Lightning strikes can be shocking

By AMBER DILLEY

GLASGOW — House fires can be devastating – wiping out the family home, destroying personal belongings – but having homeowner’s insurance can help ease the pain.

Buddy Underwood, agent at Cook, Downing and Underwood Insurance in Glasgow, said that homeowner’s insurance covers all natural disasters, except for earthquakes and floods. Those require special policies.

“It covers most any kind of fire, other than setting them yourself,” he said.

Things can get muddy when the “acts of God” clause in insurance policies is taken into account.

Mike Bryant, with State Farm Insurance, said that it’s more of an “acts of nature” clause.

“Under a homeowner’s policy, things like hurricanes and tornadoes are covered,” he said. “When it becomes an issue is when, for example, during a tornado a tree blows over from my yard on to your garage. Because it was an act of nature, it’s your responsibility to deal with the tree. There was no liability on my part. You can’t sue nature and it’s not my fault because I didn’t throw the tree into your garage.”

Bryant said that lightning damage falls under an act of nature.

“Lightning is a covered peril,” he said. Referring to Saturday’s fire at the Glasgow home of Dr. Muralidhar Santapuram, in which a lightning strike sparked a devastating blaze, he said, “Under a homeowner’s policy, the (home) would have been covered.”

According to the National Weather Service, when lightning hits a house, the strike can be about 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit. With temperatures like these, fires are very likely.

A way to keep lightning from striking a house is to install a lightning rod.

Keys Arnold, staff meteorologist at the University of Kentucky, said lightning rods can deflect the charge from a strike.

“The way lightning works, it occurs in thunderstorms as positive and negative charges,” he said. “They group to each other in a vertical disposition. The positive and negative collect to form a strike. This then searches for an electrical device, or something that could conduct electricity, in the ground to connect with, with a tendency to hit the highest object. The metal lightning rod will attract the strike and dissipate the charge into the ground so it doesn’t hit the house.”

The number of lightning rods needed to protect a house depends on the size of the residence.

Matt Gumm, with Alliance Corporation, which does commercial construction, said rods on a flat roof are attached on the parapit – the wall that comes up a bit on a flat roof.

Joey Botts at Botts Construction said the way rods are attached on homes depends on the shape of the roof.

“In some cases they are on shingles, sometimes underneath them,” Botts said.

Botts also said the lightning deflectors have become uncommon.

“In the past 10 years, we’ve done maybe two lightning rod systems on homes,” he said

He added that in the right situation, they can be a good investment, but it depends on the location and elevation of the house. Because of that, he said, “it can cost as much at $1,000 or as little as $10.”

What’s it cost?

Homeowner’s insurance estimates through the AllState Web site Quick Quote Generator indicate premiums de-pend on the age of a house, the materials it is made of, how close it is located to fire stations and hydrants and the price of the home. These estimates are for a brick house built in 2000 that is within five miles of a fire station and within 500 feet of a hydrant.

- $1 million – estimated annual premium of $2,570.

- $750,000 – estimated annual premium of $2,050.

- $500,000 – estimated annual premium of $1,520.00

- $250,000 – estimated annual premium of $810

- $100,000 – estimated annual premium of $480.