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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
Flocks of sparrows or swallows, calmly perched on thick power lines carrying thousands of volts, are a familiar sight in both cities and villages. Yet few realize why the birds are not struck by the current.
One would think any touch to such cables should be fatal, but the birds feel perfectly comfortable, History of Simple Things explains.
The secret lies not in extraordinary biology of the birds or insulation on their feet, but in basic laws of physics. Electric current is a directed flow of electrons, which always chooses the path of least electrical resistance and arises only when there is a potential difference (voltage) between two points.
When a bird lands on a single wire, both of its feet touch a section with exactly the same electrical potential. Since the bird's body has a much higher resistance than the copper or aluminum cable, electrons find it much easier to run along the metal, bypassing the living organism.
Why birds are not struck by electricity: watch the video
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The mechanism is completely different when a person standing barefoot or in ordinary footwear touches the wire on the ground. The ground surface potential is zero, while the high-voltage cable can reach tens of thousands of volts. In this case, a colossal voltage difference forms, and the human body becomes a convenient conductor through which current instantly flows into the ground with catastrophic consequences.
The bird, however, hangs in the air and has no contact with the ground, so a closed circuit simply does not form. This phenomenon is easy to imagine with a fast mountain river. The metal wire is a powerful current channel, and the bird on it is a tiny dry island in the middle of the flow. The water continues on its usual path and does not rise to the crest, because there is no way out for it.
Nonetheless, birds are not completely immune to current. The real danger arises when the avian creature simultaneously touches two different objects—for example, it sits on a wire and accidentally touches a wing, beak, or tail of a metal support, traversing or adjacent cable on another phase. At such a moment, the circuit is closed, a short circuit occurs, and a blast of current flows through the body.
For this reason, large birds with wide wingspans—storks, hawks, herons, owls, and eagles—most often suffer. To protect rare species, energy companies install insulating housings, protective polymer pads, and warning markers on high-voltage poles to minimize the risk of tragic contact.
Document: PDF proof of the original version of the news item "На дроті – смертельна напруга, але птах живий: чому його не вбиває струмом". It records the publication content at the moment of the first scan, the preservation date and the source: Channel 24.
