How Lightning Works

It’s a rainy evening, you got home just in time before it started pouring. The sky outside is a deep purple-blue. You can see bright flashes of light all over, and hear roaring sounds once every few minutes.

Lightning is a beautiful phenomenon, even if it is alarming. I always thought of lightning as a spark between two clouds! But it is much more complex and interesting. Here is how lightning works:

An interesting fact is that the air near a lightning strike is close to 28000 Degrees Celsius, or 50,000 Degrees Fahrenheit, which is even hotter than the surface of the sun. This heat causes the air to expand densely and quickly, releasing an intense sound wave, and that’s how we hear thunder.