“Listen to an iPod during a storm and you may get more than electrifying tunes,” Linda A. Johnson reports for The Associated Press.
“A Canadian jogger suffered wishbone-shaped chest and neck burns, ruptured eardrums and a broken jaw when lightning traveled through his music player’s wires,” Johnson reports. “Last summer, a Colorado teen ended up with similar injuries when lightning struck nearby as he was listening to his iPod while mowing the lawn.”
Johnson reports, “Emergency physicians report treating other patients with burns from freak accidents while using personal electronic devices… Contrary to some urban legends and media reports, electronic devices don’t attract lightning the way a tall tree or a lightning rod does.”
“When lightning jumps from a nearby object to a person, it often flashes over the skin. But metal in electronic devices — or metal jewelry or coins in a pocket — can cause contact burns and exacerbate the damage,” Johnson reports.
Johnson reports, “A spokeswoman for Apple Inc., the maker of iPods, declined to comment. Packaging for iPods and some other music players do include warnings against using them in the rain.”
Full article here.
Helen Branswell reports for The Canadian Press, “Wearing the device that is said to put ‘1,000 songs in your pocket’ during a thunderstorm may have sent millions of volts surging through the head of an unlucky Vancouver jogger.”
“His eardrums were ruptured, his jaw fractured and he suffered first- and second-degree burns from his chest – where the device was strapped – up into his ear channels, along the trail of the iPod’s trademark white earphones. He also had burns down his left leg and on the foot, where the electricity exited his body, blowing his sneaker to smithereens in the process,” Branswell reports.
“‘Using things like this, a mobile phone or an iPod, there isn’t actually an increased risk (of incurring a lightning injury),’ Dr. Eric Heffernan, a radiologist at Vancouver General Hospital, said from Vancouver. ‘But we just suggest that if you are unlucky enough to be hit by lightning while listening to anything with earphones you may be more likely to do yourself some damage.'”
“As for the offending IPod, well, it was ‘damaged beyond repair. Absolutely burned to a crisp,’ Heffernan said,” Branswell reports. “The man has bought another, the doctor reported. But as the old adage goes, once burned, twice shy. He no longer wears an IPod when he goes out for a jog.”
Full article here.
The New England Journal of Medicine’s report “Thunderstorms and iPods – Not a Good iDea” is here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “klapka,” “Shawn,” and “Pierre” for the heads up.]
Striking.
Sing along with me
“Paranoid will destroy ya!”
So, you’re kinda screwed anyway if a lightning bolt gets near enough to you to damage your iPod.
Personally, I warn against listening to “experts” on your iPod during electrical storms.
rule of thumb ,dont be outside during a thunderstorm.it is just common sense and has nothing to do with the ipod itself.it can happen with any device,it just makes it bigger news if you mention
an ipod
God, I hate these stupid non-articles.
48,000,000 iPods out there and we hear about 1 maybe 5 lightning hits. 1/48,000,000?
Lightning odds in the US are 1/400,000, possibly 1/700,000. (crappy research on my part suggests)
Yawn.
I could spin it so that it’s SAFER to wear an iPod with those numbers.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” /> (Not really but no one does any research or cares about facts these days)
I’m simply electrified!
Why single out the iPod? I presume the Zune is just as conductive? Of course, someone would actually have to own one before they could be hurt by it…
Is this covered under the warranty?….
So the dead person struck by lightning while wearing an ipod is deader than the dead person struck by lightning while not wearing an ipod.
Not just stricking…also shocking news.
“In further news, a man in Montana singed his peripherals while urinating on an electric fence. Experts are now advising us that the male peripherals may cause groin burns.” – True Story*
*Well, maybe…..
MDN Word: Knew, as in ‘Who knew!?”
And for sure, NEVER wear steel tipped safety shoes or for that matter metal hinged eyeglasses or even metal filled tooth cavities or for that matter even metal belt buckles and I’ll not even get into ear-rings, finger-rings, or toe-rings, or even belly-rings, nose-rings, lip-rings, nipple-rings, ….and such.
If I don’t look when crossing the street and get run over, can I sue the auto maker of the car that struck me for making a device that doesn’t explicity say that “running over a pedestrian with the vehicle may result in death”?
Or when I buy gasoline, should gas stations have a sign up that says “pouring gasoline over your body and lighting it on fire may result in serious injury or death”?
Or should doctor’s offices have signs up that say “excessive masturbation may lead to hairy palms, brain damage, and/or death”?
