Zap! Play it Safe Around Electricity!

Electricity’s charged with fascinating factoids! Check these out…

How Small Can You Get? Electricity is made of electrons—particles of energy one million MILLIONTH the size of a speck of dust! If an electron grew as big as a speck of dust, and you grew at the same rate, you’d be so big that when you stood on Earth, you’d bump your head on Jupiter!

Dig It Right!

If people dig ; buried electric lines, they can be seriously shocked. Anyone planning a digging project (even just to plant a tree) should call 811 several days before digging. This service will make sure underground electric lines and other utilities are clearly marked so people can dig a safe dis tance away.

That’s Shocking! Shuffle across a carpet on a dry day, and your shoes pick up extra electrons. Touch a doorknob, and the “static” electricity (the extra electrons that are “static” or not moving) suddenly leap to the doorknob, so they can get to the ground. You feel a shock! This same principle makes lightning, a buildup of elec trons suddenly leaps from the clouds to the ground.

SmartGuy Thomas Edison While inventing the first practical light bulb, Thomas Edison filled 200 notebooks with 40,000 handwritten pages! “Genius,” he said, “is 1% inspi ration and 99 % perspiration”— plain old hard work!

At the Speed of Light When you turn on a

lig ht, you’re drawing electricity all the way from a power plant to your light bulb. That power plant may be sev eral hundred miles away. It’s a good thing electricity can travel 186,000 miles per second!

—AlanDrummer

6 ZAP!