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- When many small pieces of these frozen raindrops collide with each other in a thundercloud, they create an electrical charge. After some time, the entire cloud fills with an electrical charge. The negative charges (electrons) concentrate at the bottom of the cloud.
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Lightning is a giant spark of electricity in the atmosphere between clouds, the air, or the ground. In the early stages of development, air acts as an insulator between the positive and negative charges in the cloud and between the cloud and the ground.
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Jan 9, 2022 · The first detailed observations of lightning's emergence inside a cloud have exposed how electric fields grow strong enough to let bolts fly.
- How Thunderstorms Develop
- How Lightning Forms
- Thunder
All thunderstorms go through stages of growth, development, electrification and dissipation. Thunderstorms often begin to develop early in the day when the sun heats the air near the ground and pockets of warmer air start to rise in the atmosphere. When these pockets of air reach a certain level in the atmosphere, cumulus clouds start to form. Cont...
Lightning is a giant spark of electricity in the atmosphere or between the atmosphere and the ground. In the initial stages of development, air acts as an insulator between the positive and negative charges in the cloud and between the cloud and the ground; however, when the differences in charges becomes too great, this insulating capacity of the ...
Thunder is the sound made by a flash of lightning. As lightning passes through the air it heats the air quickly. This causes the air to expand rapidly and creates the sound wave we hear as thunder. Normally, you can hear thunder about 10 miles from a lightning strike. Since lightning can strike outward 10 miles from a thunderstorm, if you hear thun...
Jun 16, 2014 · Lightning is a visible electrical discharge that occurs within a cloud, between two clouds, or between a cloud and the surface of the earth. As lightning passes through the air it heats the air quickly. This causes the air to expand rapidly and creates the sound wave we hear as thunder.
Jun 20, 2024 · Lightning occurs when rain, ice crystals and a type of hail called graupel collide in a thunderstorm cloud. When these precipitation particles collide, they exchange electrons, which creates an...
Cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning comes from the sky down, but the part you see comes from the ground up. A typical cloud-to-ground flash lowers a path of negative electricity (that we cannot see) towards the ground in a series of spurts.
Oct 1, 2005 · Most of the four million lightning flashes that occur on our planet each day originate from inside thunderclouds, often just a few miles above our heads, and yet despite decades of research we ...
