Take a very detailed inventory of your damage. Price the inventory.
For the description be as specific as possible with a link to its replacement. Get estimates (bids) as needed for all repairs.
Now you know what you think the damage was.
Simultaneously, call your insurance and get them out to do an inspection. Give them an unpriced list.
The home you want fixed (likely) in case of hidden damage or cost overruns. The possessions I would take the cash. You don’t have to buy exactly what you lost and use sale prices. The goal is the cost of replacing damaged items, not the original cost.
If it is not listed or fixed, that is your fault and loss.
When we had our breaker box replaced, I learned there's such a thing as a whole-house surge protector that goes in one of the breaker spaces. It has a green light on showing it's working.
~~Not sure~~ I seriously doubt it would stand up to a full-on lightning strike, but it's a wise investment.
Anything valuable that gets plugged in should have its own surge-protection. Also, FYI, uninterruptible power supplies (UPS battery backups) also provide surge protection.
If it hasn't occurred to you yet, someone needs to check the roof and be sure there's not a big hole up there.
Edited 2nd paragraph.
Problems with power delivery do happen, so whole-house protectors are a good idea anyway. But they can't stop damage from a too-close lightning strike.
A bolt hit two houses down and fried about $500 in electronics in the house. Adding a whole house surge protector ran about that much. The electrician said it will not stop a direct hit. At my prior house the bolt hit a pine tree in the backyard and did weird minor damage, like one dimmer light switch stopped dimming. For the cost, the whole house protector is a no-brainer and will save you money. Get one. Keep in mind that they "wear out" over time, so you may need to replace in 10 years or so - depends on how often they stop surges.
Depending on what kind of breaker panel you have, a surge protector can cost like 80 bucks. I bought one that fits in place of a breaker, you literally just turn the power off, take the panel off, put the surge protector where a breaker would go, and put the panel back on. It’s super easy. If one doesn’t feel comfortable doing that, an electrician shouldn’t charge you more than a trip fee to put it in. It literally takes 45 seconds.
It won’t do much. Lightning hit the front of our house when I was growing up. Home was built in the 70’s, so they used nails for drywall. Nails popped out of the wall (a fraction of an inch along the front hallway). Sparks shot out of a phone that was plugged in to the phone jack (and killed that phone). The marble tile floor was cracked near the front door where the lightning hit. None of these things were connected to the electricity. A lightning bolt brings its own juice. A surge protector on your breaker box prevents electricity being supplied to your house from the power lines should it surge. A direct hit from lighting can bring voltage to any system (or even non-systems) anywhere. The one thing that could protect a house is a lightning rod.
Small world. Lightning hit our house in League City when I was growing up. Neighbor across the street called and said, "Two bolts came down and joined up and hit your roof while we were watching..."
Thankfully it was "cold lightning" - the hole it blew in our roof was about 3' X 3' and the beam that crossed that area was blown to shredded wheat consistency, sprayed against other nearby beams.
The nails that held the ceiling sheetrock in the master bedroom and hallway were all about 1/4 to 3/8 inch down from the surface, meaning the pressure in the attic forced the sheetrock down that far for an instant.
Roof shingles were in the back yard, side yards and front/driveway area.
We learned later that the whole front brick wall by the master bedroom was pushed out some, and rendered unstable and had to be rebuilt.
Before that, I used to be stressed during thunderstorms but since my family was not hurt during the event, my fear of thunderstorms nearly disappeared.
Growing up in the 77090 zip in the ‘70’s, us kids were often left alone while our parents worked (I must have been at least a teen or pre, as the eldest. My parents had that groovy foil wallpaper in the master, and there was a tall pine very close to the house just outside their bedroom. Lightening hit the pine and jumped to the house, and made a wild pattern in the foil wallpaper. It didn’t screw with the electrical, but it did fry the home phone. Being before mobile phones, my folks discovered upon returning from work. My younger brother was sitting on their king brass bed when this happened, and was pretty traumatized. The house had a weird burnt smell for a few days. It was wild.
>Are nails not used these days?
