Lightning Damage Prevention Tips From Fremont Insurance Company
FREMONT, Mich., Aug. 17 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Michigan offers residents and visitors an opportunity to experience everything that Mother Nature has to offer like few other places in the world. Summers in Michigan can be particularly enchanting with thousands of miles of freshwater beaches, hiking, and biking trails, and more than 800 golf courses. Unfortunately, along with the natural beauty, the summer season also means severe weather, often resulting in ferocious thunderstorms and violent lightning. Lightning strikes at an average current of 30,000 amperes – that's 100 million volts of electrical potential – and is about 50,000 degrees F. In the US, lightning storms are responsible for more injury, death, and destruction each year than all the hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods combined, particularly in the Northeast.
"Lightning striking a home can have a devastating impact on a family, even if no one is injured," said Kurt Detmer, vice president of marketing for Fremont Insurance. "While it's true that lightning losses are generally a covered peril in most property insurance policies, many things can be lost that simply can't be restored. You can replace a damaged device, but personal photos, music, and other files stored on electronic devices can be irretrievably lost. Following a few simple guidelines can help prevent damage from occurring."
Personal Safety Guidelines:
- Seek Shelter. Lightning currents can branch off to a person from a tree, fence, pole, or other tall object. If you are caught outside, avoid high areas, open water, metal fences, wires, and other horizontal conductors.
- Stay away from trees, poles, flagpoles, or other vertical conductors. Put down metal tools and golf clubs.
- If your hair stands on end, drop to your knees, bend forward, and place your hands on your knees. Do not lie flat on the ground. Protection from rubber-soled shoes is a fallacy.
- Avoid appliances, telephones, and water. Currents traveling through a structure can hit a person using anything electric or corded, and any running water, including showers, bathtubs, and pools.
- Put aside personal electronic devices such as cell phones, iPods and laptop computers. These can cause serious injury when used outdoors during an electric storm.
- Encourage your electric company to keep trees trimmed around power lines.
Personal Property Protection:
- All connections to a structure, surface and buried, electrical, telephone, cable television, and plumbing, are potential routes for lightning energy, so whole-house surge protection is ideal. Surge breakers are available that can be installed on the main panel board or you can ask your utility to install surge suppression at the meter.
- Equip critical devices (i.e. telephones, computers, garage door openers) with individual transient voltage surge suppressors (TVSS). These should have three sets of MOVs (metal oxide varistor) rated at least 250-300 joules. Many modern devices have built-in surge suppression. MOVs are listed on their power supply circuit boards.
- Quality surge protectors, while more expensive, provide better protection, in particular thermal cut outs to prevent fire in the event of MOV failure.
- Properly and professionally designed and installed lightning rods provide some protection.
- The best protection for any electronic device is still too simply to unplug it during a lightning storm.
About Fremont Michigan InsuraCorp, Inc.
Fremont Michigan InsuraCorp, Inc. is the holding company for Fremont Insurance Company. Headquartered in Fremont, Michigan, the company provides property and casualty insurance to individuals, farms and small businesses exclusively in Michigan. Fremont Michigan InsuraCorp's common stock trades under the symbol "FMMH."
SOURCE Fremont Insurance
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