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kindling can strike the ground miles off from the loom electric storm that produce it , a phenomenon called a " bolt from the blue . "
A mellow - speed camera run by the University of Florida ’s Lightning Research Laboratory caught an unusual deadbolt from the blue that zapped some trees in Gainesville on June 8 , 2013 . Thelightningflash skipped some of the key steps that researchers have worked out for how lightning travel from swarm to ground .
The bolt from the blue caught on camera in Gainesville, Florida, on 6 December 2024.
" The mechanisms ofhow a lightning flash strikesan object are still very badly understood , " said lead study author Manh Tran , a doctoral student at the University of Florida . " We do n’t know whether we can call this rarely observed or common . But we are doing more observance so we can hopefully shed some light source on the physics behind lightning . "
Lightning is one of the deadly yet least understand weather phenomena , according to the National Weather Service .
Here ’s the basic model for how cloud - to - ground lightning works : A positivistic or ( more commonly ) negative charge jumps from the swarm , trace a way visit a stepped leader . The loss leader searches blindly for the ground , branching out through undefended air . As the leader , or bursting charge , draw near the surface , a strong opposite thrill construct in the ground , reaching upward meet the loss leader . The two collide in a violent , high - energy discharge . Lightning ’s blink of an eye is in reality a return stroke , as the electric current races back up the stepped loss leader . [ Electric Earth : Stunning Images of Lightning ]
The second lightning stroke recorded just after the first bolt from the blue.
In abolt from the blueing , the drawing card leap sideways out of the thundercloud , then angles down toward the surface . For people on the reason , the bolts seem to issue forth out of clear melodic line . " People await up and see blue sky , and then boom , there ’s lightning , " Tran allege .
The detailed telecasting of the Gainesville lightning never showed a hot , bright upwards leader . Instead , the researchers take care a uncommon coup d’oeil of streamers , positively point electric communication channel stretching upward from the earth . " This was unusual and a little number different than what is generally opine in the literature , " Tran sound out .
And no one at the lightning laboratory has ever seen an upward leader turn over on its path toward the undercoat , the investigator report . Lightning often kicks out another leader if there ’s enough rush leave in the swarm . In the case of the recorded bolt , the crest of the 2d loss leader bent up , turn back toward the swarm , just after the grownup flash ( or return stroke ) zoom toward the sky . " We do n’t really sympathise the physics of that yet , " Tran told Live Science .
The study was release Sept. 19 in the journalGeophysical Research Letters .
Between 5 to 10 percentage of the 25 million cloud - to - earth lightning flashes in the United States each class strike in Florida . Some parting of the state see 40 hits per square mile .
