Lightning Climatology and Human Vulnerability to Lightning Hazards in a School Community: A Case Study in Sri Lanka using LIS Data from TRMM Satellite
Abstract
This study reported lightning climatology and human vulnerability to lightning in a 20 km × 20 km high-density school area in Colombo city in Sri Lanka from 1998 to 2014 using Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS) flash data of NASA’s Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM). An average annual flash density recorded over the study area was 9.43 flashes km-2 year-1. A maximum of 49% lightning flashes happened during the first inter-monsoon season. There were only 4% lightning flashes that occurred during 06.00-12.00 LT and during 18.00-24.00 LT, it was 67%, whereas 94% of lightning flashes within a day had occurred after 14.00 LT. It is recommended that, without having proper lightning hazard preventive measures, schools in the study area should avoid or minimalize scheduling their outdoor activities in high lightning risk months of April and November. Especially, after-school outdoor activities should be planned with proper safety measures during the aforementioned months as per the diurnal analysis. Moreover, May to September and December to February were the months with the least lightning risk levels. It is recommended to follow the proposed five-level lightning safety guideline which includes, schedule outdoor activities by considering the variation of lightning activities, follow the 30-30 rule whenever required, avoid staying at the most hazardous locations which are vulnerable to lightning accidents, crouching action if required and providing first-aid whenever necessary. Not only for the Sri Lankan context but also the study is crucial and highly applicable for all schools and other institutes especially in other tropical countries.
Keywords
Full Text:
PDFReferences
Aslar, A. K., Soran, A., Yildiz. Y., Yildiz, Y. & Isik, Y. (2001). Epidemiology, morbidity, mortality and treatment of lightning injuries in a Turkish burns units. Int. J. Clin. Pract. 55(8), 502-504, PMID: 11695067.
Curran, E.B., Holle, R.L. & Lopez, R.E. (1997) Lightning Fatalities, Injuries, and Damage Reports in the United States from 1959-1994. NOAA Technical Memorandum, NWS SR-193,64.
Edirisinghe, C. M., Rupasinghe, D. & Jinadasa, C. P. (2015) Design Methods of Lightning Protection Systems by Keeping Aesthetic View of Architecturally Complex Structures. International Letters of Chemistry, Physics and Astronomy, 52,126-133. https://doi.org/10.18052/ www.scipress.com/ILCPA.52.126
Edirisinghe, M. & Maduranga, U. G. D. (2021) Distribution of lightning accidents in Sri Lanka from 1974 to 2019 using the DesInventar database. ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf.,10,117. https://doi.org/ 10.3390/ijgi10030117.
Edirisooriya, K.V.D. (2019) Hazard Risk Assessment and Management Methodologies Review: Sri Lanka. International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, 9, 7, 857-864. http://dx.doi.org/10.29322/IJSRP.9.07.2019.p91110.
Gomes, C., Gomes. A. & Ahmed, M. (2015) Safety issues in regions with high lightning occurrence density. IEEE Scientific Visualization. 21, no.1:1-16.
Gomes, C., Hussain, M. A. F. & Abeysinghe, K. R. (2006) Lightning accidents and awareness in South Asia: Experience in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. 28th International Conference on Lightning Protection, 1240–1243.
Graves, R., Conover, S., Jones, H., Hardin, D., Harrison, S., Drewry, M., Nair, M., Goodman, M. & Blakeslee, R. A. (2009) Ten Year Record of Space Based Lightning Measurements, American Geophysical Union.
Groszek, K.A. (2004) Survey of Lightning Safety Policy in Selected High Schools, Master's Theses, Western Michigan University, Michigan.
Holle, R.L. (2008) Annual rates of lightning fatalities by country. International lightning detection conference. Arizona, USA, 21–23.
Holle, R. L. & Cooper, M. A. (2016) Lightning-caused Deaths and Injuries at Schools. 33rd International Conference on Lightning Protection, Estoril, Portugal.
Holle, R. L, López R. E. & Zimmermann, C. (1999) Updated Recommendations for Lightning Safety-1998. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 80, 2035-2041.
