Monday, June 4, 2012

Lightning Crashes, Can You Feel It?

While researching the smell of lightning, I ran across a great Q & A by lightning expert Joe Dwyer on the NOVA website. Some of it got a little technical, but the article was fascinating and confirmed a few things that I'd been told over the years.

Things like: don't wash dishes or take a shower during an electrical storm. Don't swim during one, either.

And I now know what physical mechanism causes the sound of thunder, woohoo!

I hope you'll take a few minutes to click over and check out the NOVA article. Who knows, maybe one day it'll save a life .

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/dwyer-lightning.html

~ Olivia J. Herrell

P.S. The embedding was disabled, but click to listen to Lightning Crashes, a poignant song by Live. This one's for Dastan Trant. May you live on and on.

4 comments:

Roland D. Yeomans said...

I have a friend who loves to stand out in the open watching the lightning crackle and arc across the sable storm clouds. Needless to say, he is a bit insane! He happily admits or I would not write it~! LOL. Another great post, Roland

A.T. Post said...

"The smell of lightning"? Wouldn't that be ozone? Seeing as how lightning itself is super-heated plasma (and, I just learned recently, they throw off small amounts of gamma radiation as well)? Ain't nature amazing?

Wendy Lu said...

Okay, so I have to say, I don't know why but I absolutely love the title of this blog post. It almost sounds like the title of a novel or other creative work (blog post?? haha). I clicked the NOVA link but sadly nothing came up - perhaps the article was taken down. Thanks anyway for sharing!

By the way, I'm hosting an awesome blogfest and critique giveaway at my blog from June 22-24 that you should totally come participate in if you're interested! :) Hope you have a great day.

~Wendy Lu

The Roarin' Twenties Poetry Blogfest + Chapter Critique Giveaway (hosted by The Red Angel)

Unknown said...

I haven't smelled lightning in years. It's not quite as dramatic here in the bay area as it is in other parts of the country.

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