双语 | 揭秘：夏天到了，被雷劈是怎样的体验？概率有多大？

在网络用语中，我们常常会说“被雷到了”“天雷滚滚”“自带避雷针”等等，表示受到了惊吓。那么，在真实的生活场景中，遭到雷击会对人带来哪些影响？雷击中身体时会发生哪些反应？每个人遭雷击的概率又是多少？下面这篇科普文将为你揭开雷击的面纱…

For every 10 people hit by lightning, nine will survive to tell the tale. But they could suffer a variety consequences, both in the short and long term. The list is lengthy and daunting: cardiac arrest, confusion, seizures, dizziness, muscle aches, deafness, headaches, memory deficits, distractibility, personality changes and chronic pain, among others.

每10个遭雷击的人中，有9个能够幸存下来讲述自己的经历。但无论是从短期还是长期来看，他们的生活都将受到一系列深远而又痛苦的影响，其中包括：心脏骤停、思维混乱、癫痫、头晕、肌肉酸痛、失聪、头痛、记忆减退、注意力分散、性格变化、慢性疼痛等。

Many survivors have a story that they want to share. In postings online and during annual gatherings of Lightning Strike & Electric Shock Survivors International, they swap tales of their brush with nature’s brutal force. The group has convened in the mountains of the south-eastern US every spring since its first meeting of 13 survivors in the early 1990s. In those pre-internet days, it was far more difficult to meet other survivors coping with the headaches, memory troubles, insomnia and other effects of a lightning strike, says Steve Marshburn, the group’s founder, who has been living with symptoms since he was struck near a bank teller’s window in 1969.

许多幸存者都希望与人分享自己的故事。他们在网上发帖，参加每年的“国际雷击和电击幸存者组织”的聚会，互相分享自己与大自然洪荒之力擦身而过的经历。自20世纪90年代初，13位幸存者第一次组织聚会以来，这个组织每年春季都在美国东南部山区组织集会。该组织创始人史蒂夫·马什本表示，在互联网普及之前，幸存者们很难互相交流雷击所带来的后续问题，如头痛、记性差、失眠等。马什本于1969年在银行柜员窗口前被雷击而留下了一些后遗症。

The changes in personality and mood that survivors experience, sometimes with severe bouts of depression as well, can strain families and marriages, sometimes to breaking point. Mary Ann Cooper, a retired Chicago emergency physician and long-time lightning researcher, likes to use the analogy that lightning rewires the brain in much the same way that an electrical shock can scramble a computer – the exterior appears unharmed, but the software within that controls its functioning is damaged.

幸存者们所遭受的性格和情绪变化（有时还伴随着严重抑郁的发作）对家庭和婚姻会造成一定的影响，有时甚至是妻离子散。玛丽·安·库珀是芝加哥一位退休的急诊医师，长期从事于闪电方面的研究，她喜欢将雷电对大脑的重击类比成电击对电脑的干扰——从外表来看一切完好，但内在的软件功能却遭到了破坏。

Both Marshburn and Cooper credit the organisation’s very existence with saving lives, with it preventing at least 22 suicides according to Marshburn. It’s not unusual for him to field a call in the middle of the night and talk for hours with someone in dire straits. He is drained afterwards, unable to do much for the next few days.

马什本和库珀相信，这个组织存在的意义就在于挽救生命。据马什本称，这个组织至少使22人放弃了自杀。他经常半夜跟遭到困扰的人通电话，一打就是几个小时。事后他总会觉得很疲倦，接下来的几天都无法投入太多精力。

Yet, even after decades of research, Cooper and other lightning experts readily admit that there are many unresolved questions, in a field where there’s little to no research funding to decipher the answers. It’s not clear, for example, why some people appear to suffer seizure-related symptoms after their lightning injury. Also, are lightning survivors more vulnerable to other health problems, such as heart conditions, later in life?

然而，即使库珀和一些研究闪电的专家已经从事了数十年的研究，他们仍然心甘情愿地承认还有许多未解之谜，这个领域鲜有研究发现能够解释这些现象。比如，为什么有些人在遭雷击后会引发癫痫的相关症状？还有，被雷击的幸存者在之后的生活中是否更容易引发其他健康问题，比如心脏病？

Flashover effect 闪络效应

When someone is hit by lightning, it happens so fast that only a very tiny amount of electricity ricochets through the body. The vast majority travels around the outside in a ‘flashover’ effect, Cooper explains.

