On the Impact of Lightning Strike to Animals

Abstract

Cloud to ground lightning sometimes threatens the wellbeing of livestock. Yearly, worldwide, there are thousands of wild and farm animals suffering from lightning strikes. The increasing numbers of injuries and the importance of animals has raised the need for awareness of studying the lightning current and its impact on farm animals. This study aims to investigate the effects of lightning current on animals' bodies. To give the readers a better insight of the possible damages to the animals' tissues, a complete model of both lightning current and animals' bodies has been simulated using PSCAD/EMTDC software. The animal body model consists of six resistance values representing the body parts. The Heidler function is used to generate the lightning current impulse. The generated impulse current is injected into the animal model. The simulation results are obtained for 5%, 50% and 95% of the positive and negative first stroke and negative subsequent stroke. Results show that the ventricular fibrillation and cardiac arrest may be the dominant cause of death.