I have heard that an electrical ark can kill you so I would like to know what circumstances creares this condition.
You mean an electrical arc. That's what happens when there is a short circuit. Electricity flows through air, ionizing the air. There is a flash, noise, and a physical blast. More appropriately, the arc projects an enormous amount of heat that can cause severe burns to nearby unprotected skin. Industry has evolved a set of practices to quantify the thermal energy generated by arc flash, and to prescribe the protective clothing that personnel must have in order to work on energized equipment.
*An electric arc is an electrical breakdown of a gas which produces an ongoing plasma discharge, resulting from a current flowing through normally nonconductive media such as air. A synonym is arc discharge. Undesired or unintended electric arcing can have detrimental effects on electric power transmission and distribution systems and electronic equipment. Devices which may cause arcing include switches, circuit breakers, relay contacts, fuses and poor cable terminations. When an inductive circuit is switched off the current cannot instantaneously jump to zero; a transient arc will be formed across the separating contacts. Switching devices susceptible to arcing are normally designed to contain and extinguish an arc, and snubber circuits can supply a path for transient currents, preventing arcing. If a circuit has enough current and voltage to sustain an arc formed outside of a switching device, the arc can cause damage to equipment such as melting of conductors, destruction of insulation, and fire. An arc flash describes an explosive electrical event that presents a hazard to people and equipment. *An arc-fault occurs when loose or corroded connections make intermittent contact and causes sparking or arcing between the connections. This translates into heat, which will break down the insulation of the wire and can be the trigger for an electrical fire. Unlike a short circuit, that is a hot wire coming into contact with a ground or neutral wire, arcing may not trip the circuit breaker. If you’ve ever heard a switch buzzing, hissing, or popping, you’ll know what I’m talking about. In order to protect your home, an arc-fault circuit interrupter can be used to detect just such a problem.
The word is arc, meaning a curved line. It simply means a spark powerful enough to jump through air or other medium from one electrode to another. If the voltage is high enough, an electrical arc can be dangerous, or even lethal.
Electricity tends to want to go towards the path of least resistance to something with the opposite charge. An arc is when it goes through the air in order to do that.
Don't know what an electrical 'ark' isbut and electrical 'arc' refers to the charge jumping from the anode to the cathode thru a medium such as air. Lightening is a electrical arcas is the sparks seen on Tesla Coils and other hi voltage devices.
