Do Rubber Tires Protect You From Lightning

The truth is rubber tires don t prevent lightning strikes in the least bit.

Do rubber tires protect you from lightning. What keeps you safe while inside a car is the metal body surrounding you which creates a faraday cage. Being in a car doesn t guarantee 100 protection against a lightning strike just because of the fact that it has rubber tires that do not conduct electricity. Do the rubber tires on your car protect you if you are outside the car and you re leaning on it. Rubber is indeed an electrical insulator but your shoes or bike tires for instance are way too thin to protect you from a lightning strike.

Ironically it s not the rubber tires insulating the car but rather the conductive metal framing which protects you by conducting the electricity around the vehicle and its occupants. Lightning often strikes more than three miles from the center of the thunderstorm far outside the rain or thunderstorm cloud. So the rubber tires on your car do not protect you from lightning they simply ground your vehicle so that the electricity has a place to exit. Whether it s a yokohama or a continental car tires don t protect you from lightning.

Rubber tires on a car protect you from lightning by insulating you from the ground. Rubber soled shoes and rubber tires provide no protection from lightning. However the steel frame of a hard topped vehicle provides increased protection if you are not touching metal. Tires are too small to insulate a lightning strike.

The good news though is that the outer metal shell of hard. Here s where your grandmother is right though your car is a fairly safe place to be in a thunderstorm but for a different reason entirely. Rubber does not protect you from lightning. Most people believe the rubber tires on a car prevent lightning strikes.

Like trees houses and people anything outside is at risk of being struck by lightning when thunderstorms are in the area including cars.