Lightning Fatality Research Articles

Lightning threats in Nepal: occurrence and human impacts

Nepal has a very large topographical variation; this elevation change has a major influence on lightning occurrence and human casualties. The Himalayan peaks cover the northern part of Nepal with low population density, the middle is covered by hills with intermediate density, and the southern plain with the greatest density. This study will leverage lightning detection by Vaisala’s Global Lightning Dataset GLD360 network with a recent detailed compilation of lightning casualties from 2011 through 2020. Over one million lightning strokes per year were detected from 2016 through 2020. Stroke density is least over high elevations to the north, moderate in hilly regions, and very frequent over the south. The thunderstorm season begins in March and ceases by August after the annual monsoon cycle. Of all the natural disasters, lightning has been recorded to be the second highest killer after earthquakes. The Ministry of Home Affairs reports an average of 103 lightning deaths per year. The fatality rate of 3.8 deaths million−1 year−1 is highest among the South Asian countries. Fatalities over high mountains are rare, with most casualties over the center of Nepal. Lightning Fatality Risk is not a good indicator of the fatalities that occur in a district.

Lightning Occurrence and Casualties in U.S. National Parks

AbstractNational park visitors travel primarily to view natural features while outdoors; however, visits often occur in warmer months when lightning is present. This study uses cloud-to-ground flashes from 1999 to 2018 and cloud-to-ground strokes from 2009 to 2018 from the National Lightning Detection Network to identify lightning at the 46 contiguous United States national parks larger than 100 km2. The largest density is 6.10 flashes per kilometer squared per year within Florida’s Everglades, and the smallest is near zero in Pinnacles National Park. The six most-visited parks are Great Smoky Mountains, Grand Canyon, Rocky Mountain, Zion, Yosemite, and Yellowstone. For each of these parks, lightning data are described by frequency and location as well as time of year and day. The four parks west of the Continental Divide have most lightning from 1 July to 15 September and from 1100 to 1900 LST. Each park has its own spatial lightning pattern that is dependent on local topography. Deaths and injuries from lightning within national parks have the same summer afternoon dominance shown by lightning data. Most casualties occur to people visiting from outside the parks’ states. The most common activities and locations are mountain climbing, hiking, and viewing canyons from overlooks. Lightning fatality risk, the product of areal visitor and CG flash densities, shows that many casualties are not in parks with high risk, while very small risk indicates parks where lightning awareness efforts can be minimized. As a result, safety advice should focus on specific locations such as canyon rims, mountains, and exposed high-altitude roads where lightning-vulnerable activities are engaged in by many visitors.

Lightning Fatalities and Injuries in Nepal

AbstractLightning is one of the most devastating hazards in Nepal because of a large amount of atmospheric water vapor coming from the Indian Ocean and a large orographic lifting of this moist air. In 2019, a total of 2884 people were affected, with loss of USD 110,982, and the fatality number was the highest (94) in reported lightning events since 1971. The long-term analysis of this hazard is very scanty in Nepal. Therefore, this study analyzes lightning fatality events, fatality rates, and economic loss from 1971 to 2019 collected from the DesInventar dataset and the Disaster Risk Reduction portal of the government of Nepal using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and geographic information system (ArcGIS) tools. The analysis shows that the overall countrywide lightning fatality rate of the entire period is 1.77 per million per year. District lightning fatality rates range from 0.10 to 4.83 per million people per year, and the Bhaktapur district has the highest fatality density (0.067). Furthermore, there were a total of 2501 lightning fatality events in which 1927 people lost their lives and 20 569 people were affected. The increase in lightning fatality events in recent years is due to internet penetration and other measures of information gathering that result in lightning fatality reports reaching agencies collecting information. The high and low concentrations of loss and damage are mainly due to geographic distribution, population density, and economic activities. This study recommends the establishment of lightning early warning systems in the Nepal Himalayas to save life and property.

Harnessing Thor's Hammer: Experimentally induced lightning trauma to human bone by high impulse current

Lightning fatality identification relies primarily on soft tissue traumatic pattern recognition, prohibiting cause of death identification in cases of full skeletonisation. This study explores the effects of high impulse currents on human bone, simulating lightning-level intensities and characterising electrically induced micro-trauma through conventional thin-section histology and micro-focus X-ray computed tomography (μXCT). An experimental system for high impulse current application was applied to bone extracted from donated cadaveric lower limbs (n = 22). μXCT was undertaken prior to and after current application. Histological sections were subsequently undertaken. μXCT poorly resolved micro-trauma compared to conventional histology which allowed for identification and classification of lightning-specific patterns of micro-trauma. Statistical analyses demonstrated correlation between current intensity, extent and damage typology suggesting a multifaceted mechanism of trauma propagation - a combination of electrically, thermally and pressure induced alterations. This study gives an overview of high impulse current trauma to human bone, providing expanded definitions of associated micro-trauma.

