The story of how lightning protection has been developing in Russia and in the world

The first studies of lightning and the development of lightning protection methods began over 250 years ago. Despite this, modern lightning protection still leaves many questions open. We asked Eduard Meerovich Bazelyan to tell about the history of lightning protection and some interesting facts from the work of the Laboratory of mathematical modelling of electrical processes (ENIN to the name of Krzhizhanowsky). The laboratory, now headed by Professor E.M. Bazelyan, was formed in 1936 and became a place of unique discoveries in physics of lightning and discharges, often accompanied by world records.

Learn more about the history of lightning protection from the video lectures by Professor Eduard Meerovitch Bazelyan!

Navigation through the video lecture:

№	Moment in history	Time code
1	The first scientific studies of lightning The middle of the XVIII century, the study of Benjamin Franklin and the reaction of Mikhail Lomonosov on these studies.	00:03:02
2	The beginning of studies on the physics of long sparks, (late 19th - early 20th century, the theory of avalanches by John Sealy Edward Townsend; the question of how a long spark channel was developing from the cloud to the ground.)	00:06:10
3	Studies of long spark physics in the USSR, (1930s, Gleb Krzhizhanovsky initiated the study of long spark physics; research by Ilya Stekolnikov, the discovery of a long spark leader)	00:07:55
4	Experiments of Vadim Stepanovich Komelkov Studies of long sparks, unexpected business trip.	00:12:51
5	The activities of the laboratory during Wold War II and the post-war time (The studies of lightning during World War II and after it;construction of a 3,000,000 V surge generator; the era of world records, creation of a pulse oscillograph, development of non-inductive cylindrical bridges, pursuit for the perfect current leader recordings, creation of a Russian electro-optical converter).	00:17:52
6	The activities of the laboratory during the late 1950s - 1960s Eduard Meerovich Bazelyan joins Kzhyzhanovsky Institute, a new level of the laboratory's operations, lightning simulation, studies of the result dependence on the voltage pulse front.	00:24:02
7	The leader mechanism of sparks and lightning	00:35:35
8	About the role of streamer zone and special charge sheath	00:37:02
9	The elementary theory of leadership	00:38:58
10	The history of Russian protection zones	00:40:05
11	About the way of lightning What way lightning "chooses": the short or the longer one? Krzhyzhanovsky's Institute statistical method development	00:42:17
12	Methodical bases of calculation of the number of lightning strikes into overhead lines	00:45:41
13	Recording of the number of strikes into the Ostankino television tower	00:47:06
14	Features of ENIN statistical methodology and its application	00:48:23
15	The study of lightning corona by Valery Ivanovich Popkov	00:52:14
16	Experiment "Triggered lightning" (about the charge cloud)	00:55:33
17	Research of corona discharge in an electric field of a thunderstorm cloud	00:55:33
18	Practical application of corona discharge studies About dissipation array systems that prevent the formation of a counter-leader and, consequently, a direct lightning strike into an object	01:01:10
19	What active lightning protection really does	01:06:50
20	Grounding for lightning protection About electrical fields and behavior of lightning current in the ground.	01:10:39
21	Collaboration between Krzhyzhanovsky's Institute, High Temperatures Institute of RAS and RF SRC TRINITY About the creation of a surge-current generator with the voltage of 2 mV and energy of 4 MJ, as well as studies carried out using this generator	01:14:07
22	The final word About lightning protection conference, standard documentation and urgent task of lightning protection, wish to the younger generation of researchers.	01:19:08

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See also:

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