Lightening Strike

[PacRat]

So Mike, do you measure resistance with a regular VOM?  If you drive one of those copper rods down to shallow ground water at five feet will that pretty much guarantee low resistance?

Not exactly a VOM. It's a megger that injects a current into the earth. I like the old Biddle analog units but most people are using the AEMC digital meters. You can do a "Fall of Potential" test to see the resistance to earth of a ground rod and you can also do "Soil Resistivity" to know either how deep you'l need to go and also to prospect for the best locations for ground rods. There are also some clamp-on testers but they are somewhat limited and often misused. They can be quicker and easier but will only test one electrode at a time. With Fall of Potential you can test the entire ground grid at smaller sites.

If you're in ground water, you typically have good earth...sea water is the best.

Here's a good source of information on the instruments and grounding, it's old but the principles are the same: https://archive.org/details/GettingDownToEarthBiddleInstrumentsApril1981/page/n23/mode/2up 

[Wompus Cat]

Your soil resistivity is the variable and it changes with depth most of the time. This is likely because the soil has more moisture down there but it can also be a mineral layer.
What are your soil conditions like there?

I use to have a Beltec Rock Drill on my old 65HP Kubota and drilled holes for a local Marina here and the strata is just NUTS near the Lake it is 1 inch of dust then one foot or more of solid limestone then Gravel at 18 inches then 26" to 34 "where my  standard bit would bottom out you would get River Rock (old smooth rounded rock )
I live about a block from the Lake and have pretty much black gumbo mostly .Have not dug below about don't 10 foot or so but think I am in a wash from millions of years of sediment. All the neighboring properties here are pretty much solid rock below a foot or less .

[Dominick]

Check out this link.  16 people killed in one lightening strike.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-57801398 Dominick

[David Hall]

Rob,  (José Cuervo). And I had one of our best days salmon fishing during a lightning storm last year.  Northern California was already ablaze and the sky to the north and east was glowing red.  I figured we had the numbers on our side, there were at least 50 other boats out there along with us that day and I made sure to keep 20 of them between us and the storm at all times.  It was a strangely beautiful day with periods of on again off again rains, thunder and lightning, periods of no wind, light wind and 30mph gusts. The weirdest part of the whole day was only Rob could get a bite? Every bite, every hookup and every fish landed.  When we were done he gave his gear to the other boat.