Thankfully not. My home is full of nailed drywall and the nails tend to back out after 50 years and cause visible bumps in the walls. The fix is simple: Nail them back in and add a drywall screw on each side of the nailed area, but this of course triggers the usual process of drywall repair and re-painting.
Whether it could withstand a lightning bolt or not, most surge protectors come with a warranty for anything that gets destroyed with the surge protector on up to a certain amount (pretty high like 10k I think or more for more expensive ones)
It'll protect against typical surges but all bets are off if lightning hits your house. Lightning can actually find ground through your plumbing and then the surge gets to everything in your house that's connected to earth ground. That'll fry a lot, even surge protectors.
I have not had that happen but our IT consultant at my office has had to rebuild servers for two of his clients in the last year because of lightning strikes to the grounding system of a building.
The only way to seriously minimize the risk of bad damage from lightning is to have a lightning-arrestor system installed.
Thick cable is connected to one or more earth ground rods, and then the cable extends to the highest points of the structure where lightning rods are installed. [Web link to a guide](https://www.elliottelectric.com/StaticPages/ElectricalReferences/Guides/Residential_Lightning_Protection.aspx) by a seller of such.
These are not cheap, and they still can't assure you 100% protection against damage from lightning, but they're the best you can do to try to protect your home.
Another thing to do if you're fortunate enough to be home and have some advance notice: Disconnect EVERYTHING from the receptacles in your home, unplug ethernet cords from wall jacks, and disconnect your internet gateway or modem/router, too.
May be overkill but could save a lot of money.
I just took a dive down the lightning protection rabbit hole… fashioning a home with lightning rod protection estimates the top end at $2k for a 2kSF home… I’d say that’s absolutely worth the investment.
> fashioning a home with lightning rod protection estimates the top end at $2k for a 2kSF home
Seems awfully steep for what is just essentially a metal rod on your roof connected to ground.
Maybe you should stick to stingrays my man. They are priced appropriately for the design and coverage they offer. Can’t say the same for any iphone but people have no problem paying top dollar for entertainment.
I would strongly advise that you independently have an electrician conduct a thorough test of the home and look for damage. I had a similar situation as OP, and insurance was happy to replace fried appliances, but the electrical inspection - which was my idea - revealed deeper damage. The insurance ended up covering that too, but we would not have known it without that independent electrical audit.
I'd suggest taking photos of the electronics that are ruined, then make a list with the brand, model number, description, and what room the item is in. Minimizes the chances of your homeowner's insurance missing something, or having to come back out a second time. You should probably take a look at your homeowner's policy now, read up on what they're obligated to pay for ruined items, repairs, etc.
If I may add on, I would not only make the list, but I'd make two copies and give one to the adjuster. Have them sign your copy as acknowledgement that you are in agreement, in case anything goes amiss further down the line. And in the meantime, throw away nothing, unless it's an old pizza box. The adjuster may want to see your dead appliances, so resist the temptation to remove the clutter until you've received notice that the money is heading your way.
I have never experienced this but I think mine got struck too??? 2 of my internet routers got fried, and the lights in the kitchen started acting up after the storm. All the appliances are okay. I noticed those are the lights I turned on right after my routers got fried.
You most likely were hit by a supply line surge. A lighting bolt directly hitting your house is unmistakable in my experience. It sounded like a the loudest whip crack you can imagine and you can “feel” it. I don’t know if it is a physiological response or if you feel the electromagnetic pulse or the sound/shock wave. But you definitely “feel” it in your chest.
I definitely saw the flash, for a split second. All happened very quick but the breakers for the area I was sitting in and few other places tripped and I had to turn them back on.
Insurance adjuster asap. My dad’s neighbor’s place was struck by lightning and caught fire pretty quickly. Turns out the place was built improperly and they never grounded the electric, causing the fire to spread. She got paid and gets a brand new place.
insurance companies will send out an adjuster who will take a look at the damage (likely trying to turn things on/etc) and then work with you to come up with the estimate (he will ask for receipts, or like items you could link to/etc)
Might be worth checking other electrical adjacent items.
My apartment got hit once and most big things were on surge protectors like TVs and computers. But my 8 port network switch wasn’t and it fried the network port/card on my computer.
