Blue lightning storm series#

There are only two absolutely safe places to be during a thunderstorm. WATCH VIDEO: Do you have a calling as an Extreme Storm Surveyor? Lightning can come in through the sides or travel through the ground.

If you're outside and you hear thunder, go inside right away. If the radar shows storms approaching, Buchanan said, postpone outdoor activities. The best thing people can do to avoid getting hit is to be vigilant of weather forecasts. Whatever the cause, bolts from the blue can, on rare occasions, be deadly. Scientists also know that bolts can emerge from the side of a cloud and they may then travel for miles through long horizontal channels before eventually striking ground. The International Space Station solar panels can be seen in the foreground. A bolt from the blue can strike ground at a spot with blue sky above it. Artists rendering of blue jet lightning blasting from a storm cloud towards space. One theory is that the first few strokes create a charge that repels subsequent strokes, diverting them elsewhere. storm, then travels horizontally away from the cloud before going to ground. Reflections from lightning flashes can be carried large distances via high-level clouds but sounds. But studies show that between one-third and one half of flashes end up sending bolts to multiple end-points. Lightning flashes can often be seen without hearing thunder due to how far away a storm might be. Dreamstime is the worlds largest stock photography community. Sometimes, those strokes all follow the same path. Use them in commercial designs under lifetime, perpetual & worldwide rights.

And often, it ends up in more than one place.Ī flash of lightning can last for up to a second, Rakov explained, and each flash is usually made up of many strokes. But exactly where a lightning bolt will end up is anyone’s guess. The recipe includes hot temperatures on the ground and moist conditions, as well as strong updrafts that propel wet air into the cooler atmosphere, where it condenses and form clouds.Īs electric charges accumulate inside cloud, sparks start to fly, much like the sparks you sometimes see as you reach for a doorknob after shuffling your feet on a carpet. To form, lightning requires a specific combination of circumstances, said Vladimir Rakov, an electrical engineer and lightning expert at the University of Florida, Gainesville. The chances of lightning hurting someone close to you is one in 300. As captured on dashcam video by Lutz resident Jonathan Moore, a large and booming bolt of lightning dropped out of the blue sky and struck a neighbors palm tree across the street with such. According to calculations on NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory website, there is a one in 3,000 chance of getting killed or injured by lightning in your lifetime, assuming an average life span of 80 years. Lightning kills an average of 55 people every year, Buchanan said, but it hits and severely injures hundreds more. NEWS: Thunder Could Help Track Lightning on Titan

Blue lightning storm series#

Most games in the series have some distant storms with thunder and/or lightning. For information on a real thunderstorm, see the Wikipedia article (link above). This article is only about the in-game storms. Main article: Article about thunderstorms on Wikipedia. Over the course of a year, 25 million bolts strike the ground, usually during thunderstorms but also during intense forest fires, heavy snowstorms, volcanic eruptions, nuclear detonations and large hurricanes. Thunder and lightning storms are a type of extreme weather featured in the Just Cause game series. That amounts to an average of 1,800 storms happening at any given moment. The 'real story' behind the flashes mistakenly called 'exploding transformers'.Every year, according to the National Weather Service, the Earth experiences 16 million thunderstorms. To see a more detailed description on how lightning causes electrical arcs or flashovers see our article about flashovers.Ī commonly seen, but frequently misidentified phenomenon observed when lightning strikes an energized power line. Video clip of lightning-triggered flashover He has also been involved in the research community, providing material for published scientific journal papers on tornadoes and lightning. Dan has been extensively published in newspapers, magazines, web articles and more, and has both supplied footage for and appeared in numerous television productions and newscasts. His career has involved traveling around the country covering the most extreme weather on the planet including tornadoes, hurricanes, lightning, floods and winter storms. About the Author: Dan Robinson has been a storm chaser, photographer and cameraman for 30 years.