Weather: The Ultimate Book of Meteorological Events

Nature's Fireworks

For the estimated eight out of 10 people who survive the initial shock of a lightning strike, more than half suffer memory loss and 44 percent have sleep disturbances.

Of all the dangers of a thunderstorm, lightning can be the greatest. There are about 1,800 thunderstorms in progress over the earth's surface at any given time, and lightning strikes about 100 times each second. Some scientists believe that this constant bombardment of lightning is critical in maintaining the electrical balance of our atmosphere. The majority of deaths occur when people fail to seek shelter in open areas such as golf courses or when people seek shelter under isolated trees.

Roughly 100 people per year die in the United States from lightning strikes with an average of 258 receiving lightning-caused injuries. Lightening also causes more than $200 million in property losses to structures, forests, and livestock annually.

Can there be lightning without thunder? It's impossible. A flash of lightning can be as hot as 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit. That intense heat causes the air around it to expand violently. The expanding air always causes the sound waves we call thunder. If you see lightning and don't hear thunder, it means that there was a rumble that was too far away for you to hear. Lightning appears to flicker because the lightning stroke is usually composed of a series of rapid electrical exchanges between the cloud and the ground.

Even though this seems to be the opposite of what we think we see, most lightning bolts travel from the ground up to a cloud. The jagged paths they follow, however, are formed from the cloud to the ground a split second before each bolt's discharge. Think of this jagged path as a channel. A lightning channel is formed in steps, each about 50 yards long, moving from the cloud toward the ground. Each of these steps jumps forward in less than a millionth of a second, and only about 50 millionths of a second passes between steps.

Eventually, the negatively charged channel gets close enough to the ground (or to something projecting from the ground, like a golf club) to attract the positive charge from the ground. The stroke of light, resulting from the negative and positive charges making contact, travels up the channel—at speeds of 20,000 to 60,000 miles per second.

One major misconception about lightning is that it does not hit the same place twice. The Empire State Building in New York City is hit about 23 times each year. Commercial aircraft are struck by lightning an average of once every 5,000 to 10,000 hours of flight. Although flying through a lightning storm can be scary, most modern aircraft are safe from lightning dangers.

If you ever feel the hair stand up on the back of your neck, move your position quickly. What you are feeling is the electricity of the channel through which the lightning will travel. —Warren Faidley

Weather: The Ultimate Book of Meteorological Events

Authors: Editors of the Weather Calendar
ISBN: 978-0-7407-6989-4
Format: 13 ½ x 10 ¼, 256 pp, hardcover with jacket
Price: $50.00 U.S.A. ($60.00 Canada)

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Contact: Shelly Barkes, (800) 851-8923, ext. 7498, sbarkes@amuniversal.com