Physics and Models of an ESD Event

Electrostatic discharge (ESD) events occur all around us. We might not know these events by the name ‘ESD’ but nevertheless they happen. The first time many people experienced ESD was on a cold dry winter day as a child. Going out of the house we walked across the carpet not knowing that the act of walking was charging our bodies to 1000’s of volts. Unsuspectingly, we reached for the door to open it and go outside. As our hand approached the doorknob a small spark flashed between our hand and the doorknob. The spark scared us and also hurt. The doorknob was at a lower potential than our bodies. This caused the charge to pass from our body through our hand to the doorknob. Confused we asked our parents. They probably just said, “You just shocked yourself. Go on out and play” Being more careful we opened the door but this time there was no shock because we had been discharged already. Even though we were confused we went on out and played.