POWER OF NATURE - THUNDERSTORM || NATURAL DISASTERS ( #part 1 )||

There are a lot of types of energies and power in all aspects of life. One of the main animal needs are being stronger than other ones, people are competing, building machines and fight for the top. But.. can we really compare that with nature's superpower?

Of all extreme weathers and natural disasters, I've picked thunderstorms as #1 I'll write about. It is fascinating that thunderstorms are so marvelous, either in visual and audio facet. Is it possible that it's so relaxing and exciting in the same time? You can literally spend minutes and hours just looking and enjoying the view of lightning flashes during thunderstorm accompanied with attractive smell of rain.

Since I was a kid I was interested in how it rains and thunder, actually how the clouds are made and how does even water comes to the sky. In matter a fact it's not quite simply, but it's fully logical so I'm going to introduce you with thunderstorms step by step.

CLOUDS

In meteorology, a cloud is an aerosol comprising a visible mass of minute liquid droplets, frozen crystals, or particles suspended in the atmosphere above the surface of a planetary body.

Warm, moisture air is rising and at a certain height it's cooled to its dew point.

The dew point is the temperature to which air must be cooled to become saturated with water vapor.

On low temperature, warm air can't keep moisture in water vapor so it's transformed in droplets or pieces of ice, sometimes both - and they create clouds. All of clouds are different because they're made on various heights and temperatures. Also, clouds are incessantly changing their shape.

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We differentiate 10 genus of clouds:

• Cirrus
• Cirrocumulus
• Cirrostratus
• Altocumulus
• Altostratus
• Stratocumulus
• Nimbostratus
• Stratus
• Cumulus
• Cumulonimbus

We can divide them into 3 categories: High, Middle and Low. Clouds are seen in Earth's homosphere.

CUMULONIMBUS

The accent is on Cumulonimbus (Cb) because it's also called thunderheads - the core of the storm.
Cumulonimbus are heavy and thick water clouds with towering vertical extent and frozen top. They occur in highly unstable air. These clouds are capable of producing lightning and other dangerous severe weather, such as tornadoes.
FACT: Cumulonimbus can be heavier than 1 000 000 ( 1 million ) pounds!

THUNDERSTORM

A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm, lightning storm, or thundershower, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder.

Thunderstorms are recognized by strong winds, heavy rains and showers and lightning.

Lightning is a sudden electrostatic discharge that occurs typically during a thunderstorm.
This discharge occurs between electrically charged regions of a cloud (called intra-cloud lightning or IC), between two clouds (CC lightning), or between a cloud and the ground (CG lightning).

Lightning is connected with appearance of powerful flash and sound it makes - a thunder. A lightning flash can also be a strike if it involves an object on the ground. It is generated due to explosive spread of air heated by lightning on high temperature which climbs up to 30 000 °C. Thunder is spread at sound speed - 343 m/s on room's temperature (20 °C).

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Within the thunderous clouds, electric potential grows up to 3 million volts, so air is no longer an insulator and there is an outflow of electric charge inside the clouds, to the other cloud, to the surrounding air or to the ground (happens once in 10 outbrakes).

LIGHTNING

The most common is broken linear lightning - Several branches are separated from the main one. Linear lightning researches shown that lightning cloud-ground is formed in few steps: Every lightning has its own pre-empty which advances in speed of 50 m/s. Gradual ionization of air makes lightning channel, lumious and intensively heated. A corridor has a diameter of few centimeters.
When the channel connects cloud and ground (or two oppositely charged clouds) it comes up to huge electric discharge.

INTERESTING FACTS:

• With enough distance, lightning flash is seen before you hear the thunder, because light speed is much faster than speed of sound.
• Sound volume around a powerful lightning bolt is about 120 dB.
• Lightning is visible on distances up to 150 km.
• The main lightning stroke is most frequently the one which travels from ground to cloud, but vice versa.
• Almost every lightning is not onetime, there are up to 40 back strokes, but usually there are 2 with time interval of 0,03 seconds.
• Electric voltage between end points amounts up to 100 million volts!
• Some lightning has power of 100 000 A!
• Lightning can do a quite amount of damage but people have invented systems against it. (lightning rod)

Lightning pictures are @originalworks of my friend. Just click on the picture and see beautiful collection of his. flickr- M. Martinec

Have a good day :) - @tonac