Air-mass Thunderstorm - Lightning

Lightning

See also: Lightning

Relationships between lightning frequency and the height of precipitation within thunderstorms have been found. Thunderstorms which show radar returns above 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) in height are associated with storms which have more than ten lightning flashes per minute. There is also a correlation between the total lightning rate and the size of the thunderstorm, its updraft velocity, and amount of graupel over land. The same relationships fail over tropical oceans, however. Lightning from low precipitation (LP) thunderstorms is one of the leading causes of wildfires.

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Famous quotes containing the word lightning:

    “O, better that her shattered hulk
    Should sink beneath the wave;
    Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
    And there should be her grave;
    Nail to the mast her holy flag,
    Set every threadbare sail,
    And give her to the god of storms,
    The lightning and the gale!”
    —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    “We saw the lightning and that was the guns; and then we heard the thunder and that was the big guns; and then we heard the rain falling and that was the blood falling; and when we came to get in the crops, it was dead men that we reaped.”
    —Harriet Tubman (1821–1913)

    “When the cross blue lightning seemed to open
    The breast of heaven, I did present myself
    Even in the aim and very flash of it.”
    —William Shakespeare (1564–1616)