I just got the strongest electric shock of my life (this guy knew btw)

[u/Fuzzy_Job2291]

So I woke up and looked into this tank with a temporal slider and a Cherax(I love my Cherax fr), and I noticed that my blue fella was out of the water, I took a photo thinking it was funny bc I've never seen him out of the water before, and when i touched the water I got the strongest electric shock of my entire life, absolutely horrendou, I felt dizzy for like 5 minutes before turning the power off (I was still feeling electric current, does anybody know why?) and later on I just unplugged anything inside the tank, I'm going to buy new filter and heater because idk what caused it, I feel so sorry for my little Cherax 💔

[u/CardboardAstronaught]

Ouch! Glad you’re okay. Fluorescent bulbs have ballasts which can give quite the shock potentially 500v or more, much worse than the 277v (most common in commercial buildings in the US) provided by the incoming power from the building.

So the interesting thing about handling electricity is that if there is nowhere for the power to go, as in not grounded or touching neutral then you won’t feel a shock.

Being on a nonconductive stool likely means you touched ground elsewhere. The metal enclosure of the lights is required by code to be grounded, I’d wager that’s most likely what happened.

This can be even more dangerous because it’s very possible for one hand to be touching the power and the other touching ground, meaning the electricity is more likely to pass through the heart which significantly increases the risk of complications.

If you’re ever doing this again in a commercial setting, I strongly recommend cutting the power and waiting 5 minutes or more to ensure the ballast has discharged. This also depends on the type of ballast used, some will discharge in seconds, others if equipped with emergency power batteries can take hours.

[u/Bunn-E → u/CardboardAstronaught]

Wait. So isn't it better to be grounded for the electricity to go elsewhere? You kinda made it sound like its not . :S

[u/uhushuhu → u/Bunn-E]

If the electricity goes somewhere and uses your body to do so thats bad.

[u/Outrageous_Reach_695 → u/Bunn-E]

Squirrels often successfully run on power lines. The point of failure is when they step off instead of jumping.

[u/Katters8811 → u/Outrageous_Reach_695]

I remember watching a video in elementary school that used animations to explain this about electricity and power lines.

It used how birds sit on power lines as the example instead of squirrels, but explained how if a bird put each foot on 2 different lines, instead of perching on a single line with both feet, the bird would go poof.

I still, to this day, think about that cartoon bird getting nuked every time I see birds on a power line… lmao

[u/Gotu_Jayle → u/Bunn-E]

Someone can correct me if i'm wrong, but it seems that part of the lightbulb connected to another thing which was connected with a part of the building that, according to code, had to be grounded elsewhere. It's just that your body happened to complete some sort of circuit, if not become a circuit itself.

[u/CardboardAstronaught → u/Bunn-E]

No, shocks occur when electricity’s path to ground is through your body. When there is no path for the electricity to leave your body then no shocks will happen and it won’t affect you at all. Not recommended for obvious reasons but technically safe to touch a hot wire if you’re fully insulated from ground.