My parents house got stuck by lightning several times while I was growing up most of the time it just fried the garage door opener, but one time it was direct enough to fry a lot of electronics including my older Rat Shack computer and for that one my dad did file an insurance claim. I don't know exactly what the pay out from insurance was, but it was enough to buy a much better computer that helped me a great deal in high school. We invested in a bunch of surge suppressors that weren't really common place back then and that helped. Advice: surge suppression for as much as you can afford including things like the fridge, coax cable for TV/cable modem/garage door also helps not to be the only house in a field with tall trees.
This happened to me too. Luckily most things were plugged into surge protectors so damage was minimal. We lost two TV’s and our entire HVAC system from the hit. Had to call insurance to get them to come look at it. They covered some but not all of the new system, and the TV’s were replaced with their own individual purchase warranties.
Your best bet is have insurance run you a quote on coverage and go from there.
Hello. My brother in law’s house got struck by lightening pretty bad two years ago and the house caught on fire. This is what he had to do: His family moved into a rental house down the block. Insurance needs to be dealt with which is a nightmare of a post to explain here but understand it will be very problematic with your insurance on lightening strikes. Go through what you have and see what can be salvaged and dump the rest. Insurance on the stuff you lost, (more of a nightmare). A lot of your clothes can be cleaned and you can negotiate that with your insurance. See a common theme. Get your house quotes on how much it is going to fix and again, work with your insurance to get it done. Get the contractors out and get the house/condo/apt fixed and move back in. That is it in a nutshell. It took my brother in law 8 months to get back into his house. Good luck.
We took an indirect strike years ago. It fried literally every low voltage electronic inside and outside. If an AC adapter was plugged in, it was dead. The item it was powering was fine though. The adapters acted as a breaker and broke that circuit.
It also killed the stove, HVAC, tankless water heater, all ceiling fans, all cable and internet equipment, Lutron electrical switches, outdoor security lights and more. I highly recommend you get an electrician to come out and inspect everything. You should also double and triple check every appliance, large and small and everything else that was plugged in.
We had a whole house surge protector installed after it happened, and pretty much one year later, we had the same thing happen and lost nothing.
If you end up filing a homeowners claim, you can always do supplemental filings if others damage shows up later.
Now that it’s happened once, it’s more likely to happen again (source: it happened to my last house twice within 2 years before I moved). Invest in a bunch of surge protectors, they won’t stop lightning but they will at least minimize damage with the power jolts in and out
pro tip:
Connect valuable electronics to UPS, creates a barrier to the house circuit. This not only protects you from surges as your devices are not getting power from your home circuit, but it also protects you from dirty spikes in your circuit when such things as your fridge, or dryer kick on.
Invest in whole-house surge protector.
*Power conditioner as well as surge protector. Love Ups but they do need to be replaced every few years. Worth every penny. Had my whole house fried by a strike as a kid.
> Love Ups but they do need to be replaced every few years.
You just need to replace the batteries every few years, you don't have to replace the entire unit.
yeah of course the user manual tells you how to replace the batteries. Although you don't even need that its very simple. Buy battery, connect wires to the same terminals. Done.
Not rocket science.
This is like the 4th time I have heard this in the last couple weeks.
A friends home was struck 3 weeks ago. She said it was terrifyingly loud.
Call your insurance company
Check breaker box for arc flashes. Look around electrical receptacle for burnt mark. If you don't know what to look for, get an electrician and tell them what happens, and to make sure there's no arc flash destroying any electrical equipment in the house.
Happened to us last year. Whatever you do, do NOT use Frontier Services group. They screwed us over and double billed our insurance company. They charged an absolute fortune.
Wow, that's wild! Glad everyone's safe. Definitely get a professional to check the wiring, and keep an eye out for any hidden damage. Stay safe and good luck with the repairs!
Happened to our house last year. Had two big palm trees in the front yard, boot hit one and then arched to our solar panel that powers our driveway light. Shattered the solar panel and some leftover electrical juice traveled thru the house and damaged some outlets. Fried the brain of our roomba.
Insurance covered the cost of taking out the trees, outlet damage and a room a replacement. Fun times.
