Can you Float During a Lightning Storm? – DSP 188

Certain areas are prone to particular natural events. Some more terrifying for float centers than others. Lightning storms come to mind. Because water is conductive and the last thing you want in your float tanks are electrocuted customers.

So, is it a bad idea to float during lightning storms or does it even matter? Graham and Ashkahn weigh in with a heavy dose of skepticism and repeated calls to consult with a professional electrician before making any big decisions.

Listen to Just the Audio

Transcription of this episode… (in case you prefer reading)

Graham: And we have a question.

Ashkahn: Great!

Graham: So, “Living in the Midwest, we have thunderstorms often. What are your thoughts on floating during a thunderstorm? My room has all of the required GFCIs on the electrical but, do you think I should cancel float clients during a storm anyway?”

Ashkahn: Alright, so we had to do a little research into this one, mostly because it turns out we are not electricians.

Graham: We’re not experts.

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: Hardly in anything! Like barely an expert in Graham-ology over here.

Ashkahn: I had thought that I had a degree, and was an electrician, but it turns out I have no idea how electricity works.

Graham: I just read that on the back of a cereal box at some point!

Ashkahn: So we did a little digging! We did a little digging into this concept and-

Graham: Asked our old friend Professor Google what was going on with this one!

Ashkahn: And I’m pretty sure we’re experts now, so here’s how it works! So we looked into a little bit, there’s a few things you should know.

Graham: Yeah. Number one, probably not. You probably shouldn’t float people during thunderstorms.

Ashkahn: And we’ll see, don’t just like give away the ending.

Graham: I want to, in case you don’t listen further, don’t do it! Don’t do it! You can cut out now, but we will give an explanation!

Ashkahn: Alright, okay. So there’s a few things that, if you’re building is built correctly into code, and your float tank stuff is up to you know-

Graham: Code?

Ashkahn: -snuff in regards to the electrical stuff.

Graham: Not experts! We’re not experts here.

Ashkahn: Then there’s a few things that should be going on in your building. One of them is grounding.

Graham: Grounding, big one, yep. Connecting stuff to the ground.

Ashkahn: Yeah! So-

Graham: I mean that is literally what you are doing, you’re just making a really easy path for electricity to flow through anything in your building to the ground. That’s a little like third prong on an outlet that looks like a mouth, if the two slits are the eyes.

Ashkahn: The grounding, yeah, the big tongue sticking out? Or you’re talking about the female end?

Graham: Yeah, the female end, yeah yeah.

Ashkahn: Yeah, so that’s the grounding prong. That’s what it’s called.

Graham: Yep, and that connects to, in your outlet there, a wire that actually usually connects to your building, which usually connects to a big grounding rod that’s going physically into the ground. So that’s why that’s called the ground, is that’s ultimately where the electricity is passing.

Ashkahn: Yeah, so theoretically your devices and float tanks should have that grounding rod connected to their outlets, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a float tank that doesn’t. I mean, most everything does nowadays, at least here in the U.S.

Graham: Right, and most buildings should be built to code, especially if you’re in an area that has thunder and lightning storms. Like they should be built expecting lightning to be around, which means stuff will be grounded. But, that ground can break, things can go wrong, there are issues that can pop up, even if during initial construction everything was set up properly.

Ashkahn: Yeah, there’s also like lightning protection that is usually code in buildings that you build into it. So they build, and this is about how much I know about it, but they build stuff into the building, like the outside of the building that-

Graham: Some serious stuff, too, not just regular stuff.

Ashkahn: So that if the building were to be struck by lightning, it would be okay. So that’s, yeah, hopefully your building it lightning proof. That’s another part.

Graham: Yeah! Wow, again, especially if you live in an area where there’s big lightning storms, like one would hope! Which, by the way, float tanks or not, you have some serious problems potentially springing up if it’s not. So that’s number one, grounding should be in place.

Ashkahn: And two, and lightning proofing.

Graham: And lightning. Oh, two, that was number two. Great.

Ashkahn: Number three.

Graham: Is bonding, is that where you were gonna go with number three?

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: Yeah. And so bonding is this idea of connecting all of your metal components that are around your rooms and your building. Electronic or not, things that actually have electricity passing through them, or things that are not supposed to have electricity passing through them, like a metal bench in your room, for example. And you’re connecting them all together with metal wire, or metal pieces, so that they’re kind of all part of the same electrical connection.

And this means that you hopefully don’t have this difference in potential between something that has a higher amount of electricity passing through it than another thing, which is actually when electrocution happens. So it’s this added level of safety, for both you and your equipment, making sure that you’re not going to cause unnecessary, again, like difference in electricity, which will actually cause the shocks, and the arcing, and stuff like that that you see.

I mean it is done on a building level. You actually bond all of the giant steel posts and stuff going through building. Like literally any metal piece of a building that’s built up commercially to code, and even residentially in a lot of places, I’m sure, should be bonded together.

