Comments on: Man Charged with Static Walking http://austinmatzko.com/2005/09/16/man-charged-with-static-walking/ A blog about philosophy, Christianity, web development and whatever else I feel like writing about. Mon, 20 May 2013 11:02:41 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2-RC4-18391 By: filosofo http://austinmatzko.com/2005/09/16/man-charged-with-static-walking/comment-page-1/#comment-135 filosofo Mon, 19 Sep 2005 13:59:32 +0000 http://www.ilfilosofo.com/blog/?p=121#comment-135 I emailed my chemist uncle, and here's what he had to say: <blockquote>They probably mean an electrostatic voltmeter, see http://www.trekinc.com/products/esvm.asp Anyway, the story is obviously someone pulling someones leg. Even though 40,000 volts is possible, the other stuff about "leaving a trail of scorched carpet and molten plastic" is not. The voltage is high but the current is low. That's why I haven't killed anyone with my van de Graff generator yet.</blockquote> I emailed my chemist uncle, and here’s what he had to say:

They probably mean an electrostatic voltmeter, see http://www.trekinc.com/products/esvm.asp

Anyway, the story is obviously someone pulling someones leg. Even though 40,000 volts is possible, the other stuff about “leaving a trail of
scorched carpet and molten plastic” is not. The voltage is high but the current is low. That’s why I haven’t killed anyone with my van de Graff generator yet.

]]> By: JRC http://austinmatzko.com/2005/09/16/man-charged-with-static-walking/comment-page-1/#comment-134 JRC Sun, 18 Sep 2005 20:03:29 +0000 http://www.ilfilosofo.com/blog/?p=121#comment-134 The Reuters story I saw about this had a quotation from a "fire official" that I found suspect, especially since I'm not a physicist. <blockquote cite="http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050916/od_nm/australia_electricity_dc;_ylt=Ao6ZMTw1hGuV_N9Z0CaljTKs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3ODdxdHBhBHNlYwM5NjQ-">"We tested his clothes with a static electricity field meter and measured a current of 40,000 volts, which is one step shy of spontaneous combustion, where his clothes would have self-ignited," Barton said.</blockquote> Could that be? The Reuters story I saw about this had a quotation from a “fire official” that I found suspect, especially since I’m not a physicist.

“We tested his clothes with a static electricity field meter and measured a current of 40,000 volts, which is one step shy of spontaneous combustion, where his clothes would have self-ignited,” Barton said.

Could that be?

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