UK Lightning Map
More about lightning
- At any point of time there are about 1800 thunderstorms!
- Every year, the Earth experiences an average of 25 million lightning strikes during some 100,000 thunderstorms. That’s more than a hundred lightning bolts per second.
- An average instance of lightning lasts about a quarter of a second and consists of 3-4 strikes.
- You can hear thunder from about 12 miles from the starting point.
- Lightning bolts travel at speeds of up to 60,000 miles per second.
- The average length of a single lightning bolt is 2-3 miles.
- A single lightning bolt travels through twisted paths in the air that can be as wide as one of your fingers or between six and ten miles.
- The temperature of a typical lightning bolt can reach 50,000 F degrees – that is 5 times greater than the temperature of the surface of the Sun.
- The energy contained in a single lightning strike can power a 100 Watt light bulb for 90 days.
- “Lightning never strikes twice” unfortunately is a myth. Lightning can strike the same location many times.
- Trees sometimes can take direct hits from lightning and not get burnt – the electricity passes over their wet surface and goes straight into the ground.
- Glass forms when lightning strikes into sandy soil. After a storm you can find strips of glass in the sand.
- If you have wet clothes on, lightning will do you less harm.
- The irrational fear of lightning is known as keraunophobia. The fear of thunder is termed brontophobia.
- There are from 100 to 1000 instances of ball lightning at the same time on Earth, but the chance you’ll see at least one in your lifetime is just 0.01%.