# Lights/Outlets No Longer Work After Thunderstorm



## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

Hello,

We have a few lights and outlets that no longer work after a big thunderstorm. I was home at the time when one of the lightning hit very close by. All the 15amp breakers tripped. I went to the main panel to reset all the breakers, but still some of the lights/outlets are not working. I don't know if they are on the same circuit or not. And the lack of labeling in the main panel is not helping either. So far, I have made sure that all the breakers are in the "on" position and checked/reset all GFCI outlets.

I thought one of the breakers might have been damaged. So I turned them off one at a time and checked the lights around the house. Each time the "off" breaker did turn something off.

Any other things I should be checking?

Thanks in advance.

Willy


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## fabrk8r (Feb 12, 2010)

Did you check the main disconnect?


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## fabrk8r (Feb 12, 2010)

I re-read your post and see that you did have some working after resetting the breakers, so it wouldn't be the main.

Do you see any burn marks or smell anything odd in the breaker panel?


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## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

Hello fabrk8r,

Thanks for taking time to reply. I did smell something burning when the lightning hit, but couldn't find out exactly where the smell was coming from. When I went to put the tripped breakers back on, I did not notice any smell coming from the panel.

Willy


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## joed (Mar 13, 2005)

Are you sure there is not a GFCI somewhere? Where are the receptacles located?


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## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

Hello Joed,

Thanks for replying.

The locations:

1. two of the outlets in living room, on adjacent walls
2. two of the outlets in family room, on adjacent walls, near living room
3. one of the outlets in my son's bedroom, directly above family room
4. one of the outlets in guest room, directly above family room
5. two of the outlets in master bedroom
6. one light in walk-in closet in master bedroom
7. both light and fan in master bathroom

Yes, I am quite sure that I checked all the GFCI outlets. All the outlets in all the bathrooms and kitchen are working.

Willy


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## fabrk8r (Feb 12, 2010)

Do you have any outside receptacles?


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## HooKooDooKu (Jan 7, 2008)

If I'm understanding you correctly, only SOME of the outlets on a given circuit are not working. That combined with circuit breakers tripping sounds like you might have sustained a lightning strike. I'm thinking that's where fabrk8r is going with asking about outside outlets. Even if you don't have any exposed outside outlets, you most likely have some outside lights that might have been a path for lightning to get in the house (that's what happened to an apartment we used to live in).

I would suggest cutting power to one of the rooms, say master bedroom, and remove the coverplate from one of the outlets that is not working and see if you can find some obvious damage. The other thing to do is check your outdoor outlets and lights and any other metal things connected to the house looking for a possible entry point for a lightning strike. Even if the main bolt of a lightning strike didn't hit your house, there is the possibility that one of the side forks of a lightning strike did.


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## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

fabrk8r, yes. There is one outlet outside near the front door, and one near the AC unit in the back.

HooKooDooKu, thanks. I will check the outlets for damage.
I already had to replace the phone line from the NID to the house. The main coax splitter for cable TV died. My cable modem and router both died. Directv receiver still says no signal found. Sigh....


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## fabrk8r (Feb 12, 2010)

If the outside receptacles are GFCI, make sure they are reset and then recheck the outlets in the house that weren't working previously.


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## joed (Mar 13, 2005)

None of those circuits are normally GFCI. So I will agree GFCI is probably not the problem.
I would start opening the dead outlets. Start with the ones closest to the panel. Problem could be in working devices as well. Wires are usually installed a sequential order. Try to figure out where the next closest device is to the panel that could possibly feed the dead circuits and check it out as well. 

I don't like the burning smell you describe. I have never seen lightning damage but it can be very unpredictable. There could be major unseen damage. This might be worth an insurance claim. The entire house could need to be rewired.


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## jbfan (Jul 1, 2004)

Last strike close to my house took out all my gfci's, my phone, my broiler element, my cable and 3 tries on my stepson's car, and the big tree 100 foot from the house.


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## oh'mike (Sep 18, 2009)

You have lost enough circuits to suggest that the house may have lost one leg of the power coming into the box.

Open your panel (if you feel safe doing this) and test the two leads going into the main breaker,

Your house actually has two different 110 lines powering the box--test each line to a neutral -each should read 110 volts.

then test the two lines to each other--it should read 220 volts

If they are o.k. test the output of each breaker---if they are o.k. 

using the tester --got o the 'bad' outlets--test the power(the smaller slot) to the neutral(larger slot)--then test the power to a ground-(the box or cover plate screw)

If you get a 110 reading off the ground but not the neutral slot --you know the neutral is faulty.


O.K. sparkies--Have I steered him right?---Mike---


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## AllanJ (Nov 24, 2007)

Have you been able to identify:
1. Circuits where everything (receptacles, lights) still works?
2. Circuits where nothing works?
3. Circuits where some things work and some things don't?

If you lost one of the two power legs, then you would have all the dead circuits arranged in some pattern on the panel, for example all the odd rows of breakers.


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## joed (Mar 13, 2005)

The OP has stated


> So I turned them off one at a time and checked the lights around the house. Each time the "off" breaker did turn something off.


It appears only partial circuits are out not multiple entire circuits.


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## AllanJ (Nov 24, 2007)

The most likely connection to be broken after a lightning strike is where a wire connects to a switch or receptacle and when such a joint is backstabbed (push in and it sticks). This may be at the first dead receptacle or the last working receptacle in the daisy chain.

It is just tedious to go looking for them.

But this is sometimes accompanied by a melt-through that could be anywhere in the dead section, including in the middle of a cable inside the wall.

