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Show Special Marks for Lightning Nowhere else do the electrical discharges dis-charges of the atmosphere assume so Intense and terrifying a character as on the summits of high mountains. Last August the laboratory of the Society So-ciety of Observatories, built on the summit of Mont Blanc, was struck by lightning, with fatal results to one of Its occupants. This building Is of wood, roofed with sheets of copper, and Is not provided with lightning rods. It was practically buried ln snow at the time of the disaster. The famous Janssen observatory on Mont Blanc was repeatedly struck, although It bore numerous lightning rods, connected connect-ed by cables to some rocks a few hundred hun-dred feet distant This building waa of wood and was built on the mow. The effects of the lightning were extraordinary ex-traordinary and appalling; the metal tableware was frequently melUd or perforated; the bolts and nuts ln the walls were melted; the woodwork charred; the metal cap of the large telescope was pierced with holes. |