CAPE CORAL, Fla. — A series of nasty storms made their way through Cape Coral this afternoon, even offering a dazzling display of lightning.
But the bolt of electricity can have a lasting impact on the roof over your head. Thankfully, there are a few measures you can take to ensure the safety of your home.
“We produce more lightning strikes than anywhere else and it is a problem," says Larry Ploski, General Contractor. “If it strikes, it’s probably going to create a fire in your attic or inside your walls. If that happens, where you get a strike, call the fire department.”
Ploski is a general contractor, working on interior remodels and home additions in Southwest Florida. He also happens to be a former science teacher. So when it comes to lightning, you can say he knows the difference between his electrons and protons.
“You get this negative charge up in the clouds and it builds up with this negative charge of electrons," he says. "The Earth has positive charge to it and like charges want to attract and it wants to pull those electrons from the clouds down to the Earth.”
There are solutions you can do around your house to improve lightning safety. One of those includes installing surge protectors for your electronics. Doing so will help reduce the chance any wiring is fried should your power go out. Which can give you peace of mind with your electronics.
“You can try to mitigate the problem by putting a lightning protection system on your homes," said Ploski. "Basically what that is are these small lightning rods which are grounded through a cable. What that does if your house does get hit by a lightning strike, it will go through the rods first. It’ll take the path of least resistance, go down through the cable and into the ground.”
And if you happen to catch yourself in the middle of a storm….
“Get out of the way, stay indoors," Ploski says. "It’s not a good idea to be outside, don’t be under a tree, don’t be out in a large open field area, try to find shelter. Stay out of it. That’s the best way.”
