Experimental studies of current distribution in stratified seawater under spark discharges

Abstract

The objective of this work is to investigate lightning phenomena that occurred on sea surface. This paper is focusing on observing discharge current distribution on seawater when lightning strike on seawater surface. An imitation of sea condition that composed of an electrode system of underwater electrodes and water surface electrode was developed and lightning phenomena was imitated using spark discharge. The experiment was done using positive and negative discharge. Discharge characteristics of tap water and saline solutions with different conductivity was observed by the mean of voltage and current waveforms, discharge condition and current distribution both on water surface and underwater. Discharge characteristics during positive discharge and negative discharge show almost same characteristics. Thus, only data for positive discharge are discussed on this paper.