Capacitor Question

[tim.hall53]

Hello,

I am pretty new to this field and was hoping to avoid doing something dumb.

Could someone please tell me what is the smallest capacitor or capacitor bank that would be fatal?

Thanks!

[Hero999]

The only dumb thing about this question is not enough information is given to answer it. Whether a capacitive discharge is fatal or not depends on many factors, including the person being shocked. A tiny static shock may be enough to trigger a heart attack in very vulnerable person yet many people report surviving shocks from much lager capacitances charged to high voltages.

In scientific papers statistics such as the 50% lethal dose are given but in this case it still depends on many factors. The voltage and capacitance are obviously important but there are others such as skin moisture and where the electrodes are placed.