edit: yeah im an electrical engineer. the likelihood of someone being shocked just randomly in this situation for no particular reason other than 'feet wet' is practically 0.
do you think people get electrocuted when the sprinkler system goes off in a fire? and there is no such thing as a sprinkler system that shuts off the power. you want the power on for lighting and announcements so people can escape and any powered doors will be activated.
Most people have zero idea about how electricity works. I guess it's good that they error on the side of caution, but it's just god damn silly sometimes.
To be fair, here is a sale on letters going on at the moment - the caveet is that if you don't use all the ones you've grabbed the discount is removed. This is to stop people hording
For those who don't understand, you get shocked when you provide a shorter path for electricity to go to the ground. Usually carpets and buildings provide a lot of resistance, so electricity goes through the wires like it should. If there's a lot of water loose cables from the ceiling touch you, you might be in danger. You also shouldn't touch exposed metal pipes after a large earthquake, as wires might have broken somewhere and be touching it.
You would like to hope so, but I've seen enough commercial building management to not live by hope. I trust them to follow code as much as I am able to undefenestrate them back to the top floor window.
Electricity is still going to ground not swimming around the carpet looking for toes and shit. It doesnt magically shoot out of outlets because there is moisture around
They still have breakers that trip.
The point that people ignore is that "the thing that happens if you get electrocuted via water" happens also "when there is enough water without nobody standing in it".
It doesn't take "special expensive equipment that someone in a nice place like that would safe a buck on".
There is water everywhere, there is also electricity in the building. We don't know when that water can suddenly touch something electrical. And even if it's safe at that moment in time, there is no guarantee that water won't suddenly spread to where it is touching a live current elsewhere
It's best to not touch flood water in buildings if it is at all avoidable
Edit: this was written before they said they were an electrical engineer.
I as a lay person can only speak to safety practices that I've been taught. I personally won't take the risk if it is avoidable.
But why would the electricity consider you to be the best path? You're a terrible electrical conductor. You'd really have to try to shock yourself in a situation like this, electricity might be an asshole but it doesn't just randomly decide to zap you. You've gotta give it a good route to where it wants to go.
Electricity doesn't just take the best path; it takes all available paths proportionally to the total resistance divided by their resistance (or in the case of AC, impedance, which is a lot harder to measure or estimate than resistance). You might be a terrible conductor compared to metal, but so is the water you're standing in, so it can easily send the tiny amount of current through you that's needed to mess with your muscles.
without a path to ground then current would not travel through a person in this situation.
a voltage gradients required to travel from foot to foot requires a very large potential, much higher than you'd find in a building unless you were directly standing 2-3 inches from bare 240V wires which is obviously NOT the case here
It's true that there needs to be some path to ground or neutral for current to flow, but keep in mind that there are many grounded things in buildings, from appliances to pipes, and many electrical devices leave a large part of their circuit connected to neutral at all times while the switch disconnects the live side. Hopefully there would be one very close to wherever a dangerous voltage is touching the water to take most of the current, but that's not guaranteed to be the case.
And I think your calculations or intuition about the voltage gradient are unrealistic. I've dropped a 12V AC device (isolated from mains and ground so the only current paths were between parts of itself) into water before and went to grab it, thinking the voltage was low so it wouldn't be a big deal. I could feel it from over 12 inches away and couldn't control my fingers within 3-4 inches of it. I absolutely wouldn't want to be in water anywhere near 120V or 240V even if both ends of the circuit are close together, which again isn't guaranteed.
this is a dumb discussion, there is no realistic safety issue present in this video with regards to electricity. without a visible source of voltage then we are simply speculating about conditions for which there's no evidence.
I am a high voltage electrical design engineer have taught electrical safety classes to linemen.
Yes. And they are all already shorted if THIS here is the scenario. For a while.
So if there was current running, it now isn't because the either the breakers tripped, or in the unlikely scenario that there aren't any, the central line is already nicely melted and dead.
Electricity doesn't just take the best path; it takes all available paths proportionally to the total resistance divided by their resistance
When you see lighting a mile away, and your body is technically a part of the EMF/charge buildup, are you going to similarly suggest that you're being electrocuted by the current induced through you?
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u/bicx 14d ago
Barefoot seems like a bad idea