| Show LIGHTNING 8 FREAKS A mile and a half from hooper station on the line of the deseret telegraph company during the electric electria storm of sunday morning the lightning played some queer freaks with the telegraph wire knocking down some thirty five yards of it and chopping it literally to pieces the head lineman mr carr of tho the deseret company came to the news office last evening with a sack of the wire which was broken into pieces from froin a half inch up to several feet in length most of the pieces being about an inch long some of the pieces were found sticking upright in the ground these melted at the end that was waa in the ground forming a bulk of fused metal in other instances two pieces of wire had come in contact at the in stant of the breaking up and these were firmly welded together another strange fact is that some of the pieces of wire were twisted out of shape but all were straight as it if they had been clipped off by the means of nippers the ends of all of them however were slightly fused A handful of the wire was waa taken to vt dr talmage of the university of utah and he promptly pronounced it as being one of the strangest freaks ff at eric electricity he had ever dejl en in the course of the conversa uon he accounted for the action of the current and brought out many inter sating euting facts on the action of electric shocks he has made an especial study of lightning which is a form of electricity but little understood by electricians tri ians clans owing to the fact that it has scientific value only and has nothing of the practical as is the case with low tension electricity electricity is known as high tension electricity the electricity such mih as an Is used in the telegraph is low tension n the former may be compared topeat t of high intensity but small in quantity t y such as small quantity of bolling boiling water w ater the latter may be be com atred 8 d to heat of low intensity but of k forge 9 e 4 quantity to illustrate the point the doctor drew attention to the tact fact that the water tte r of the great salt lake often reaches each en one hundred degrees of heat ims would not scald the body yet the duft of heat in all the water of the lake would make an immense total high tension electricity he compared to itak a cup of the same water heated to A scalding point there to Is not enough electricity in the moot moat violent viole nt stroke 0 of o lightning to send a message from salt lake to ogden but a battery can be made in a gun cap out of a tear of strength to have its influx perceptible through thousands of amiles of wire atmospheric electricity passes sea only on the outside of a con com 1 00 while lo 10 low w tension electricity passes through the umi ductor hence tad abe practical medical utility of the lat A lightning bolt Is the passage 0 of between the earth and the amoR acs here bere jn the passage from the duds to 0 the ear earth th t the 14 e electricity takes be e path but unlike electric ity of low tension tens fon it often leaps across ride separating spaces and may aste to ube to ne way y and an traverse such lt jf uch h objects oppose little re other ather words if they are c victors ors they ma may r pass with station of mechanical vlon on the other ir hand the he body r d t a poor or conductor of elec L it becomes e c Q es into ado mechanical energy melting it if the body be treble tp eble tearing or rending as the case may ifray be it Is evident in case of the stroke at hooper that the wire though a ductor offered a resistance to the high tension electricity of the lightning bolt and the electricity was transformed into both heat and mechanical force wel welding dirig and breaking the wire the characteristic of high tension electricity to remain near the surface of the conductor is proved in this instance as the wire has been greatly changed upon the surface a semi while the inside of the wire is unchanged often discharges of electricity takes place on o n sandy deserts and the passage of the electricity into or from the ground produces heat enough to practically fuse and cement the grains of sand together masses are sometimes found of many inches in length generally cebular and of irregular shape these are called with electricity of high tension as aa with very high explosives you cannot always be sure that the discharge will take place along the line of the least resistance As for example gun cotton which is generally more effective than gunpowder but which is likely to make its way through the breech of the gun instead of the barrel this was shown in the case of one of the early experimenters with electricity dr richardson in following dr franklins experiment of drawing electricity from the clouds by the means of a kite he was killed in his laboratory by the bolt leaping from the conductor to his head this accounts for the many freaks played by the subtle fluid |
