Lightning
...A solitary lightning bolt can travels through twisted paths in the air. Some can be as wide as one of your fingers or from six to ten miles! A flash of lightning is brighter than 10,000,000 100-watt light bulbs. A flash of lightning can pulse as much power as there is in all the power plants in the United States in that split second. A flash of lightning could power a light bulb for a month. Trees sometimes can survive direct hits from lightning because the electricity passes over their wet surface and go into the ground. Florida is the lightning capital of the United States. 10% of all people struck by lightning were in Florida at the time. In March of 1991, a single six-hour storm stretching over Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri caused more than 15,000 lightning strikes. During the storm the skies were blazed with almost constant lightning. Lightning can be made in a laboratory by an instrument called a Van de Graaff static electricity generator which could generate million of volts of artificial lightning from a metal sphere mounted at the top of an insulated column. About 71.4286% of all people struck by lightning still survive. Temperatures in the path of a lightning bolt can reach as high as 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Intracloud lightning - One of the main kinds of lightning and it is the most common one. It occurs when lightning arcs between oppositely charged centers within the same cloud. Cloud to ground lightning is also one of the main kinds of lightning. It is the most dangerous form of lightning and the kind we know most about. Intercloud lightning - Another one of the main kinds of lightning. It occurs when lightning leaps across a gap of clear air between two different clouds. Heat lightning - It occurs when it's hot. Summer lightning - It occurs in the summer. Sheet lightning - It seems to come in flat waves. Ribbon lightning - It looks like streamers flashing through the sky. Silent lightning - It appears without a s...