Please make sure you all remove your “prince alberts” during a thunderstorm…
Bonano….priceless!
Expect AAPL to drop significantly tomorrow upon increased awareness of this story.
I see stupid people.
Let’s see… Don’t wear metal objects on your person so if you get STRUCK BY LIGHTNING (and live to tell about it) the damage won’t be as severe. That’s like saying you should wear leather instead of denim clothing while playing on the freeway so if you get struck by a car (and live to tell about it), you will have less severe road rash.
If it ruptured his eardrums, how did he expect to listen to his new iPod? I guess the shock didn’t knock any sense into him. Free second rate health care in Canada tho’, eh?
Best advice:
Do Not Jog in an Electrical Storm!!!!
It is not the iPod per se that does the damage. It is the type of music you are listening to.
Punk rock and rap are the worst offenders. When listening to this genre you don’t even notice that you are being struck by lightning and therefore you just stand there and take multiple strikes as opposed to falling to the ground where the lightning will no longer hit you.
And in other news, a man wearing his iPod in a waterproof case was bitten by a shark off the coast of Florida. The doctor who examined the bite said that the iPod provided no protection whatsoever from the shark’s razor sharp teeth.
Shark experts said that sharks are attracted to electrical impulses, and that the shrill voice of Clay Aiken coming from the iPod’s headphones may have driven the shark into a feeding frenzy.
Apple, Inc. was contacted minutes before this article was uploaded, and did not respond quickly enough to satisfy this journalist, therefore appearing guilty of promoting shark attacks.
File this under “duh”. I live where thunder storms are common. I have knoen since I was 5, read five years old, not to be out side if at all possible when thunder storms are visible in the area.
It’s almost as dangerous as using an iMac in an earthquake!
Try the Belkin lightning rod next time. Double plugs into yer iPod and outta yer ar… never mind.
The problem remains that lightning programming is still done on normally unpatched Windows computers. It’s the defective implementation of that program within the defective operating system that is the real culprit here! Yes, all can be traced backed to Microsoft…
An Aussie iPod collection in no particular order, but the YEAH YEAH YEAHS are my favs lately – Couldn’t think of many more right now, but there are soooo many others. Aussie music has always rocked !!!
Tune into FBI – a Sydney – local indie radio station.
FBI
Anyway – every one of them is worth check’n out, course some will be familiar to you. As Ian “Molly” Meldrum the iconic aussie presenter of Count Down would say “… Do yourself a favor and check them out …”
PTY LTD
SPIDERBAIT
THE BIRTHDAY PARTY
THE ANGLES
JOHN BUTLER TRIO
ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI
NICK CAVE
THE LIVING END
SNEAKY SOUND SYSTEM
AUGIE MARCH
JET
PARKWAY DRIVE
BLACK SORROWS
THE HERD
DIVINYLS
HILLTOP HOODS
YEAH YEAH YEAHS
ROGUE TRADERS
GRINSPOON
THE AUDREYS
THE WAIFS
THE WHITLAMS
INXS
LITTLE RIVER BAND
THE SAINTS
COLD CHISEL
LASH
THE CHURCH
YOU AM I
SEVERD HEADS
SONIC ANIMATION
THE VINES
1200 TECHNIQUES
WOLTHMOTHER
INSTITUT POLAIRE
THE AVALANCHES
EVERMORE
POWDER FINGER
–
If Apple could pre-load an iPod with this lot, I reckon that would be a kinda cool, coz i like em … again, no particular order. tracks in parenthesis are Grade’
AIR
THE CURE
KULA SHAKER
LEMON JELLY
SLADE
ST GERMAIN
45 DIP
NICK DRAKE
LIBERA
SIGUR ROS
DJ SHADOW
GRACE JONES – REMIXED
SEELENLUFT
DIRECTIONS IN GROVE
THE DOORS
JEFF BUCKLEY
JIMMY SMITH
KOSHEEN
L. VIZZANA
OMD
QUEEN
RINOCEROSE
ROOT DOCTORS (I’D RATHER GO BLIND)
TONY SCOTT
MARC MOULIN (INTO THE DARK)
STEVE LAWLER (2 BKACK 2 GAY)
CORNELIUS
Get em off iTunes.
Ah … ok so I’m a dead dingos donga, wrong bleed’n thread.
Sorry, will now bore everyone again in the right thread re
Yellow submarine / Beatles / iPod rumor.
my bad