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We have two tall coconut trees at our residence. The trees are, unfortunately, very close to a neighbors house. There has been a recent case in our locality where a bolt of lightning struck a coconut tree and fried the electrical wiring and electrical appliances of the adjacent house. Since then, they are asking us to cut down the coconut trees because they are concerned that another lighting bolt will our coconut tree and damage their house. While I agree with the concern, I'd also like to save the trees.

So, my question is: Does installing a lightning arrester taller than the trees considerably reduce the chance of a lightning bolt striking the trees?

isherwood
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Outsider
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    That's an unreasonable request by your neighbor. Don't cut down your trees to satiate paranoia. Lightning strikes happen and there isn't much you can do to change that. – isherwood Jun 18 '21 at 13:52
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    A lightning ROD or "air terminal" (and associated grounding cables, properly connected) might make a difference, and can be attached to the tallest tree. – Ecnerwal Jun 19 '21 at 11:44

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Having repaired 2 homes having direct and indirect hits of this kind will not be affected in the slightest by lightning arrestors.

Think about it the lightning is a massive arc that is jumping from the sky to the ground. In the case of the direct hit the circuit breakers we found scattered throughout the house. we never found some parts and there were trees over 100’ tall within 50-60’ from the home.

The second an indirect had a parking space between the home and the tree that was hit and the power/ bolt jumped to the house grounding system and fried the electronics and even the power meter.

Not trying to scare anyone but the lightning arrestors are there for the cases where the strike is on the power lines or pone/cable. Honestly nothing is going to stop a close strike from doing damage and I would not be cutting down trees for the rare in my area strike.

If you want to keep the tree and the arrestors make the neighbors feel better ok but know even 20’ is nothing to lightning and arrestors ok point made.

Ed Beal
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  • Yes the direct strike on the home blew the electrical panel to pieces the “dead face” cover or what was left went through a wall. The buss bars had mostly vaporized the neutral lug and ground lugs were gone and almost a foot of the metal conduit into the box. To tell the truth it looked like a bomb had gone off. I have seen buss duct blow bolted covers of in heavy industrial power distribution rooms and twin 350kva 480v generators sink 180 out of phase but the lighting strike was the most destructive event I have ever seen. – Ed Beal Jun 18 '21 at 14:17
  • Yeah, the Illinois Railway Museum had a little misadventure with a lightning strike on the trolley wire... which carried it everywhere. One place was a disconnect switch in a trolley barn, that connected mainline trolley wire to the trolley wires inside the barn (brought down to eye level). The lightning blew a hole through the back of the switch box to the building steel. Lightning struck the arc, *but 600VDC trolley power sustained it*. They lucked out and didn't lose a whole barn full of wooden cars... but decided to get a rate-of-rise (AFCI) on the DC substation after that. – Harper - Reinstate Monica Jun 19 '21 at 01:13