I’ll take “Two Sounds You Don’t Want to Hear at the Same Time” for a hundred, Alex

mtn said:

Toyman! said:

1988RedT2 said:

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

I thought a lightning horn sounded about 5 seconds after the lightning per mile away the lightning was...

Thunder = Conscious man's lightning horn.

That's what I was thinking. Lightning comes with its own annunciator. It's almost impossible to miss. Why is a horn needed? 

I wish I knew who sold that idea. Pretty sure he could sell water to a drowning person. 

I don't know how they work, but they do work and often times will go off before you can hear thunder or see any lightning in the distance. We had them at the golf course I worked at. Once it went off, and about 15 seconds after the siren went off we saw a gigantic bolt hit about 500-700 yards away. It was slightly overcast, there had been no thunder whatsoever before that.

Now I am really curious about them.  I know you can use a voltmeter to measure the air charge from ground level to however high you can elevate the other lead, I wonder if they use the same principle to predict when the air charge is getting close to its conductivity.

Neat stuff. 

Hands up who has been cone dodging with 10 minutes left in the run group and everybody steadfastly ignores the first bolt of lightning in the sky?

Good, no hands.  You know the value of keeping quiet 

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

mtn said:

Toyman! said:

1988RedT2 said:

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

I thought a lightning horn sounded about 5 seconds after the lightning per mile away the lightning was...

Thunder = Conscious man's lightning horn.

That's what I was thinking. Lightning comes with its own annunciator. It's almost impossible to miss. Why is a horn needed? 

I wish I knew who sold that idea. Pretty sure he could sell water to a drowning person. 

I don't know how they work, but they do work and often times will go off before you can hear thunder or see any lightning in the distance. We had them at the golf course I worked at. Once it went off, and about 15 seconds after the siren went off we saw a gigantic bolt hit about 500-700 yards away. It was slightly overcast, there had been no thunder whatsoever before that.

Now I am really curious about them.  I know you can use a voltmeter to measure the air charge from ground level to however high you can elevate the other lead, I wonder if they use the same principle to predict when the air charge is getting close to its conductivity.

 

Neat stuff. 

 

Hands up who has been cone dodging with 10 minutes left in the run group and everybody steadfastly ignores the first bolt of lightning in the sky?

Good, no hands.  You know the value of keeping quiet 

Uhh, we're in Florida where lightning is a big deal. I haven't run with any club that doesn't stop. 

Keesler AFB next door to us announces "Lightning in 5"(miles) over their PA, but by that point we've heard the thunder. 

Floating Doc (Forum Supporter) said:

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

mtn said:

Toyman! said:

1988RedT2 said:

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

I thought a lightning horn sounded about 5 seconds after the lightning per mile away the lightning was...

Thunder = Conscious man's lightning horn.

That's what I was thinking. Lightning comes with its own annunciator. It's almost impossible to miss. Why is a horn needed? 

I wish I knew who sold that idea. Pretty sure he could sell water to a drowning person. 

I don't know how they work, but they do work and often times will go off before you can hear thunder or see any lightning in the distance. We had them at the golf course I worked at. Once it went off, and about 15 seconds after the siren went off we saw a gigantic bolt hit about 500-700 yards away. It was slightly overcast, there had been no thunder whatsoever before that.

Now I am really curious about them.  I know you can use a voltmeter to measure the air charge from ground level to however high you can elevate the other lead, I wonder if they use the same principle to predict when the air charge is getting close to its conductivity.

 

Neat stuff. 

 

Hands up who has been cone dodging with 10 minutes left in the run group and everybody steadfastly ignores the first bolt of lightning in the sky?

Good, no hands.  You know the value of keeping quiet 

Uhh, we're in Florida where lightning is a big deal. I haven't run with any club that doesn't stop. 

One reason I don't autox much is the local Nola group continued to run an event with visible cloud-to-ground nearby. I almost walked off course to the timing trailer to say something, but it had been 15 years since I was a safety steward & wasn't sure if things had changed. 

I can in here expecting a sneeze and fart (shart?) to be two sounds you don't want to hear at the same time. 

But lightning sirens seem more interesting. 

In reply to No Time :

Especially when someone’s having a new roof put on! (The original point of this thread, in fact.)

I am legitimately curious about the lighting stuff vs tornado sirens, the fiance and I are weather junkies but it seems to be being ignored.

