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Why dont birds get zapped after landing on power lines2007-11-24 17:27:07

I'm sitting there at the bus stop and I started to wonder why birds don't get killed by a live power wire--channeling in 10,000+ volts of electricity.

Does anyone know?

Answers:

Its because they're not connected to the ground. The birds, because they're sitting free on the wires, don't get zapped. If they were like the workers who repair and reconnect the power lines, attached to the ground by a ladder, they would get fried as the ladder acts like a lightening rod and the electricity would jump from worker, through the ladder and straight to the ground. The reason wire workers don't get zapped is because they wear special rubber gloves that prevent serious accidents. If they didn't have the gloves they would be BBQ ed almost instantly.

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Because they are not grounded..

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cause they are not grounded,

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The wires are insulated, what the actual wire is is rubber around the copper wire part that transports the electricity.

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becuse you need bot paostive and negative, they sit on only one wire and they are ungrounded

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Some birds do get zapped. Large birds. They have to touch 2 wires at the same time, like when they take off from the wires, and their wings touch 2 different wires.

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I dont know. I see squrrels zapped all the time.

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they do sometimes.

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Said power lines are covered with a plastic material for safety purposes.

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their claws are special.

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They have to be touching something else at the same time other than the line they are on it has to be grounded as well meaning something that has a line going into the ground

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Its like this: