Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!att!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!purdue!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!srcsip!maitai!ferguson
From: ferguson@maitai.SRC.Honeywell.COM (Dennis Ferguson)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: Re: Touching a "hot" connector
Message-ID: <27515@srcsip.UUCP>
Date: 10 Aug 89 03:11:05 GMT
References: <248@sopwith.UUCP> <17660006@hpfcdj.HP.COM>
Sender: news@src.honeywell.COM
Reply-To: ferguson@maitai (Dennis Ferguson)
Followup-To: ferguson@src.honeywell.com
Organization: Honeywell, Systems & Research Center, Camden, MN
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In article <17660006@hpfcdj.HP.COM> myers@hpfcdj.HP.COM (Bob Myers) writes:
>
>>	It doesn't matter wether it's 120 or 220, They're both
>>	lethal.  It's not the volts that kill, it's the amps.
>
>
>Y'know, that last is said often enough that people are starting to repeat
>it as Holy Writ without actually understanding it.  Yes, it is the amount
>of current passing through the body (particularly the heart itself) which
>determines whether or not you'll just get a tingle, or wind up as a customer
>of the local coroner.... 

Actually, the problem with 220 and 120v is partially the 60Hz.  Most
electrocution deaths are the result of fibrillation of the heart.  The
60Hz current wrecks the timing to the heart... resulting in spasms
that prevent pumping action.  The tissue itself is undamaged.  Fibrillation
can also occur as a result of other circumstances and has been
induced in heart patients with very low currents (microamps).  The
classic recovery procedure is to use a dibrillator which applies
a *high* voltage charge across the heart, clearing the spasms and
restarting the heart.

I once worked for a power company as a communications engineer and
we had a technician go into a substation to read the serial numbers
off a capacitor bank.  He bent down to read the numbers and lost
his balance, falling backwards onto the capacitors.  The capacitors,
charged to 7500 volts, discharged through his body (the capacitors
were across a distribution line for power factor correction).  He lived.

Dennis