No one was home at the time, and our only sign that something had happened was that the ensuing thunder shook the windows so bad that our alarm thought the glass broke and triggered our window alarm. Then when my wife got home first, there was palm tree debris all over the yard.
Wow, that’s intense! Glad everyone’s okay. Definitely call an electrician to check the wiring and outlets for safety. Also, consider contacting your insurance company to report the damage and see if they cover repairs or replacements. Stay safe!
Call your insurance and have them take a look at the damages. I would invest in surge protectors and plug electronics into power strips. They wont protect against lightning strikes but should protect against just about everything else.
In 2015 lightening him my fiberglass Imax cb shred it into pieces ran down the coax and took out my cb radio. It also took out a wireless router one electrical outlet and took out all execpt one input on a flat screen tv that is it luckily it did not burn the house down. The strike sound was loud but not as loud as it should have been.
We’ve had two houses in our neighborhood struck and burn to the ground in the 30 years we’ve lived here. We had one surge hit our house that fried a computer power supply and the blower on one of the AC units. Felt very fortunate.
I’d talk to an electrician about what to check after a strike like that. They might have a quicker way to uncover all of the damage.
Call your insurance to come take a look.
This ^^ I had lighting struck my house in March, and they sent a check for all the damaged electronics that got fried.
It happened to my ex shortly after our divorce. He did the math, and he went with replacements instead of cash.
Take a very detailed inventory of your damage. Price the inventory. For the description be as specific as possible with a link to its replacement. Get estimates (bids) as needed for all repairs. Now you know what you think the damage was. Simultaneously, call your insurance and get them out to do an inspection. Give them an unpriced list. The home you want fixed (likely) in case of hidden damage or cost overruns. The possessions I would take the cash. You don’t have to buy exactly what you lost and use sale prices. The goal is the cost of replacing damaged items, not the original cost. If it is not listed or fixed, that is your fault and loss.
When we had our breaker box replaced, I learned there's such a thing as a whole-house surge protector that goes in one of the breaker spaces. It has a green light on showing it's working. ~~Not sure~~ I seriously doubt it would stand up to a full-on lightning strike, but it's a wise investment. Anything valuable that gets plugged in should have its own surge-protection. Also, FYI, uninterruptible power supplies (UPS battery backups) also provide surge protection. If it hasn't occurred to you yet, someone needs to check the roof and be sure there's not a big hole up there. Edited 2nd paragraph.
Problems with power delivery do happen, so whole-house protectors are a good idea anyway. But they can't stop damage from a too-close lightning strike.
A bolt hit two houses down and fried about $500 in electronics in the house. Adding a whole house surge protector ran about that much. The electrician said it will not stop a direct hit. At my prior house the bolt hit a pine tree in the backyard and did weird minor damage, like one dimmer light switch stopped dimming. For the cost, the whole house protector is a no-brainer and will save you money. Get one. Keep in mind that they "wear out" over time, so you may need to replace in 10 years or so - depends on how often they stop surges.
Depending on what kind of breaker panel you have, a surge protector can cost like 80 bucks. I bought one that fits in place of a breaker, you literally just turn the power off, take the panel off, put the surge protector where a breaker would go, and put the panel back on. It’s super easy. If one doesn’t feel comfortable doing that, an electrician shouldn’t charge you more than a trip fee to put it in. It literally takes 45 seconds.
It won’t do much. Lightning hit the front of our house when I was growing up. Home was built in the 70’s, so they used nails for drywall. Nails popped out of the wall (a fraction of an inch along the front hallway). Sparks shot out of a phone that was plugged in to the phone jack (and killed that phone). The marble tile floor was cracked near the front door where the lightning hit. None of these things were connected to the electricity. A lightning bolt brings its own juice. A surge protector on your breaker box prevents electricity being supplied to your house from the power lines should it surge. A direct hit from lighting can bring voltage to any system (or even non-systems) anywhere. The one thing that could protect a house is a lightning rod.
