In 1777, a fireball shot from the clouds on to the point of the lightning conductor on the Observatory of Padua. The conductor, which consisted of an iron chain, was broken at its junction with the stem. However, it sent on the discharge.
Some years later, in 1792, a huge ball of lightning struck one of the two conductors on the house of M. Haller at Villiers la Garenne. This conductor was much injured by the audacious assailant, and so was the framework of the house; the keen fluid had damaged the metallic gutters.
At this point I must add that lightning conductors are of recent creation. Nor would it be surprising if there were defective ones which could not assure an efficient protection.
However, much later, on December 20, 1845, the same phenomenon was observed at the château of Bortyvon, near Vire. There, again, the fireball, ignoring the danger to which it was exposing itself, flung itself on a lightning conductor placed in the centre of the château. It was spared, but the château suffered greatly. The electric ball descended from both sides of the metallic stem, causing a great deal of damage along its path. On touching the ground it expanded, and many persons affirm that they saw what was like a huge cask of fire rolling along the ground.
In truth, ball lightning seems in a certain measure to escape the influence of lightning conductors.
On September 4, 1903, towards ten o'clock in the evening, M. Laurence Rotch, director of the Observatory of Blue Hill (U.S.), happening to be in Paris, made the following curious observation from the Rond-point of the Champs Elysées.
Looking in the direction of the Eiffel Tower, he saw the summit of the edifice struck by white lightning coming from the zenith. At the same moment a fireball, less dazzling than the lightning, slowly descended from the summit to the second platform. It appeared to be about one yard in diameter, and to be situated in the middle of the tower, taking less than two seconds to cover a distance of about 100 yards. Then it disappeared. The next day the observer ascertained, on visiting the tower, that it had actually been struck by lightning twice on the previous day.
It is to be noted that the meteor did not follow the conductor; but, after all, is not the whole tower itself the most powerful conductor imaginable? Would not the enormous masses of iron used in its construction neutralize the attraction of the thin metallic rods, effectual for the protection of ordinary buildings, but incapable, one would think, of competing with the attractive force of this immense metallic framework?
Here are some cases where globular lightning has struck bells or telegraph wires, which it has followed with docility.
Several times it has been seen poised like a bird on a telegraph wire near a railway-station, and has then quietly disappeared.