Ball lightning is a phenomenon that people have been seeing since the 17th century. It's pretty much like regular lightning except, you know, a ball.
Descriptions actually vary widely. It has been described moving in unpredictable trajectories (up, down, side to side) as well as moving through physical obstacles (sometimes without any effects, sometimes melting or burning anything it touches) and occasionally popping or exploding.
For a long time people thought it was fake, made up, because there was no physical proof etc, even though people had supposedly been killed by it (and plenty of people (including famous people like Aleister Crowley and Tsar Nicholas II) had reported seeing it).
Nowadays, it's considered a natural phenomenon, but with no real understanding yet as to what it actually is.
In some cases, they're able to recreate it in the lab, but whether that recreation is actually what happens in the atmosphere is unclear.
Some people think that a lot of UFO sightings may actually just be ball lightning, and that's probably true in a lot of cases of lights in the sky.
Have you ever seen ball lightning?
9 comments:
The first video is freaky. I've seen a lot of lightning, but never ball lightning.
It makes no sense, because electrical current always wants to follow the path of least resistance to the ground, so why would it ever "stick" to itself like that? Very weird, but also pretty cool.
This is wicked cool. I saw it once a long time ago at the beach. We had a killer storm move in and it was like the sky just exploded.
I've never seen ball lightning, but I think the funniest thing is in the second video. I mean what was that guy thinking: "I work in a lab that makes unpredictable ball lightning that scampers across the floor. I know, I'll wear flip flops to work today!"
I mean really?
wow! Id love to see one, though maybe not up close:)
Nutschell
www.thewritingnut.com
I've seen some pretty interest storms but that's a new one for me.
I love watching lightning, but I've never seen a lightning ball.
In the paper this weekend there was an article about invisible lightening, ie instances where the radiation signature created by lightening is detected but without the visual flash of the lightening, which is also pretty crazy.
Ball lightning is so odd ... my theory is that there's a wizard's duel somewhere that's gotten a bit out of hand.
Jamie @ Mithril Wisdom
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