On Wednesday a 16yo girl from Florida and her dad got struck by lightning while hunting. She passed away.

Sad.

Story

I'll combine the two topics we're discussing. 

I had just passed under the bridge at Longboat Key and was heading offshore when I heard a humming sound. When I pulled the throttle back, it didn't change, so I killed the engine. 
 

It was my fishing rods, upright in the rod holders, building up an electrical charge. That sound, loud enough to hear above a two stroke 90 horse outboard definitely was a scary combination. 
 

I laid the rods down and turned around, then spent the next 30 minutes under the bridge. Conditions didn't really change much, so I made a run back to the ramp and loaded up. 
 

z31maniac said:

I am legitimately curious about the lighting stuff vs tornado sirens, the fiance and I are weather junkies but it seems to be being ignored.

If you are asking how they operate, my guess is that the lightning sirens are manually operated by the city/Sheriff/Fire dpt. 
 

edit:

https://discover.pbcgov.org/parks/golf/pages/lightning-safety.aspx

"Did you know that lightning kills more people in Florida than all other weather hazards combined? To help protect golfers at Palm Beach County-owned golf facilities, we utilize the Earth Networks system to help track inclement weather. This state-of-the-art, professional grade weather sensor suite tracks 27 different variables from stations located at over 10,000 educational, government, emergency management and recreational facilities nationwide. When lightning is detected within a 6-mile radius of our golf courses, a signal triggers a 15-second horn blast that warns course patrons. Golfers are advised to seek shelter. No new golf or range fees will be accepted and no groups will be sent to tee off until the all-clear signal, consisting of three shorter 5-second horn blasts, is sounded."

Not sure how our horn operates, but it’s in the middle of a park that includes ball fields, a play park, a skatepark, etc. It’s fairly open space. (Also a decent place to watch rocket launches.)

The horn also tells us that it might be time to put on someone’s thunder shirt. (She so loves wearing it.)

SWMBO has an alert on her phone for weather. We get this "Lightning has been detected in your area" No e36m3? It's dark as hell with thunder booming all over. When I ran work boats offshore the radios would get an increasing static click then flash boom. Very predictable.

When I first saw this thread, I thought it was going to be like: "Mother's moving in and the sound of a car on the driveway"

Today’s weather update.

I heard the horn less than 5 minutes ago.

The rumbling started very soon after. 

Still sunny but my app says thunderstorms in the area. 

Slippery said:

z31maniac said:

I am legitimately curious about the lighting stuff vs tornado sirens, the fiance and I are weather junkies but it seems to be being ignored.

If you are asking how they operate, my guess is that the lightning sirens are manually operated by the city/Sheriff/Fire dpt. 
 

edit:

https://discover.pbcgov.org/parks/golf/pages/lightning-safety.aspx

"Did you know that lightning kills more people in Florida than all other weather hazards combined? To help protect golfers at Palm Beach County-owned golf facilities, we utilize the Earth Networks system to help track inclement weather. This state-of-the-art, professional grade weather sensor suite tracks 27 different variables from stations located at over 10,000 educational, government, emergency management and recreational facilities nationwide. When lightning is detected within a 6-mile radius of our golf courses, a signal triggers a 15-second horn blast that warns course patrons. Golfers are advised to seek shelter. No new golf or range fees will be accepted and no groups will be sent to tee off until the all-clear signal, consisting of three shorter 5-second horn blasts, is sounded."

At the golf course I worked at, they went off on their own. The proshop had a manual override for it - I remember we were looking at the forecast and looking at the sky and decided that it must have been malfunctioning since it hadn't gone off yet, so the pro set it off manually.

I was taking a snooze on a bench directly underneath one once when it went off. They are LOUD. I levitated about 4 feet in the air when that went off, I can't remember ever being that surprised/shocked/scared/OMGWTFWASTHAT in my life. 

Years ago, we were driving our RV to visit our son who was stationed at Ft Leonard Wood in Missouri. 

We started hearing tornado warnings on the radio, but they all the locations were "Tornado has touched down near Little Town No One has Ever Heard Of".  GPS and phone were both primitive and were zero help.

There was nowhere to hide and our paranoia started convincing us we were hearing sirens in the distance.

Of course we all know that to avoid being hit by lightning on the golf course, always carry a 1-iron at all times.

Because not even God can hit a 1-iron. 

Hey, it’s finally raining–although plenty has fallen this morning/last night/yesterday/this whole week.