Jayaratne, K. P. S. C. & Gomes, C. (2012) Public perceptions and lightning safety education in Sri Lanka. 2012 International Conference on Lightning Protection (ICLP), Vienna, Austria. 1-7, https://doi.org/10.1109/ICLP.2012.6344316.
Jensenius, J., Bragaw, M., Holle, R. & Harris, R. (2010) School Lightning Safety Policies - A Look at an Incident at the Ocoee Schools in Orange County, Florida”. 21st International Lightning Detection Conference (ILDC) & 3rd International Lightning Meteorology Conference (ILMC).
Jeyanthiran, V., Edirisinghe, C. M., Fernando, M. & Cooray, V., (2008) Study of Lightning Activity over Sri Lanka. 28th International Conference on Lightning Protection, Uppsala, Sweden.
Lushine, J. B., Roeder, W. P. & Vavrek, R. J. (2015) Lightning safety for schools: an update. 14th Symposium on Education, Session 1.3, American Meteorological Society, San Diego, CA, 10 .
Maduranga, U. G. D., Edirisinghe, C. M. & Gamage, L. V. (2019) Spatiotemporal Variability of Lightning Flash Distribution over Sri Lanka. International Letters of Chemistry, Physics and Astronomy. 82, 1-13. https://doi.org/10.18052/www.scipress.com/ILCPA.82.1
Maduranga, U. G. D., Edirisinghe, C. M. & Gamage, L. V. (2018) Annual Variation Trend of Lightning Flash Activities over Sri Lanka. World Scientific News. 114, 256-264.
Mary, A.K. & Gomes, C. (2015) Lightning safety of under-privileged communities around Lake Victoria. Journal of Geomatics, Natural Hazards and Risk., 6,8,669–685. https://doi.org/10.1080/19475705.2014.922506
Ministry of Education of Sri Lanka, (2008) National Guidelines for School Disaster Safety, Ministry of Education of Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka.
Pédeboy, S. (2018) Introduction to the IEC 62858: lightning density based on Lightning Locating Systems. ILPS 2018 - International Lightning Protection Symposium, Shenzhen, China.
Roeder, W.P. (2010) Lightning Safety Procedures for the Public Private Meteorologist. 21st International Lightning Detection Conference (ILDC) & 3rd International Lightning Meteorology Conference (ILMC).
Schmitt, S. & Rousseau, A. (2016) Thunderstorm Warning Systems: IEC 62793 standard, 33rd Intl Conf Light. Prot, Estoril, Portugal.
Spengler, J.O., Connaughton, D.P. & Earnshaw, J. (2002) Perspectives on lightning safety risk management in sport and recreational activities. World Leisure Journal., 44(4), 22-29. https://doi.org/10.1080/04419057.2002.9674288
Statistics Branch of Ministry of Education of Sri Lanka. (2018) Annual School Census of Sri Lanka: Final Report - 2017. Ministry of Education of Sri Lanka.
Tong, C. (2008) Research and Application of Active Lightning Protection Technology. 20th International Lightning Detection Conference, Tucson, AZ, USA.
Uman, M. A. (1987) The lightning discharge. Dover Publications, 60.
United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Census of Population and Housing 2012 Key Findings. (2014) Department of Census and Statistics Sri Lanka, ISBN: 9789555779067.
Walsh, K. M., Cooper, M. A., Holle, R., Rakov, V. A., Roeder, W. P. & Ryan, M. (2013) National Athletic Trainers’ Association Position Statement: Lightning Safety for Athletics and Recreation. Journal of Athletic Training. 48(2), 258–270. https://doi.org/10.4085/1062-6050-48.2.25
Walsh, K. M., Hanley, M. J., Graner, S.J., Beam, D. & Bazluki, J. A. (1997) Survey of Lightning Policy in Selected Division I Colleges. Journal of Athletic Training, 32. PMID: 16558450
Yadava, P. K., Soni, M., Verma, S., Kumar, H., Sharma, A. & Payra, S. (2020) The major lightning regions and associated casualties over India. Natural Hazards, 101, 217–229. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-020-03870-8
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.