When a storm’s charging zone sits close to the earth’s surface, the resulting “superbolts” can be 1,000 times stronger than regular lightning.
Category: lightning
Observation of the onset of a blue jet into the stratosphere
We propose that the microsecond flashes are the optical equivalent of negative narrow bipolar events observed in radio waves. These are known to initiate lightning within the cloud and to…
'Spider lightning' seen from space
From NOAA/NESDIS: When you spend 24/7/365 staring at Earth, you see some strange things. The NOAA GOES East satellite (GOES-16) witnessed a frightening display of stratiform, or ‘spider’ lightning as…
Another benefit of global warming – less lightning
From the UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH: Lightning storms less likely in a warming planet, study suggests Lightning may strike less often in future across the globe as the planet warms, a…
Discovery: Lightning creates anti-matter in our atmosphere
From the “this is likely to push out chemtrails as the next big conspiracy theory” department. I posited back in 2009, when I first covered this story, that the huge…
New capabilities on NOAA satellite help predict lightning strikes
From NASA/GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER Flashy first images arrive from NOAA’s GOES-16 lightning mapper Detecting and predicting lightning just got a lot easier. The first images from a new instrument…
How lightning strikes can improve storm forecasts
From the UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON Humans have always been frightened and fascinated by lightning. This month, NASA is scheduled to launch a new satellite that will provide the first nonstop, high-tech…
The study of 'fossilized' lightning
From the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA (USF INNOVATION) Study provides a new method to measure the energy of a lightning strike By investigating ‘fossilized’ sand cylinders made by lightning strikes,…
Incredibly close lightning strike recorded on slo-mo video
This video from a dashcam was taken July 24th, 2016 in Chicago. The slo-mo of the lightning hitting a pole near the vehicle is one of the most intriguing things…
High-speed camera captures amazing lightning flash
Super-slow-motion footage from recent Florida storm From the FLORIDA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY MELBOURNE, FLA. — Scientists at Florida Institute of Technology used a high-speed camera to capture an amazing lighting…
Solar wind to lightning strike link discovered
From the Institute of Physics: High-speed solar winds increase lightning strikes on Earth Scientists have discovered new evidence to suggest that lightning on Earth is triggered not only by cosmic…
Curious claim – lightning erodes mountains
From the University of the Witwatersrand New evidence on lightning strikes By Kanina Foss Lightning strikes causing rocks to explode have for the first time been shown to play a…
Making ball lightning
From the American Chemical Society New insights into the 1-in-a-million lightning called ‘ball lightning’ One of the rare scientific reports on the rarest form of lightning — ball lightning —…
China's big jet – not the passenger kind
From the Science China Press Is there gigantic jet event in middle latitude region in mainland China? When talking about lightning, appearances of different lightning which occur along with thunderstorms…
It's not only 'global warming' that causes headaches, so does lightning it seems
While we all know ‘global warming’ to be our major source of headaches here at WUWT, this from the University of Cincinnati Academic Health Center , suggests lightning is also…
An explanation for ball lightning?
I wonder how long it will be before Al Gore tries to blame ball lightning on “dirty weather”? A neat video follows. From CSIRO: Goodness, gracious, great balls of lightning Sightings…
Wildest lightning strike I've ever seen
Why being in a car during a lightning storm is the safest place to be As watcher of weather, both as as a one-time storm chaser as well as a…
NASA seeing sprites
From the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center High above the clouds during thunderstorms, some 50 miles above Earth a different kind of lightning dances. Bursts of red and blue light, known…
Lightning induced Schumann Resonance may help divine exoplanets
From the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Science nugget: Lightning signature could help reveal the solar system’s origins Every second, lightning flashes some 50 times on Earth. Together these discharges coalesce…
Crowdsourced Climate Complexity – Compiling the WUWT Potential Climatic Variables Reference Page
By WUWT regular “Just The Facts” With the help of an array of WUWT reader comments, which began on this thread on January, 15th 2011, and grew on January 22nd,…
Watching lightning jets hit the ionosphere
From Spaceweather.com: You know what comes out of the bottom of a thunder storm–lightning. But do you know what comes out of the top? On Sept. 28th at 7:01 am…
Storm elves and sprites recorded on video
From Eurka Alert: FECYT – Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology A team of Spanish researchers has made a high-speed recording of elves and sprites in storms, fleeting and luminous…
Another UHI effect – thunderstorms & lightning
The March-April edition of WeatherWise magazine has an interesting article in it regarding UHI (Urban Heat Island) effects of enhancing thunderstorm formation in the downwind heat plume. It Stems from…
Lightning: a new tool for accurately measuring the sun's rotation when sunspots are not present
This is one big surprise. Moments of serendipity are some of the best quotes of science: “Hmmm, that’s odd”. As an amateur radio operator myself, I find this study fascinating.…
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