Fatalities related to lightning occurrence and agriculture in Bangladesh

Large numbers of Bangladesh lightning fatalities during the pre-monsoon season have resulted in speculation about causes for this annual event. The present study addresses the situation with lightning occurrence, lightning fatality, and agricultural data. Of the 1,434 lightning deaths from 2013 to 2017 in Bangladesh, an average of 1.73 deaths occur per day in the pre-monsoon season, 0.71 in the monsoon, and very small averages in other seasons. More than half of the deaths are related to agriculture. Population-weighted fatality rates are large in several northeastern districts. Lightning fatalities are frequent in April and especially May during both morning and afternoon. Based on 37.2 million strokes from the Global Lightning Dataset GLD360 network over Bangladesh from 2013 to 2017, lightning is also most frequent in the northeast from mid-April through early June at all hours of the day. Several districts with large lightning stroke densities and fatality rates are the same as with the greatest farming participation. A common crop is Boro rice harvested during April and May in several districts with frequent lightning. As a result, temporal and spatial connections exist among lightning fatalities and occurrence, and agricultural workers. This study identifies the lightning fatality maximum during the pre-monsoon season as frequent lightning coincident with labor-intensive agricultural practices in specific locations. As a result, measures can be taken to address the underlying lightning vulnerability. Additionally, agricultural studies at the times and locations identified here need further exploration. The final steps are to provide meteorological warnings and lightning-safe locations for the most vulnerable population.

Spatial Vulnerability Assessment of Extreme Lightning Events in Bangladesh Using GIS

This study explores human death, injury and overall casualties as a result of ongoing extreme lightning events in Bangladesh. Especially the month of May starting from 2010 to mid-2017 were taken under consideration for this study where, a total of 1811 lightning casualties composed of 339 fatalities and 273 injuries are identified. Spatial and geographic aspects of division wise lightning events are evaluated with the help of ArcGIS. The annual average number of fatality is 227 for the whole country whereas, 43 fatalities and 35 injuries over the entire study period was found in May only. The rate of lightning fatality is high in Pirganj of Thakurgaon, Nikli of Kishoreganj, Shibganj of Chapainawabganj, Nawabganj of Dinajpur, Ullapara of Sirajganj, Bagmara of Rajshahi, Bhuapur of Tangail, and Tarail of Kishoreganj. The majority of lightning-related fatalities occurred to males. Maximum people affected by lightning strike during working outside like in field, hoar, road side etc. Farming is the major activity during lightning fatalities. One seventh of death people are affected during stay in indoor like-house, mosque etc. The rural people affected by lightning fatalities accounted 93%. The analysis shows that the highest lightning vulnerable zone is Sunamganj, Sylhet.J. Environ. Sci. & Natural Resources, 10(2): 11-18 2017

Factors contributing to a long-term decrease in national lightning fatality rates: case study of the United Kingdom with wider implications

Decadal average lightning fatality rates in the United Kingdom have decreased markedly from 1.09 deaths per million population per year (M−1 yr−1) in the 1850s to 0.02 M−1 yr−1 by the 2010s. Factors contributing to the decrease are explored. They include a large reduction in the national workforce engaged in manually-intensive agriculture. Consequently, agricultural workforce deaths fell from 38% of all lightning deaths around 1850–9% by 2000. The percentage of the national population living in urban areas, where many jobs were indoors, increased. As buildings were modernised with electric and plumbing circuits they offered greater protection from lightning. Consequently, deaths indoors fell from 39% in 1850 to 11% in 1950, and with none in the past 50 years. Other factors contributing to lower fatality rates in recent decades included improved thunderstorm forecasts, lightning location detection systems, stricter safety regulations for outdoor workers, advances in the medical treatment of lightning casualties, better communication and road networks to request and receive medical help promptly, and greater public awareness of the lightning threat. Factors slowing down the fatality rate decrease include population growth and, in recent decades, the increased participation in outdoor leisure and sports pursuits in exposed locations. Fatality rates in other countries are explored. It is suggested that by recognising the influence each factor has on lightning fatality rates, countries currently experiencing high lightning fatality rates may be able to accelerate and enhance the beneficial impacts of some factors, albeit after adjustments to reflect their national social, economic and cultural characteristics.

