Lightening Strike

[Bob James]

In July a sailboat 4 slips down from me took a lightening strike. The surge went through the shore power and fryed his shore power plug-in box, went down the row of docks and caused some relatively minor damage to some boats that were connected to shore power on either side - mostly instruments. I was on shore power and lost my battery charger that I replaced. Everything else seemed fine and we sailed for another 2-3 months. I hauled the boat last week for the winter and noticed some damage to the hull around the prop strut. I did not notice any other damage around other thru hulls but will inspect further this next week. Question, could the damage around the strut have been caused by the lightening? I would like to get some other opinions before I contact the insurance company - Boat US. Thanks for your insights and opinions.

Bob

 

[rpwillia]

Good likelihood

Bob, Lightning will take the path of least resistance and since your prop strut is a nice chunk of metal it is likely - especially if you consider most of our thru hulls are marelon and not metal. One thing I do not know is how or even if the stut is bonded to the rest of the system. You may also want to check the stuffing tube and shaft as well as there could have been some damage there also.

 

[Bob James]

Boat USInsurance is sending a marine surveyor to look at the boat next week. Noone has disputed the cause of the damage as the lightening strike. I'll provide some more follow-up. Interesting note - of the 5 boats near the one that was hit, the only one without any damage had disconnected from shore power before the storm.

 

[rpwillia]

Hardle ever am on shore power

I don't hook up for a few reasons, one is that if someone has a current leak, then everyone on that dock has one and you get galvanic corrosion. Lightning is another, and if you are going out it is one more thing to disconnect.

I use my solar charger on my batteries and they are always topped off.

 

[Bob James]

To close the loop on this thread - I met the surveyor at the boat and we looked at the mounting bolts for the prop strut and detrmined that the hull damage around the strut was not caused by the lightening strike nearby. Charger yes but not the strut. Did notice that my cutlass bearing needs replacement and the vibration could have accelerated the cracking around the strut. I will fix both in the Spring.