Ever wonder how birds perch on high-voltage power lines without getting electrocuted?

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Power lines may be safe for birds, but they’re deadly for humans. Here’s why…

In the movies or on cartoons, you’ll often see comical characters end up with an ash-covered faces and frizzy hair after coming into contact with a live electrical wire. But what makes for entertainment fodder is likely to kill you in real life, and it isn’t going to make for good television if they accurately showed what really happens to people after they’ve been electrocuted.

Still, the rules seem different for birds. Ever wonder why?

Birds have no problem sitting on the high-voltage power lines, as you often see among the trees and lining the road. As an attorney who litigates fatal electrocution and serious shock injury/death cases, the juxtaposition between humans and birds when it comes to high voltage power lines is an interesting one.

Why do birds and squirrels not get electrocuted, but humans do?

This has nothing to do with them being birds (and squirrels), explains Ranbel Sun, a graduate from MIT Electrical Engineering and Computer Science who teaches at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, in a blog post on MIT.com.

She says it’s all about the “connections” they’re making, or actually, not making. Sun explains that electrical current is the movement of electrons. The movement of electrons through a device, like your television, is what gives it the energy to display images and produce sound. She describes the long process these moving electrons take to get to your house:

“The electrons are essentially being pulled from the ground by the power station. They move through the power lines, through your TV, and eventually they make their way back into the ground from where they came.”

This creates a closed loop, which is required for electricity to flow. The other thing electrons need in order to move is motivation – more specifically, a difference in what’s called “electrical potential,” Sun says.

“Imagine lugging a bunch of bowling balls up a mountain. If you give them a path, the balls will naturally roll down the mountain to a lower position. At the top of the mountain, the bowling balls (which represent the electric current) have a high potential, and they will travel down any path that becomes available. When a bird is perched on a single wire, its two feet are at the same electrical potential, so the electrons in the wires have no motivation to travel through the bird’s body. No moving electrons means no electric current. Our bird is safe.”

But if the bird stretches out a wing or leg, and touches the second wire, it can open a path for the electrons to electrocute the bird.

Here’s the reason this doesn’t work the same way for humans, as our electrocution lawyers understand first-hand from our own cases:

The wood pole supporting the wires is buried deep in the ground. A person cannot touch the pole and a live wire suspended anchored high above on insulators, at the same time. Humans who are electrocuted are almost always in contact with a “ground,” as well as an electrical source. Our bodies are very good conductors of electricity, unfortunately, and the electrical current uses them to complete a closed path to flow from high potential (the wire) to low potential (the ground).

Then how do electrical workers repair live wires and power lines without getting hurt?

I recently wrote a blog post about the importance of drones in preventing electrocution accidents. Drones can take the place of humans in inspecting and maybe even one day repairing live wires, as it’s often contractors who are hurt while in the vicinity of power distribution conductors.

When humans from utility companies repair live wires, they use insulating materials in their clothing, personal protective equipment, tools (such as “hot sticks”) and bucket trucks. Insulating materials like rubber makes it difficult for electricity to flow. So instead of passing through the electrician or utility worker, the electrons stay on the other side of his or her rubber gloves or rubber-handled tools. Remember this for your safety: These are not everyday household gloves and tools, but are specially designed and manufactured safety “rubber goods” that are designed to protect against shock and electrocution. Do not ever try this at home, please!

Despite some safety improvements, working on power lines is still one of the most dangerous jobs in America.

Steer clear of any sort of electrical power lines, whether on a utility pole, floating above the earth, on the ground, or buried, unless you are a journeyman lineman and are experienced and trained to be around it. Your life literally depends on it.

And unlike the cartoons and movies, that is no laughing matter.

Jeffrey feldman

Author 
Jeffrey H. Feldman
Electrocution Lawyer

Jeffrey has tried more electrocution cases than most other injury lawyers in the country. He’s also secured several multi-million dollar verdicts and settlements on behalf of his clients, many who have lost loved ones in electrocution accidents.

5 stars

He’s an honest lawyer. If he takes on a case, it’s because he truly believes in it.

– L.B.