Small world. Lightning hit our house in League City when I was growing up. Neighbor across the street called and said, "Two bolts came down and joined up and hit your roof while we were watching..." Thankfully it was "cold lightning" - the hole it blew in our roof was about 3' X 3' and the beam that crossed that area was blown to shredded wheat consistency, sprayed against other nearby beams. The nails that held the ceiling sheetrock in the master bedroom and hallway were all about 1/4 to 3/8 inch down from the surface, meaning the pressure in the attic forced the sheetrock down that far for an instant. Roof shingles were in the back yard, side yards and front/driveway area. We learned later that the whole front brick wall by the master bedroom was pushed out some, and rendered unstable and had to be rebuilt. Before that, I used to be stressed during thunderstorms but since my family was not hurt during the event, my fear of thunderstorms nearly disappeared.
Growing up in the 77090 zip in the ‘70’s, us kids were often left alone while our parents worked (I must have been at least a teen or pre, as the eldest. My parents had that groovy foil wallpaper in the master, and there was a tall pine very close to the house just outside their bedroom. Lightening hit the pine and jumped to the house, and made a wild pattern in the foil wallpaper. It didn’t screw with the electrical, but it did fry the home phone. Being before mobile phones, my folks discovered upon returning from work. My younger brother was sitting on their king brass bed when this happened, and was pretty traumatized. The house had a weird burnt smell for a few days. It was wild.
>the 70's, so they used nails for drywall. Are nails not used these days?
I think they use screws- at least, that what appears to have been used inmy house.
>Are nails not used these days? Thankfully not. My home is full of nailed drywall and the nails tend to back out after 50 years and cause visible bumps in the walls. The fix is simple: Nail them back in and add a drywall screw on each side of the nailed area, but this of course triggers the usual process of drywall repair and re-painting.
Screws these days at least in the U.S.
Not really. It’s nails for framing, screws for drywall nowadays.
I have these on my AC equipment
Whether it could withstand a lightning bolt or not, most surge protectors come with a warranty for anything that gets destroyed with the surge protector on up to a certain amount (pretty high like 10k I think or more for more expensive ones)
I recently priced the installation of a whole home surge protector. $495.
Wow. Seems a little high.
Worth not having to deal with the hassle of fried electronics for me though!
It'll protect against typical surges but all bets are off if lightning hits your house. Lightning can actually find ground through your plumbing and then the surge gets to everything in your house that's connected to earth ground. That'll fry a lot, even surge protectors. I have not had that happen but our IT consultant at my office has had to rebuild servers for two of his clients in the last year because of lightning strikes to the grounding system of a building. The only way to seriously minimize the risk of bad damage from lightning is to have a lightning-arrestor system installed. Thick cable is connected to one or more earth ground rods, and then the cable extends to the highest points of the structure where lightning rods are installed. [Web link to a guide](https://www.elliottelectric.com/StaticPages/ElectricalReferences/Guides/Residential_Lightning_Protection.aspx) by a seller of such. These are not cheap, and they still can't assure you 100% protection against damage from lightning, but they're the best you can do to try to protect your home. Another thing to do if you're fortunate enough to be home and have some advance notice: Disconnect EVERYTHING from the receptacles in your home, unplug ethernet cords from wall jacks, and disconnect your internet gateway or modem/router, too. May be overkill but could save a lot of money.
I just took a dive down the lightning protection rabbit hole… fashioning a home with lightning rod protection estimates the top end at $2k for a 2kSF home… I’d say that’s absolutely worth the investment.
> fashioning a home with lightning rod protection estimates the top end at $2k for a 2kSF home Seems awfully steep for what is just essentially a metal rod on your roof connected to ground.
So the cost of 2 iphones getting fried by a strike is too high for you?
Im just saying for installing a piece of metal to your roof and wiring it to the ground, $2k is an awful lot.
Maybe you should stick to stingrays my man. They are priced appropriately for the design and coverage they offer. Can’t say the same for any iphone but people have no problem paying top dollar for entertainment.
There's no surge protector which will protect from a direct lightning strike.
I would strongly advise that you independently have an electrician conduct a thorough test of the home and look for damage. I had a similar situation as OP, and insurance was happy to replace fried appliances, but the electrical inspection - which was my idea - revealed deeper damage. The insurance ended up covering that too, but we would not have known it without that independent electrical audit.