You may identify the presence of although not the exact location of such a melt through by unplugging everything from the circuit, turning off that circuit's breaker, and checking for continuity between hot and neutral, and between hot and ground, at a receptacle that was dead. Getting continuity means there is a problem (and you will get a breaker tripping short when you find and fix the original loose connection) although no continuity does not mean that there is no problem.


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## Jim Port (Sep 21, 2007)

AllanJ said:


> If you lost one of the two power legs, then you would have all the dead circuits arranged in some pattern on the panel, for example all the odd rows of breakers.


Normally every other vertical breaker is on the opposite leg of the breaker above or below it. Breakers across from each other are on the same leg.


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## boman47k (Aug 25, 2006)

Jim Port said:


> Normally every other vertical breaker is on the opposite leg of the breaker above or below it*. Breakers across from each other are on the same leg*.


 
Sure about that? I'm thinking just the opposite for breaker panels.

As far as checking both leads at the panel, checking your 220 outlets would give a *hint* as to the possibility of one being dead. Be safer too than prowling around inside the panel, not to mention less trouble.


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## Jim Port (Sep 21, 2007)

Yes, I am sure about the buss fingers. If you interlace your fingers you will have an arrangement similar to the buss fingers in a panel. This is how a 240 volt load picks up from both legs of the panel. Example leg hand is leg a, right hand is leg b. Legs a and b together = 240 volts.


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## HooKooDooKu (Jan 7, 2008)

Jim has it right.

From what I recall in my GE panel, there are not two sets of tabs (one for the left, one for the right). Instead, when you look inside the panel (with all breakers removed) you see a single column of tabs down the center of the panel. The tabs are sized such that a breaker on the left and a breaker on the right can fit on the same tab. To get the interlaced "fingers" so that you can have the 240v breakers, the center tab is alternately fed from the left or right leg.

So ROWS of breakers alternate legs, but two breakers on the same row are on the same leg.


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## joed (Mar 13, 2005)

Panel buss bar layout depends on the panel. Some panels will be ABABABAB down each side. Some are ABBAABBAAB down each side.


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## boman47k (Aug 25, 2006)

OKay, I'm gonna have go out and check an older box I have. We may just being a communication breakdown.


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## boman47k (Aug 25, 2006)

Jim Port said:


> Yes, I am sure about the buss fingers. If you interlace your fingers you will have an arrangement similar to the buss fingers in a panel. This is how a 240 volt load picks up from both legs of the panel. Example leg hand is leg a, right hand is leg b. Legs a and b together = 240 volts.


 
I absolutely stand corrected. I am not an electrician per se, but I don't know what I was thinking. I was picturing the interlacing of the buss bar, just was not thinking correctly. I should have known better. I should have just thought of a 220 breaker. I may have been thinking too far back to the old fuse boxes. 
Now, I am not even sure about that.


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## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

*Let There Be Light...!!!*

Hello and thank you all who replied to my issue. I had some time over the weekend and finally figured out what it was. AllanJ had it exactly correct. The first outlet on the circuit was wired in series, using the push-in connection on the back of the outlet. The hot wire that feeds the rest of the circuit popped out of the outlet. I also noticed that the two neutral screws turned black, like they had been burnt. The outlet itself was working, so I never suspected that it was the issue. I replaced the outlet and re-connected the wires (to the screws this time). Electricity's back to the master bedroom.

I went through all the rest of the working outlets in the house and found another outlet on a different circuit that had the exact same issue. Replaced and the rest of the broken lights/outlets all came back.

Thank you again to all.

Willy


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## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

Actually, this leads me to a bunch of questions that have been puzzling me.

1. Aren't circuit breakers supposed to prevent wires/outlets from being damaged?

2. My phone line is grounded at the NID and the lightning damaged the telephone wires inside the house. Do people put surge protectors on their phone lines at the point where the wire enters the house?

3. How about coax (for cable tv & internet) lines? The wire is grounded right before entering the house also. The lightning was able to damage my cable modem, router, ps3, and xbox360. They still power up, but the ethernet ports on them are now all dead.

4. The Directv receiver can no longer detect a signal. I dug up an old one and it finds the signal ok. The coax lines connect the dish to a grounding block right after entering the house, then from the grounding block to the receiver. How could lightning have damaged the receiver?

Any recommendations to prevent these from happening, if I get hit by the "lottery" again? :laughing:

Thank you.

Willy


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## HooKooDooKu (Jan 7, 2008)

leungw said:


> 1. Aren't circuit breakers supposed to prevent wires/outlets from being damaged?


Circuit breakers are designed to cut power when they detect too much current flowing through a 120v/240v circuit. Generally that's limited to circuits with too many devices connected to it, or something going wrong that shorts a hot to ground (faulty equipment/wiring, cutting a live wire, etc).

Circuit breakers are NOT designed to handle the sort of power associated with lightning. A bolt of lightning can easily have 30,000 to 120,000 amps of current, generate temperatures three times hotter than the surface of the sun. While I couldn't find an exact number for voltage associated with lightning, it's high enough to break down the resistance of air (which is on the order of requiring about a million volts per meter).

I guess I would equate a circuit breaker facing a lighting strike to a person wearing a bullet proof vest facing a nuclear blast.


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## leungw (Apr 20, 2009)

HooKooDooKu said:


> I guess I would equate a circuit breaker facing a lighting strike to a person wearing a bullet proof vest facing a nuclear blast.


I see. Thanks again for taking time to reply. And I like your comment very much. :laughing:


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