Grounding A Boat On A Lift?

[grady33]

It's storming here in Ocean City MD and I was looking out the window at my boat on a lift and have what I think is a good question. If a boat is totally out of the water on a lift, how is it grounded and what would happen if lightning struck it or one of the outriggers? With 210 gallons or so of fuel on board, would one be looking at a fireball?

Are boats really grounded when in the water or is that something boat owners are told to make us feel better?

 

[ocnslr]

We had some really strong thunderstorms move through here on July 4th. Most of the local fireworks were cancelled.

A GW 222 in a lift at our dock had a direct hit on the VHF antenna.

The current passed through the console structure, destroying all the electronics and the electrical distribution - breakers blew apart - and then down into the lower structure. Seeking a path the ground, the current "created" two exit paths to the aft aluminum "I" beam on the lift cradle. Here is the "exit" on the port side:

Our boat was in our slip, about 60-ft away, and suffered a good bit of electronics damage from an EMP-induced voltage in the NMEA2K bus.

Not sure if this answers your question, but it certainly gives an indication of what can happen.

Brian

 

[grady33]

Wow. I'm wondering if there is anyway to ground the boat and prevent this type of damage. At least the boat didn't catch fire. We were fishing the WMO a few years back when a squall blew up and lightning struck a Cabo next To us. Heard a breaker got fried and some wiring but everyone was ok.

 

[StriperMan]

I keep my Marlin on a lift off the Pax. River in Solomons, MD. Two years ago my boat got hit by a discharge of electrical energy from a lightning strike which hit a tree over 100 ft. away from my lift. Wiped out items on both AC/DC side of the panel. What items that survived the initial discharge started failing over the next year.

Took about 18 months to finally replace the items as they failed. Fortunately Boat US let me keep the claim open, received my last payment this past April. I would be interested if you find a solution to grounding your boat while on your lift.

 

[ahill]

There is a great article on lightning protection in a Power & Motor Yacht magazine a few years ago.
Log on to PMY & search "Farraday Cage".
Its very illuminating.

 

[CWOT]

when cruising we attached battery jumper cables to the shrouds on our sailboat when lightning was hitting around us. The idea was the lightning would take that path and exit into the water, I don't know if it worked but we went through a lot of storms without any damage.

we have our power boat on a lift now, I will not go near it with lightning striking near us.
the lift is a big metal thing saying "here I am".

 

[alfa1023]

Tagging along on wanting a solution to this. Living in the Tampa Bay area - often referred to (at least around here) as the lightning capital of the world - finding a way to prevent having a hole blown through the bottom of the boat (whether covered by insurance or not) would be of great interest around here.

 

[res1xhxc]

Hi, I am Jake in Tampa. We have some lively T-Storms around here and my Marlin was visited by lightning this season. So far damage has been minimal: one ECU on my twin F250's and a complete ignition replacement. I am still attempting to trace down an electrical problem in the gages. They only work intermittently. All connections, readily accessable, are good. Looks like a long process... any suggestions? :hmm