Take a look at this impressive image of a lightning strike taken from the Port of Baltimore Sunday night! Wow! Lightning can be frightening for sure, but how does it form?
It all starts from convection! The sun heats the ground, and that air rises, cools, and condenses to form these towering cumulonimbus clouds.
At the top of these clouds, the air is so cold that ice forms! At the bottom of the cloud, the air is warmer and the moisture remains liquid in the form of raindrops. Keep in mind...inside these clouds are updrafts which can move at 100 mph!
These strong winds within the cloud cause many collisions between the liquid raindrops and the ice particles. These collisions cause changes in charges. Typically, negative charges form at the base of the cloud, and positive charges remain on the ground and the top of the cloud. Usually a lightning strike begins with the negative charge and works its way out to the positive charge! This means you can theoretically have cloud-to-cloud lightning and cloud to ground lightning.
The safest place to be during a lightning storm is inside an enclosed space such as a house or car with the windows shut. The worst places to be are an open field, such as a golf course, or at the top of a hill. Even the base of a tree is a bad place to be, because if lightning strikes the tree it could reach you on the ground.
Lightning can strike up to 10 miles away from a storm, so if you hear thunder, you are likely close enough to be struck!
