Heres a short but informative little video re lightning. The most common question I receive is whether or not the persons lightning flash image was positive (polarity) especially from ones that leap out the side of storms - Bolts from the Blue or clean air discharges. The fact is that less than 5% of all lightning is of positive polarity, unless the storm structure dictates that the electric field is either positive strike dominant, in countries where mostly positive lightning occurs due to the storm structure or the storm(s) is/are in a state of reversal between positive and negative etc. A thunderstorm can eject a few positive strokes due to changes in charge pool location, but there are no guarantees. Each storm is different, but in the mainstream, typical thunderstorm charge structures worldwide are somewhat the same. There are many optical characteristics that can sometimes be determined to distinguish between both types but just because it appears to come from near the anvil does not mean it is in a positive charge pool - meaning that the actual location of the initiating leader(s) could be in the negative charge pool - and even if in the positive charge pool, can have bipolar leaders transporting either polarity. The question could be asked: If youre only seeing the lower portion of the lightning flash whether through the base of the cloud or out to the side, where did it actually originate? The video shows the horizontal and vertical propagation of a particular lightning flash. Its a valuable little insight actually - because what you see come out of the cloud is only a small fraction of what nature is doing - which should also serve as a reminder of lightning safety. It does and can travel tens of miles even hundreds of miles. https://youtube/watch?v=BmrW_pvn56M
Posted on: Fri, 26 Sep 2014 23:36:25 +0000
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