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Re: [Shop-talk] kid safety & outlets (was: 110vac outlet question)

To: <shop-talk@autox.team.net>
Subject: Re: [Shop-talk] kid safety & outlets (was: 110vac outlet question)
From: "Randall" <tr3driver@ca.rr.com>
Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:03:42 -0800
> Will 110vac kill a young (~2 years old) child?

It can be done, certainly.  But it's very unlikely.  For example, grabbing
both pins with the same hand wouldn't do it; although if his hands were wet
it might give him a significant burn.  To even have a chance of killing him,
he would have to have one hand on the pin and the other hand on a good
ground.  Even that likely wouldn't do it, unless he also had open sores on
both hands, where they were touching the conductors.  Your skin actually
does an amazing job of (relatively) harmlessly deflecting low frequency AC.

Child electrocution is so rare in the US that the authorities don't even
keep statistics on it, lumping it into the 'other' category.  According to 
http://www.childdeathreview.org/causesOA.htm
only 238 kids (0-18) died of "other" during 2000, and both poisoning and
falls are more common causes (of "other") than electrocution.

Then you have to subdivide those few deaths (if any) into bathroom
accidents, defective appliances, and being in the wrong place (eg high
voltage transformer vaults).

A quick Google doesn't turn up ANY cases where someone was electrocuted by
touching the pins ... by contrast there were 11 people 19 or under killed by
lightning in the USA in the year 2000.
http://tinyurl.com/5hc4x9

Randall
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