Lightning Protection Where it Don't Much Storm.

Storms are very rare over these here parts of Wales.  So rare, that one tends to establish a ham shack without too much thought for lightning protection, other than pulling the feeds out when rarely needed.

But, this spring and early summer has seen a fair number of storms already, when there may be several years between storms otherwise.

Not good for transceivers...

So far, with the feed lines out, I've not had any problems, even though there have been a number of very close strikes.  But it's clear that, if you are establishing a new station, or renewing some feed lines, it's worth grabbing some surge protectors and fixing a single point ground box on your property. 

With surge protection units only costing about $25, it's a real false economy not to bother with lightning protection - even if those storms only very rarely come by...