A Summary of Recent National-Scale Lightning Fatality Studies

Abstract There is a major difference in population-weighted lightning fatality rates between the lower fatality rates in developed countries and the higher fatality rates in developing countries. The large decrease in annual rates of population-weighted lightning fatalities in the United States is described over the last century. A similar large reduction in lightning fatality rates has occurred during recent years in Australia, Canada, Japan, and western Europe, where there has also been a change from a mainly rural agricultural society to a primarily urban society. An important accompanying aspect of the lower casualty rates has been the widespread availability of lightning-safe large buildings and fully enclosed metal-topped vehicles, as well as much greater awareness of the lightning threat, better medical treatment, and availability of real-time lightning information. However, lightning exposure for many people in lesser-developed countries is similar to that of a century ago in developed countries. The number of people living in these areas may be increasing in number, so the number of people killed by lightning may be increasing globally due to these socioeconomic factors. It can be difficult to locate national lightning fatality data because of their mainly obscure publication sources. The present paper synthesizes lightning fatality data from 23 published national-scale studies during periods ending in 1979 and later, and maps these fatality rates per million by continent.

Lightning fatality risk map of the contiguous United States

A new method to calculate lightning fatality risk is presented in order to develop a way to identify the lightning risk in areas where lightning fatality data are not available. This new method uses GIS software to multiply lightning flash density and population density on a grid and display the results on a map. A comparison to the known lightning fatality data was done to verify the method. The method works well with a quadratic regression correlation coefficient as high as 0.864, although a hybrid quadratic/log-linear regression is preferred for various reasons despite having a slightly lower correlation coefficient (0.827). Given the good performance, the lightning fatality risk method may be useful for developing countries, where lightning fatality reports may not be reliable, to help guide where to allocate scarce resources for lightning safety initiatives.

Lightning fatalities in Colombia from 2000 to 2009

National lightning fatality information has been gathered and published for Australia, Canada, the USA, and Western Europe, but few such studies have taken place and been published in the formal literature during the last decade in other areas. National lightning fatality data are difficult to collect in many countries, especially in tropical regions, despite a high frequency of lightning. To partially fill this gap, the current paper provides the first comprehensive national summary of lightning deaths in Colombia. Data from the National Administrative Department of Statistics were gathered for 2000 through 2009 and were classified according to the number of fatalities by year, month, gender, age, and location of the fatality. These data were assigned to geographical departments to determine the fatality rates per type of population. Comparison was also made with the population percentage in rural areas where the outdoor lightning risk may be greater than in cities due to labor-intensive agricultural practices, housing that is unsafe from the lightning threat, lack of access to weather forecasts and lightning safety knowledge, and other factors. Data from an international lightning locating system also were used to determine the annual lightning frequency and monthly totals in Colombia. During the ten study years, 757 deaths were identified. The highest mortality rates were in rural areas with a maximum of 7.69 deaths per million per year in the Vaupes Department of eastern Colombia. The death rate for all of Colombia was 1.78 per million per year during the same period.

A Reassessment of U.S. Lightning Mortality

Lightning is a unique weather hazard when compared to other perils such as tornadoes, flash floods, and hurricanes since lightning itself does not constitute a criterion for a severe event according to National Weather Service guidelines. Indeed, the mitigation of lightning casualties is complex since lightning is often preceded by no formal warning and little informal warning, because of the unpredictability and random nature of a lightning strike. This investigation tallies and assesses the fatalities produced by lightning in the United States from 1959 to 2006 in order to reevaluate the specific vulnerabilities and impacts associated with this deadly hazard. The study is the first to assemble a comprehensive lightning fatality dataset for the United States using both governmental and nongovernmental data sources. As with previous studies that have examined data discrepancies at the state level, the comparisons between traditional data sources such as Storm Data and other alternative data sources reveal...

Lightning fatality with blast, flame, heat and current effects: A macroscopic and microscopic view

A case is presented of a fatal environmental accidental injuries of lightning. A pedestrian was struck by lightning. The macroscopic and microscopic lightning injuries are reviewed.

A LIGHTNING FATALITY

Medical Journal of AustraliaVolume 1, Issue 8 p. 226-227 Correspondence A LIGHTNING FATALITY First published: 01 February 1926 https://doi.org/10.5694/j.1326-5377.1926.tb39232.xAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume1, Issue8February 1926Pages 226-227 RelatedInformation