On 9 Aug 2006 07:46:53 -0700, "z" wrote:


# Fred # wrote:
"Toller" wrote in message
...

"z" wrote in message
ups.com...
Catching up on Tivoed Monk episodes; episode from a couple of weeks
ago, the school gym teacher is murdered while showering at school by a
mysterious hand pouring water all over the floor, then dropping onto
the water on the floor a hair drier, which we have just seen the hand
plugging into a GFI.....

Even without the GFCI it would harmless; why would current flow up through
the body when it can just go through the water?
But it is just a TV show, and a comedy at that.


Looks like current divides between the water and the gym teacher assuming he
is touching something that is grounded like a faucet handle. Don't think
this could kill a normal person even without GFI.

No, the teacher steps onto the floor and zzzt. I never understood how
that was supposed to work in tv and movies in general. One wire here,
the other wire inches away, both sitting in a presumably somewhat
grounded puddle, a person several feet away touches the water and drops
dead. We didn't cover that in Kirchoff's Law class.

I don't know either, but I'm afraid to test these things. And even if
I did test it, that it didn't kill me wouldn't prove it didn't kill
someone else. What if I didn't feel any shock at all? Would that
prove something? Anyhow, my big question is about dropping a hair
dryer in the bathtub. How much damage would that to the person in
there?

Once when there was a quarter inch water on part of the basement
floor, I wanted to unplug the washing machine to plug in the shop-vac.
I dont' remember what I was wearing on my feet, if anything, but when
I grabbed the cord of the washing machine, I got a small buzz in my
hand iirc and maybe one or two otther parts of my body. This was
probably the time the water came from the kitchen upstairs, so the
cord was a little wet too.

Would a clean wet cord have caused this problem? I'm thinking the
cord was dusty, from 25 years of being there and never being dusted,
although I had unplugged and plugged it a few times, which would have
gotten some of the dust off, but none from the last year or two. So
maybe a dusty wet cord is more dangerous??

I got a shirt or something thicker and unplugged it holding that.

Isn't the washing machine supposed to have GF protection? I have to
check what breaker this outlet goes to, but I'd be surprised if he did
that wrong. Every other GFI thing is fine.