lightning stroke

yesterday evening lightning stroke near to our house. .. the house shook a little., but the light stayed on

Result:
1 one completely dead unifi 8 port switch 60W, it had no connection to the outside
2. two 8 port unifi 150W switches have lost POE on 4/8 ports
3. one 21" monitor dead.
4. one unifi external camera (in tree) dead, all other cameras (including 5 external) ok
5. one outside ethernet cable dead ( have to check what actually died)

All 25 RPIs, all MACs, all TVs, 23 other unifi switches/gw/cloud key/cameras .. survived
Internet - ATT fiber - did not blink.

And I am using ethernet surge protectors for cables going outside, like these

Screen Shot 2020-04-29 at 13.17.47.png (143.61 KiB) Viewed 1978 times

That was really bad (replacement cost $800 +) , but I guess, it could have be worse

Don't know what to recommend or do differently, but this can happen (like the tornado last year 1 mile away), just wanted to share

==> make backups and check if they work

Karl

We have so many thunderstorms here (and several BAD ones the last couple of nights, may have been the same system as it came in from TX) that I do worry about this. We've had numerous strikes within a mile of the house the last few years but have been lucky thus far. It is really nerve wracking when the whole house audio goes crazy (with no source) thanks to the lightning!

Anyway, I have seriously considered the whole-house lightning surge protectors that install in with the meter (by the electric company, obviously). Would only help from that one entry point, but better than nothing, I suppose. I think it is a monthly fee, though, rather than a purchase since it comes from the utility. Not keen on that, but if it saves any equipment at all, might be worth it.

That stinks. We have a lot of power outages here, but no big surges as yet. Our lines are underground which I'm grateful for.

We do have whole-home surge protection --it's a small thing mounted to the outside of the breaker panel. My understanding is that it will sacrifice itself to protect everything else. But I think that also means that we'd be without power until the thing was replaced (or by-passed). I don't know how good it is, but I'm hoping it's better than nothing.

Anyway, I have seriously considered the whole-house lightning surge protectors that install in with the meter (by the electric company, obviously). Would only help from that one entry point, but better than nothing, I suppose. I think it is a monthly fee, though, rather than a purchase since it comes from the utility. Not keen on that, but if it saves any equipment at all, might be worth it.

I'm suspicious about this kind of offer. The utility has an obligation to engineer their system to withstand natural phenomena (among other things). Asking customers to spend extra for a device that might compensate for their failure to build in accordance with good engineering standards just hits me wrong.

Disclaimer: I'm a recovering utility worker. Spent 39 years in the business, but on the bean-counting side., not the engineering side.

Hi Karl,

That’s bad luck.

I had some spare SFP and SFP+ connections available on my UniFi switch gear and looked at fibre - initially for speed but also for lightning protection.

Was really surprised at how cheap it was, and have divided network as much as possible with fibre across major areas. Some are 1GBPs some 10GBPs - but benefit is lack of conduction in event of lightning strike. (having said that wouldn’t project if comes in via power supply....)

Might be something to look into? Was a fun side project anyway.

Glenn


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