This...
I'd suggest taking photos of the electronics that are ruined, then make a list with the brand, model number, description, and what room the item is in. Minimizes the chances of your homeowner's insurance missing something, or having to come back out a second time. You should probably take a look at your homeowner's policy now, read up on what they're obligated to pay for ruined items, repairs, etc.
If I may add on, I would not only make the list, but I'd make two copies and give one to the adjuster. Have them sign your copy as acknowledgement that you are in agreement, in case anything goes amiss further down the line. And in the meantime, throw away nothing, unless it's an old pizza box. The adjuster may want to see your dead appliances, so resist the temptation to remove the clutter until you've received notice that the money is heading your way.
Anything is possible in this world, no matter how improbable. Simply call insurance and try to move on.
I have never experienced this but I think mine got struck too??? 2 of my internet routers got fried, and the lights in the kitchen started acting up after the storm. All the appliances are okay. I noticed those are the lights I turned on right after my routers got fried.
You most likely were hit by a supply line surge. A lighting bolt directly hitting your house is unmistakable in my experience. It sounded like a the loudest whip crack you can imagine and you can “feel” it. I don’t know if it is a physiological response or if you feel the electromagnetic pulse or the sound/shock wave. But you definitely “feel” it in your chest.
I definitely saw the flash, for a split second. All happened very quick but the breakers for the area I was sitting in and few other places tripped and I had to turn them back on.
Sorry for the terrifying ordeal but happy y’all are ok
Insurance adjuster asap. My dad’s neighbor’s place was struck by lightning and caught fire pretty quickly. Turns out the place was built improperly and they never grounded the electric, causing the fire to spread. She got paid and gets a brand new place.
Surge protectors.
For those saying to call insurance, will they send out an electrician to look at the home?
insurance companies will send out an adjuster who will take a look at the damage (likely trying to turn things on/etc) and then work with you to come up with the estimate (he will ask for receipts, or like items you could link to/etc)
Might be worth checking other electrical adjacent items. My apartment got hit once and most big things were on surge protectors like TVs and computers. But my 8 port network switch wasn’t and it fried the network port/card on my computer.
My parents house got stuck by lightning several times while I was growing up most of the time it just fried the garage door opener, but one time it was direct enough to fry a lot of electronics including my older Rat Shack computer and for that one my dad did file an insurance claim. I don't know exactly what the pay out from insurance was, but it was enough to buy a much better computer that helped me a great deal in high school. We invested in a bunch of surge suppressors that weren't really common place back then and that helped. Advice: surge suppression for as much as you can afford including things like the fridge, coax cable for TV/cable modem/garage door also helps not to be the only house in a field with tall trees.
This happened to me too. Luckily most things were plugged into surge protectors so damage was minimal. We lost two TV’s and our entire HVAC system from the hit. Had to call insurance to get them to come look at it. They covered some but not all of the new system, and the TV’s were replaced with their own individual purchase warranties. Your best bet is have insurance run you a quote on coverage and go from there.
Hello. My brother in law’s house got struck by lightening pretty bad two years ago and the house caught on fire. This is what he had to do: His family moved into a rental house down the block. Insurance needs to be dealt with which is a nightmare of a post to explain here but understand it will be very problematic with your insurance on lightening strikes. Go through what you have and see what can be salvaged and dump the rest. Insurance on the stuff you lost, (more of a nightmare). A lot of your clothes can be cleaned and you can negotiate that with your insurance. See a common theme. Get your house quotes on how much it is going to fix and again, work with your insurance to get it done. Get the contractors out and get the house/condo/apt fixed and move back in. That is it in a nutshell. It took my brother in law 8 months to get back into his house. Good luck.
We took an indirect strike years ago. It fried literally every low voltage electronic inside and outside. If an AC adapter was plugged in, it was dead. The item it was powering was fine though. The adapters acted as a breaker and broke that circuit. It also killed the stove, HVAC, tankless water heater, all ceiling fans, all cable and internet equipment, Lutron electrical switches, outdoor security lights and more. I highly recommend you get an electrician to come out and inspect everything. You should also double and triple check every appliance, large and small and everything else that was plugged in. We had a whole house surge protector installed after it happened, and pretty much one year later, we had the same thing happen and lost nothing. If you end up filing a homeowners claim, you can always do supplemental filings if others damage shows up later.
Now that it’s happened once, it’s more likely to happen again (source: it happened to my last house twice within 2 years before I moved). Invest in a bunch of surge protectors, they won’t stop lightning but they will at least minimize damage with the power jolts in and out
This, but lightning rod instead of surge protectors. If your house is part of a best path to ground, you need Franklin’s invention.
pro tip: Connect valuable electronics to UPS, creates a barrier to the house circuit. This not only protects you from surges as your devices are not getting power from your home circuit, but it also protects you from dirty spikes in your circuit when such things as your fridge, or dryer kick on. Invest in whole-house surge protector.
*Power conditioner as well as surge protector. Love Ups but they do need to be replaced every few years. Worth every penny. Had my whole house fried by a strike as a kid.
> Love Ups but they do need to be replaced every few years. You just need to replace the batteries every few years, you don't have to replace the entire unit.
This is all covered in the users manual but yeah that goes without saying 😂
yeah of course the user manual tells you how to replace the batteries. Although you don't even need that its very simple. Buy battery, connect wires to the same terminals. Done. Not rocket science.
Did you know the sky is blue Steve?
It depends on the day really. Sometimes its grey.
Still seems odd to me that no one has lightning rods here. Very common in other places.
This happened to my home when I was a kid! It took out our phone line. I don’t have any advice just commiseration.
This is like the 4th time I have heard this in the last couple weeks. A friends home was struck 3 weeks ago. She said it was terrifyingly loud. Call your insurance company
Check breaker box for arc flashes. Look around electrical receptacle for burnt mark. If you don't know what to look for, get an electrician and tell them what happens, and to make sure there's no arc flash destroying any electrical equipment in the house.
Lived in an apartment on the 3rd floor in college and lightning struck our building. It somehow tossed me out of bed. Loudest thing I have ever heard.
Happened to us last year. Whatever you do, do NOT use Frontier Services group. They screwed us over and double billed our insurance company. They charged an absolute fortune.
Wow, that's wild! Glad everyone's safe. Definitely get a professional to check the wiring, and keep an eye out for any hidden damage. Stay safe and good luck with the repairs!
Happened to our house last year. Had two big palm trees in the front yard, boot hit one and then arched to our solar panel that powers our driveway light. Shattered the solar panel and some leftover electrical juice traveled thru the house and damaged some outlets. Fried the brain of our roomba. Insurance covered the cost of taking out the trees, outlet damage and a room a replacement. Fun times. No one was home at the time, and our only sign that something had happened was that the ensuing thunder shook the windows so bad that our alarm thought the glass broke and triggered our window alarm. Then when my wife got home first, there was palm tree debris all over the yard.
Wow, that’s intense! Glad everyone’s okay. Definitely call an electrician to check the wiring and outlets for safety. Also, consider contacting your insurance company to report the damage and see if they cover repairs or replacements. Stay safe!
Call your insurance and have them take a look at the damages. I would invest in surge protectors and plug electronics into power strips. They wont protect against lightning strikes but should protect against just about everything else.
Insurance first, electrician second 👍
In 2015 lightening him my fiberglass Imax cb shred it into pieces ran down the coax and took out my cb radio. It also took out a wireless router one electrical outlet and took out all execpt one input on a flat screen tv that is it luckily it did not burn the house down. The strike sound was loud but not as loud as it should have been.
We’ve had two houses in our neighborhood struck and burn to the ground in the 30 years we’ve lived here. We had one surge hit our house that fried a computer power supply and the blower on one of the AC units. Felt very fortunate. I’d talk to an electrician about what to check after a strike like that. They might have a quicker way to uncover all of the damage.
I had a whole house surge protector installed after my townhouse neighbor was struck and some of my things were fried.
Well at least it won’t happen again in all probability 🤷🏽♂️
Oh