Lightning injury as a blast injury of skull, brain, and visceral lesions: clinical and experimental evidences.

Abstract

Abstract. The present study attempts to better understand the mechanism of injuries associated with direct lightning strikes. We reviewed the records of 256 individuals struck by lightning between 1965 and 1999, including 56 people who were killed. Basal skull fracture, intracranial haemorrhage, pulmo nary haemorrhage, or solid organ rupture was suspected in three men who died. Generally these lesions have been attributed to current flow or falling after being struck. However, examination of surface injuries sustained suggested that the true cause was concussion secondary to blast injury resulting from vaporization of water on the body surface by a surface flashover spark. To investigate this hypothesis, an experimental model of a lightning strike was created in the rat. Saline-soaked blot ting paper was used to simulate wet clothing or skin, and an artificial lightning impulse was applied. The resultant lesions were consistent with our hypothesis that the blast was reinforced by the con cussive effect of water vaporization. The concordance between the clinical and experimental evidence argues strongly for blast injury as an important source of morbidity and mortality in lightning strikes.

Investigating the risk of lightning’s pressure blast wave

“…These findings concur with those of Ohashi et al [2][3][4] Despite the difference in size, tearing and tattering occurred in all the papers, suggesting the existence of a non-discriminant blast wave around a long, linear spark (lightning's luminous channel).…”

“…Ohashi et al [2][3][4] , through a process of elimination, came to the conclusion that blast injury results from the explosive vaporisation of superheated water along the path of the surface flashover. To investigate their hypothesis, an experimental model of a lightning strike was created in the adult Wistar rat.…”

Delayed esophageal perforation following lightning strike: a case report and review of the literature

“…There are two case reports describing patients with a lightning-related severe blast injury to the lungs, and a third describing an isolated pneumomediastinum presumably secondary to alveolar rupture [5-7]. Postmortem studies of people killed by a lightning strike have shown a significant proportion of blast injuries, and the same authors demonstrated blast injuries to the lungs and other solid organs using artificial lightning in animal models [8]. …”

Electrical Injuries in Animals

“…97 In an experimental study on rats, similar primary blast injuries to inner organs could be reproduced by the concussive effect of water vaporization due to flash over lightning in wet animals. 64 When lightning strikes, a very large potential difference between the body and the ground is established (Table 1), resulting in a brief, massive current flash over and/or through the body and in induction of secondary electrical currents around the magnetic field pulse of the lightning. The duration of the primary lightning current and the secondary electrical currents is generally too short to cause skin breakdown and lesions by Joule heating, as is characteristic for electrical injuries.…”