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: And then on the smaller-

Ashkahn: The metal framing? The metal framing in a build, if you were to have metal framing.

Graham: Yeah, exactly, like the big metal pieces, you know, everything metal, really anything. Again, benches, yeah, internal workings of your building, what do you call that?

Ashkahn: The float tank?

Graham: No, no. It wasn’t float tank. What’s the big metal grid that you put down when you’re pouring a concrete floor?

Ashkahn: Oh, the like tension grid thing?

Graham: Yeah, yeah, like a tension grid, that should all like be bonded, as well. Again, anything metal, and that goes to smaller scale things, too. So your actual metallic pieces on the float tank, all the back electrical stuff, all of that should somehow be connected together to make sure that it has the same electrical potential.

Ashkahn: Yeah, like if there’s a metal piece of your filtration equipment, like an inline heater or something like that.

Graham: Yep, yep, yep, so bonding, again, very important. Hopefully, you know, especially setting up in a place that has lightning storms, this has been reviewed by your electrical inspectors when they’re coming through your building. This is something that they should know and be paying attention to, and forcing you to do.

Ashkahn: So theoretically, if all that was kind of up to snuff and you had everything set up correctly, you actually could be in a float tank while a thunderstorm is happening, and that doesn’t actually seem to be again, as far as we can tell, not an issue. Like there’s not like a huge safety concern while you’re in the float tank, unless-

Graham: And I should say, there’s other layers to that protection, too, before you get into the “unless.” Sorry to cut you off. You were like so poised, too.

Ashkahn: Super ready, super ready, but I’ll be ready when you’re done, so.

Graham: Unless. So the smaller scale is pretty much what our lovely question asker was asking about initially, which was they have GFCI in place, which theoretically, if you’re actually getting a surge going through the electrical connections themselves, towards the float tank, that GFCI when it has more amounts of electricity passing through it than it expects, will shut off that connection really, really fast.

And same thing, you know, not as fast acting as that, but also another fail-safe is your circuit breakers back at your breaker box, which will also turn off if there’s too much current passing through them. And, on a bigger scale, your actual full breaker box itself has kind of master breaker on there that will turn off if there’s even more electricity than the full panel can handle. So, some added layers of things, where even if there is current passing through there that’s more than should be going into your float tank, specifically because it’s a piece of electrical equipment plugged into a wall, these are the extra protections that should kick in there, too.

Ashkahn: So yeah, theoretically, floating should be safe, if you’re building a setup safely and correctly, with all of this stuff, you should be able to float during a lightning storm. And I’m gonna hold on to the “unless” for a second. We’ll get to the “unless” in just a moment here.

Graham: Ah, very tricky. Got them all teased there, too.

Ashkahn: So we looked up a little bit about pools, because they kind of also deal with people being inside of big things of water, and in an outdoor pool you definitely do not want to be swimming in a lightning storm, because the lightning could just strike the pool directly. It’s a big thing of water.

Graham: So same thing in an open air float tank, too.

Ashkahn: Yeah! If you just have a float tank set up out in a field, you know who you are, you shouldn’t be doing that during a lightning storm! But indoor pools, if they’re in a building that, like we said, all the stuff is properly done, and all the pool equipment and filtration system stuff is properly grounded and bonded, being actually swimming in the pool should be fine.

There haven’t been any reported cases here in the United States of shock, or injury, or death from electrocution of people being inside of indoor pools while a lightning or thunderstorm is happening. But here’s where the tricky part comes in. It seems like, from what we can tell from our internetting, that there is a potential danger of being around a water source in a building, like a shower or a sink that is connected, usually to like a metal pipe somewhere in the system, but also the water in the system can conduct the electricity, as well.

And there are actually reported cases of people getting shocked, or even electrocuted while showering during a lightning storm, because something, lightning will actually move through the water line, or through the metal of the piping, and while you’re like that close to the metal piping fixtures of the shower, that electricity could actually get to you and give you a spark.

Graham: So that’s crazy.

Ashkahn: Yeah! And there’s some info out there that says if you set everything up a certain way, it doesn’t happen. I read a little bit about that, but a lot of what I was reading was actually people confirming that that is, in fact, the case, and there are reported cases of it happening. Not many, and we’re talking like ten or 20 people throughout the whole year-

Graham: Which is like a tenth of the total people struck by just general lightning, so this is a very small, small risk factor. But the implications are serious enough where if someone was floating in your center, gets out to shower, there’s a thunderstorm going on, and they get electrocuted? That just sounds awful!

Ashkahn: And there’s just so many showers! You’re just such a showery business as a float center, the other piece of advice is don’t use a landline phone. That’s the other thing that it seemed like could actually shock you, but I don’t imagine that being there.

Graham: So you people with your landline, when you’re out in that big open field, you know. You know who you are.

