Emergency! Grounding

[Ryan Jim Rector]

Urgent,

 

How do I ground a light for safety when next to water I.e grounding a power to a fire hydrant. I'm filming in a pool today with some powerful lights and I don't know how to ground them. I tried google but was not getting the right thing. I know you must ground it to metal or a pipe with flowing water with a clamp or something if I'm not mistaken but I don't know how.

 

Please help in dire need!

[JD Hartman]

Not sure that electrical safety such as this should be dispensed on a public forum. If you have to Google it and you don't have qualified crew with proper training and knowledge, you probably shouldn't be doing it. Really sounds like you are in over your head, if you're not certain, people could get injured.

 

At the most basic level, lighting and any equipment operating poolside should be connected through a GFCI or RCD.

[Edward Lawrence Conley III]

Well it's over and hopefully no accidents but you need GFCI protection around water/wet locations.

 

 

NONE of that grounding to metal pipe/water flowing crap.

 

 

Simple inline GFCI for household plugs if all your lights use those connectors.

 

If you are pulling power from a large Motion picture generator then you need bigger GFCI

 

http://www.guardiangfci.com

[Aapo Lettinen]

if you're using a genny it must be properly grounded but I haven't heard about grounding individual lights on set (unless the light's ballast is broken in which case it mustn't be used anyway).

could actually be dangerous in some situations if the light is somewhat grounded with some crappy bubblegum duct tape arrangement but the genny or mains has grounding issues.

 

GFCI protection absolutely.

 

Also, if there is any risk that a light/other electric equipment could tip over and fall to the pool it would be very wise to tie it down so that for example a stand would fall to a less dangerous direction and would not drop the fixture to the water. nobody wants any "whoops" accidents involving high voltage + water...