Our      Lightening

Lightning strikes somewhere on the surface of the earth about 100 times every second! Each flash contains about one billion volts of electricity. That's enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for three months.

In the United States alone, lightning sets 10,000 forest fires and causes $100 million in property damage every year. Between 1940 and 1991, it killed 8,316 people in the U.S. Today the average number of lightning-related deaths in the U.S. is 80 a year. Fortunately, not everyone who is struck by lightning dies.

A lightning flash can happen in half a second. In that instant, the lightning flash superheats the surrounding air to a temperature five times hotter than that on the surface of the sun. Nearby air expands and vibrates, forming sound that we hear as thunder. Sound travels more slowly than light, so it seems that thunder occurs later.

How it works…

 

The cloud bottom carries a negative charge. Positive charges may collect on the ground, buildings, boat masts, people, flagpoles, mountaintops, or trees. A stepped leader—a negative electrical charge made of zig-zagging segments, or steps—comes partway down from the cloud. The steps are invisible; each one is about 150 feet long. When the stepped leader gets within 150 feet of a positive charge, a streamer (surge of positive electricity) rises to meet it. The leader and the streamer make a channel. An electrical current from an object on the ground surges upward through the channel. It touches off a bright display called a return stroke.

 

Electricity is a stream of electrons that gives off energy as light and heat. In lightning, electrons flash between clouds or from a cloud to the ground. But you don’t have to be struck by lightning to get zapped. When you scuff your feet on a rug, electrons from the rug rub off onto you. If you touch a metal doorknob, which conducts electrons well, the electrons will leap into the metal. The energy transfer gives you a tiny electric shock. Electricity that builds up in this way is called static electricity.

Rub a comb against fur, silk, nylon, or wool; the comb will collect electrons and become negatively charged. That causes it to attract objects that are positively charged. Hold the comb near a trickle of water from a faucet, salt and pepper, threads, a table-tennis ball, scraps of paper, your hair, or anything else that strikes your fancy. Watch what happens.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The lightning fatality data was collected by NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) collected the lightning fatality data. They come from monthly and annual summaries compiled by the National Weather Service and published in monthly issues of Storm Data