库珀解释道，雷击在极短的瞬间发生，只有相当微量的电流穿过身体，大部分电流因“闪络效应”从人体外部穿过。

By way of comparison, coming into contact with high-voltage electricity, such as a downed wire, has the potential to cause more internal injuries, since the exposure can be more prolonged. A ‘long’ exposure might still be relatively brief – just a few seconds. But that’s sufficient time for the electricity to penetrate the skin’s surface, risking internal injuries, even to the point of cooking muscle and tissue to the extent that a hand or other limb might need to be amputated.

相比之下，接触坠地电线等高压电则更容易造成内伤，因为这种接触时间更长。虽然这种“长时间”接触依然相对较短，只有几秒，但足以让电流穿透皮肤表面，带来内伤风险，甚至会烧熟肌肉和组织，达到截肢的程度。

As lightning flashes over the body, it might come into contact with sweat or raindrops on the skin’s surface. Liquid water increases in volume when it’s turned into steam, so even a small amount can create a ‘vapour explosion’. “It literally explodes the clothes off,” says Cooper. Sometimes the shoes too.

闪电穿过身体时可能接触到皮肤表面的汗水或雨滴，液态水变成气态水时体积变大，即使量很小也会形成“蒸汽爆炸”，把衣服炸开，有时鞋子亦会如此。

Chances of strike 被雷劈的概率

The popular perception is that the chance of being struck by lightning is one in a million. There’s some truth here, based on US data, if one only looks at deaths and injuries in a single year. But Ron Holle, a US meteorologist and long-time lightning researcher, believes that statistic is misleading, set out to crunch some other numbers. If someone lives until 80, their lifetime vulnerability increases to 1 in 13,000. Then consider that every victim knows at least 10 people well. Thus, any individual’s lifetime probability of being personally affected by a lightning strike is even higher, a 1 in 1,300 chance.

人们普遍认为被雷击的概率是百万分之一。如果单从一年的死亡率和受伤率来看，基于美国的数据，这个概率还算比较接近事实。但是，美国气象学家、长期致力于闪电研究的学者罗恩·赫勒则认为上述统计是误人子弟，便着手研究其他数据。如果一个人能活到80岁，那他在有生之年被雷击的概率能上升至1/13000。接下来还要考虑到每位遭遇雷击的受害人至少熟悉10位幸存者。因此，一个人一生被雷击的概率甚至更高，达到1/1300。

Holle doesn’t even like the word ‘struck’, saying it implies that lightning strikes hit the body directly. In fact, direct strikes are surprisingly rare. Holle, Cooper and several other prominent lightning researchers recently pooled their expertise and calculated that they’re responsible for no more than 3-5% of injuries.

赫勒甚至不喜欢“击”这个词，他说这意味着闪电直接击中身体。事实上，直接击中是极其罕见的。最近，赫勒、库珀和其他几个著名的雷电研究员汇总了他们的研究数据，并算出直接击中导致的伤害比例不超过3-5%。

If the lightning ‘splashes’ from something that has been struck – such as a tree or telephone pole – hopscotching to a nearby object or person, it is called a side flash or side splash. Considered the second most common lightning hazard, side splashes inflict 20-30% of injuries and fatalities.

如果闪电在直接击中某个物体——如树或者电线杆之后，跳跃飞溅至附近的物体或者人身上，则被称作“侧击”。侧击闪电是第二大常见的雷击危害，能造成20%-30%的伤亡情况。

By far the most common cause of injury is ground current, in which the electricity courses along the earth’s surface, ensnaring within its circuitry a herd of cows or a group of people sleeping beneath a tent or a grass-thatched hut.

到目前为止，最常见的受伤原因是接地电流，电流流入大地表面，可以伏击牛群、睡在帐篷中的人，或者是草屋顶的小屋。

As a general rule, men are more likely than women to be injured or killed by lightning; at least two-thirds of the time they’re the victims, and possibly higher depending upon the study. One possibility is work-related exposure. They are more likely to be on the younger side, in their 20s or 30s, and doing something outside, frequently on the water or nearby.

从一般规律来看，男性比女性更容易因雷击受伤或死亡，研究显示，这一概率至少为三分之二，还可能更高，或许与因工作需要暴露在室外有关。经常在水上或水边进行户外作业的二、三十岁年轻人也更容易遭遇雷击。

英文来源：BBC

编译：Janet、阿狸、YOYO

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