What would happen if a lightning hit your car
What would happen if a lightning hit your car
Over the years there were some reports about lightning hitting cars. Most of the time driver and passengers were not injured. In rare cases the engine exploded, and some times passengers were electrified due touching metal parts of their car.
If you are not an electrical engineer or a physicist you must be thinking how people don't get injured when their car gets hit by lightning. Its because of Faraday's cage. Faraday's cage is a hollow conductor, in which the charge remains on the external surface of the cage. So while you are in a car, you are inside of a Faraday's cage.
Faraday's cage also stops radio waves, that is the main reason why we use car antennas. Smart phones don't need external antennas but have very small ones inside. Just remember next time you are driving in a storm that lightning won't kill you bit it may break your car.
I'm not an electrician or scientist but the car and occupants are not in danger because of the tyres. The car is not earthed and therefore the electrical charge doesn't conduct to the earth.
I am an electrical engineer and i know this stuff. Air doesn't conduct current and than we have lighting. At high enough voltage even a dielectric like air or rubber can conduct electricity. I hope I made it clear.