Ashkahn: Like an actual wired landline telephone, if you’re still using those, be careful.

Graham: Don’t, don’t do that-

Ashkahn: Just buy a cellphone.

Graham: -in an electric storm.

Ashkahn: Probably, yeah. And okay, you ready for the “unless?”

Graham: I’m ready, yeah! Yeah, lay it on me!

Ashkahn: Here’s the “unless,” there are a few float tanks out there that are actually plumbed into the building. So, plumbed in and connected to the water system-

Graham: I didn’t even know that was what you’re, I thought you were going somewhere else.

Ashkahn: I know. I thought I was gonna surprise you-

Graham: You got me, too! I’m like riveted, go on!

Ashkahn: So like this whole idea of the float tank being safe in this scenario is because it’s not connected to the plumbing line, or all this other stuff that would potentially lead to that small case of being shocked. And it’s people in showers, people doing laundry, and people washing dishes are other examples of it actually happening to people. But because the float tank is a self contained unit, most of the time you’d be okay.

But there are a few float tanks out there that do actually plumb into the building, and connect to the plumbing, and in that case you might be in the same category as you would in the shower, or the bathtub. So you probably would not want to be in the float tank in those scenarios.

Graham: Yeah, and again, this idea of everything being set up properly is also an interesting one, because things that you thought were set up properly, stuff can go wrong with. Even if it actually was, you could think that something’s set up properly and it’s not actually. You’re missing some connection in your system you thought was grounded and bonded is grounded, but not fully bonded, or something like that, so.

I don’t know, it makes me nervous. Definitely if you go the direction of wanting to have your center set up so that you actually feel comfortable having people floating during a thunderstorm, then get a serious electrician to sign off on that, and say that they’ve actually done everything. Consult a professional, which we are not, is basically what I’m saying here.

Ashkahn: The theme of this show.

Graham: Well when you’re talking about death, I don’t want to be on the line for knowing what I’m talking about when it involves death!

Ashkahn: “So I heard it on a podcast, you know.”

Graham: “Listen to these intros and tell me these guys don’t know what they’re talking about!”

Ashkahn: So yeah, you know, I guess be careful. Here’s another thing I read-

Graham: Free advice from Ashkahn here!

Ashkahn: Just doling it out! It seems like it might actually be illegal to kick people out of your building in the middle of a thunderstorm.

Graham: Yeah, yeah.

Ashkahn: So if something happens and you get the floaters out, you just can’t close down shop and kick them out into the thunderstorm, be like, “Good luck!”

It seems like that there is actually a law, at least from some random article I read, that says you’re not allowed to close a commercial, indoor facility during a lightning storm, and kind of force people out of it.

Graham: And weirdly the safest thing to do, if an unexpected lightning storm comes up and people are floating, is to get them out of the float tanks and not let them shower, and also to allow them to stay inside your building.

Ashkahn: Sounds super reasonable, yeah!

Graham: Right, I mean, maybe you should have like a five gallon jug or something-

Ashkahn: Just always, always ready?

Graham: It’s not that hard-

Ashkahn: Like a pull cord that you pull and it like dumps on your head?

Graham: No, you just keep it, you don’t even need the prefilled with water. Or maybe you do, I guess.

Ashkahn: I mean yeah, I guess the scenario is a lightning storm starts happening while people are floating.

Graham: Right! And you’re not supposed to let them shower, but they should-

Ashkahn: Just keep letting them float. Just let them keep floating until it’s done.

Graham: What if that’s not totally safe?

Ashkahn: Well, because they’re connected in. Just don’t open a float center. I mean, that’s, if you really want to be safe-

Graham: No one wants to have to answer these kinds of questions-

Ashkahn: If you don’t want to have to worry about this at all, like maybe open like a hamburger joint.

Graham: But like get, again, it so much depends on what the construction of your building was when it was first made, not even what you did with your float center.

Ashkahn: Well I’m saying, this whole question is assuming everything is set up correctly. That’s what I’m taking away from the way they worded it.

Graham: The whole question was just assuming they had GFCIs! Like it doesn’t mention anything about bonding and grounding! So let’s assume they had GFCIs, I’ll concede that point!

Ashkahn: Yeah, so if you guys see clouds in the sky, just shut down. Cancel all your appointments, close down, go home. Don’t go in the shower in your house, or do any dishes or anything, and that should be good!

Graham: When you see clouds, shut ’em down!

Ashkahn: Yeah, that rhymes, right?

Graham: I tried, I couldn’t! You come up with a rhyme with “cloud.”

Ashkahn: When you see clouds-

Graham: Put on a shroud! Alright, if you have other questions-

Ashkahn: Probably send them somewhere else! This is-

Graham: Yeah, to an actual electrician. These ones are hard for us! Yeah, just go to floattanksolutions.com/podcast is where you’ll send in your own questions.

Latest Blog Posts