METHOD FOR CALCULATION OF LIGHTNING RISK ASSESSMENT USING MS EXCEL

This work considers the method of building a model for calculating the risk of a lightning strike in a building and its implementation with the MS Excel computer program in accordance with current regulatory documents. This technique will be useful for designers who perform a part of lightning protection and during the execution of their projects must calculate the risk of lightning strike. The risk of a lightning strike according to current regulations may consist of the sum of one to four risks: the risk of loss of human life; the risk of losing the ability to provide public services; risk of loss of cultural heritage and risk of loss of economic value. This technique applies to the calculation of the risk of loss of human life, as the most important value that can be lost. The methodology involves calculating the risk of lightning strikes for public, administrative, industrial or residential buildings. That is, the buildings that the designer most often has to deal with during his work. This technique is not intended for use in building models for buildings or structures of the following purpose: public communications, objects of cultural purpose, because the buildings listed above involve the calculation of the risk of loss of the ability to provide public services or the risk of loss of cultural heritage, respectively. Also, this technique does not apply to the calculation of buildings with explosive zones, since the risk calculation for them will be specific. In addition, this technique does not provide for the calculation of the risk of loss of economic value, because it is not mandatory according to regulatory documents and is carried out additionally at the request of the customer. At the same time, it can be used as a basis for building more complex models suitable for these types of buildings. Methods of solving the main problems faced by the designer during the calculation of the risk assessment are considered in the work: automation of the calculation of similar formulas, and reduction of most of them to several basic types; obtaining a formula that returns a value or a reference to a value from a table or range and also performs a search for the specified element in the range and returns the relative position of this element; formulating the risk assessment procedure in accordance with the regulatory document and determining how certain input data affect the final result.