Tesla Madness

Giant Tesla Coil in Oklahoma - MSN Video


To put things in perspective, this device isn't that much different from the Tesla Coils in the old Red Alert games, without the ability to direct them. The amount of energy outputted by such a device is... impressive. And very dangerous.

Not that it bothered Nikola Tesla much ;-) : http://www.salrestivo.org/NikolaTesla.jpg


Though Tesla wasn't a mad genius (partly disputable), he was certainly both mad *and* a genius, and I don't just refer to his mental quirks (which included doing things in threes, physical revulsion of jewelry, germaphobia, an obsession with pigeons...). The main reason we focus so much on Tesla's AC power rather than Edison's DC is because Tesla decided to conduct a very dangerous experiment. To prove that AC power was safe, he used himself as a conductor to light two light bulbs, which he held in his hands. http://homepage.ntlworld.com/forgottenfutures/tesla/tesla_2.gif

I wholeheartedly recommend reading more about Tesla and his researches.

That's a little extreme isn't it. I don't feel safe and I'm in the UK.

Tesla mainly saw them as wireless transmitters/receptors of incredible range, and he theorized that 30 such devices would be enough to connect the entire world. You can build them to have an incredible power output as they receive and then output the Earth's various electromagnetic effects, thus requiring merely a smaller initiator power supply. Tesla had other interesting theories, including interstellar communication...

Good stuff for steampunk novels, tesla coils. Communication by lightning... ;-)

Some wacky conspiracy type theorists think that a failed Tesla experiment was what wacked Tunguska...

I have something like that, yes. Something about a Russian TV show claiming that Tunguska was the result of a scientist experimenting in producing endless energy or somesuch. There may even be a computer game that uses that theme in the central storyline.