breakers in the 200 amp electric panel

15..the next door neighbors were standing outside in the rain watching this action

JJK

Edited July 28, 2016 by JJKIZAK

[Gilbert]

Connect the power cords of your precious electronics to quality line conditioners, or quality surge protectors.

 

I once lost a PC to lightening, ever since I purchased back-up power supply with built-in line conditioner and surge protection. Cost me $95 bucks about 9 years ago, and I'm still using the same one on my PC today.

 

 

More than likely, the damage is limited to the unit power supply. Still a pain in the arse to get corrected or fixed on each unit, but it could be better/cheaper than having to buy new again.

Edited July 28, 2016 by Gilbert

[Gilbert]

13..made me drop my donut and coffee

 

 

LOL, and man with his priorities.... that would have been No. 1 on my list.

[MORE KLIPSCH PLEASE]

Damn JL

That really sucks    ........... glad no one was hurt....

 

My best to you my man......

 

MKP :-)

[DizRotus]

Wow,  That's exciting, but unwanted.  A little music might soothe the pain.

 

[CECAA850]

When we lived in our last houston lighting hit the metal flashing on our chimney and blew a hole in the roof. We were home at the time and It sounded like a grenade went off in our attic. My wife saw the flash go down a hallway. It scared the crap out of us. We called the fire department as we had quite a bit of smoke in the house and attic. We also lost a ton of electronics.

[Gilbert]

Wow,  That's exciting, but unwanted.  A little music might soothe the pain.

 

 

 

I'll bet he feels better already.

[ratcobob]

Chances are fair that the harddrive in the computer is ok even if the machine won't light. A good computer guy can tell you for sure.

If they can't access the drive it will have to go to a recovery service which is pricey. You'll have to decide if what's on the drive is worth the money. I've used Gillware several times with good results. They will do a free estimate.

Mostly what I've done for the past 38 years has been replacing and restoring harddrives.

It's not a matter of if you're going to have a harddrive failure, it's a matter of when. Your when may have just happened. 

You are only as good as your last backup. Backup drives are cheap insurance and the process is automatic on modern operating systems.

If you're a Mac user I may be able to help. I don't do Windoze.

[bhenry]

You will probably end up with an electrician checking the wiring in your house for damage.

I used to do insurance repairs and used this test a few times to look for hidden damage to the conductor/insulation.

Good luck, man! You're gonna need it!

Megohmmeter

Megohmmeter M1101M.

Megohmmeter (sometimes referred to as a megger) is a special type of ohmmeter used to measure the electrical resistance of insulators. Insulating components, for example cable jackets, must be tested for their insulation strength at the time of commissioning and as part of maintenance of high voltage electrical equipment and installations. For this purpose megohmmeters, which can provide high DC voltages (typically in ranges from 500 V to 2 kV) at specified current capacity, are used. Acceptable insulator resistance values are typically 1 to 10 megohms, depending on the standards referenced.

[Grizzog]

Hope everything turns out well. Glad everyone is safe.

Always unplug your equipment during a storm. Surge protectors don't stand a chance against a lightning strike...they protect against surges.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[mustang guy]

If you use MS Office, make sure you use OneDrive and not just My Documents. That stores data offline and even keeps versions so if something is corrupt, you can get to it. ICloud also is good for storing data like pictures if you use an iPhone or other iDevices.  

 

Bottom line is you store on the cloud, then lightning strikes don't worry you as much.

[Seadog]

Sorry to hear that.  Likely that your wiring is not damaged throughout the house, but if the light switches blew out, that circuit is probably toast.  Maybe the lightning blew out the electric meter and you will get free electricity for a few years until the electric company figures it out - well at least we can hope.  Good luck with the electronics.  Hopefully, you retrieve all of your data and get to upgrade your hardware with an insurance settlement.

[Max2]

You need to turn a claim in. Lightening is nuts with what it does all over your home, what you can see and what you cant in the walls, attic, crawlspace etc. You could have several issues start popping up down the road. Most states won't re-rate you and raise your premium from an "Act of God."  

[garyrc]

Are lightning rods any help?  I've never lived in a lightning area, so I only know what I read in Ray Bradbury.

 

My Great Grandmother was standing under a big tree when it was struck by lightning, and the flash over (?) burned her and knocked her out.  She recovered, only to be bitten by a cotton mouth.  She took a butcher knife to her arm, poured some whiskey over it, and a little down the gullet.  She recovered from that too.  It's a good thing she survived both, or I wouldn't be here.

[JJkizak]

Lighting rods really help but still cannot stop "ball lightning" traveling down the 3/4" diameter ground wire and hopping through a window. Been there done that in the 1950's.

JJK