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Old 1st April 2004 | 20:58
  #12 (permalink)  
Waldo Pepper
 
Joined: Oct 1999
Posts: 23
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From: UK
126.9

Ah, but you made it home, didn't you?

I agree that lightning can be extremely dangerous, but the point is that civil operations lack the imperative of military ones...the primary objective is to get safely on the ground rather than complete the mission. It follows that military aircraft are likely to venture into skies that civil aircraft wouldn't.

As such, a well planned passenger flight would be unlikely to encounter the extreme conditions to which the USAF quote refers...should it do so, the chances of having a wing blown off are remote, though as you correctly assert, some damage is likely.

Since it's hard for me to think of many situations that would involve a civilian aircraft encountering the above scenario, I still think it's a bit fanciful, by which I mean very unlikely.
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