As often happens, the systematic study of ball lightning began with a denial of their existence: at the beginning of the 19th century, all isolated observations known by that time were recognized as either mysticism or, at best, an optical illusion.
But already in 1838, a survey compiled by the famous astronomer and physicist Dominique Francois Arago was published in the Yearbook of the French Bureau of Geographic Longitudes.
Subsequently, he initiated the experiments of Fizeau and Foucault to measure the speed of light, as well as the work that led Le Verrier to the discovery of Neptune.
Based on the then known descriptions of ball lightning, Arago came to the conclusion that many of these observations cannot be considered an illusion.
In the 137 years that have passed since the publication of Arago's review, new eyewitness accounts and photographs have appeared. Dozens of theories were created, extravagant and witty, which explained some of the known properties of ball lightning, and those that did not withstand elementary criticism.
Faraday, Kelvin, Arrhenius, Soviet physicists Ya. I. Frenkel and P. L. Kapitsa, many well-known chemists, and finally, specialists from the American National Commission for Astronautics and Aeronautics of NASA tried to investigate and explain this interesting and formidable phenomenon. And ball lightning still continues to be largely a mystery.
It is difficult, probably, to find a phenomenon, the information about which would be so contradictory to each other. There are two main reasons: this phenomenon is very rare, and many observations are carried out extremely unskilled.
Suffice it to say that large meteors and even birds were mistaken for ball lightning, to the wings of which the dust of rotten, glowing in the dark stumps stuck. Nevertheless, there are about a thousand reliable observations of ball lightning described in the literature.
What facts must link scientists with a single theory in order to explain the nature of the occurrence of ball lightning? What are the limitations of observation on our imagination?
The first thing to explain is: why does ball lightning occur frequently if it occurs frequently, or why does it occur rarely if it occurs rarely?
Let the reader not be surprised by this strange phrase - the frequency of occurrence of ball lightning is still a controversial issue.
And it is also necessary to explain why ball lightning (it is not for nothing that it is called that) really has a shape that is usually close to a ball.
And to prove that it, in general, is related to lightning - I must say, not all theories associate the appearance of this phenomenon with thunderstorms - and not without reason: sometimes it occurs in cloudless weather, as, however, other thunderstorm phenomena, for example, lights Saint Elmo.
Here it is appropriate to recall the description of the meeting with ball lightning, given by the remarkable observer of nature and scientist Vladimir Klavdievich Arseniev, a well-known researcher of the Far Eastern taiga. This meeting took place in the Sikhote-Alin mountains on a clear moonlit night. Although many parameters of the lightning observed by Arseniev are typical, such cases are rare: ball lightning usually occurs during a thunderstorm.
In 1966, NASA circulated a questionnaire to 2,000 people, the first part of which asked two questions: "Have you seen ball lightning?" and “Have you seen a linear lightning strike in the immediate vicinity?”
The answers made it possible to compare the frequency of observation of ball lightning with the frequency of observation of ordinary lightning. The result was stunning: 409 out of 2,000 people saw a linear lightning strike close by, and two times less than ball lightning. There was even a lucky person who met ball lightning 8 times - another indirect proof that this is not at all such a rare phenomenon as is commonly thought.
Analysis of the second part of the questionnaire confirmed many previously known facts: ball lightning has an average diameter of about 20 cm; does not glow very brightly; the color is most often red, orange, white.
Interestingly, even observers who saw ball lightning up close often did not feel its thermal radiation, although it burns when touched directly.
There is such lightning from a few seconds to a minute; can penetrate into the premises through small holes, then restoring its shape. Many observers report that it throws out some kind of sparks and rotates.
It usually hovers a short distance from the ground, although it has also been seen in the clouds. Sometimes ball lightning quietly disappears, but sometimes it explodes, causing noticeable destruction.
Already listed properties are enough to confuse the researcher.
Of what substance, for example, must ball lightning be composed, if it does not fly up rapidly, like the balloon of the Montgolfier brothers, filled with smoke, although it is heated to at least a few hundred degrees?
With the temperature, too, not everything is clear: judging by the color of the glow, the lightning temperature is not less than 8,000 °K.
One of the observers, a chemist by profession familiar with plasma, estimated this temperature at 13,000-16,000°K! But the photometering of the lightning trace left on the film showed that the radiation comes out not only from its surface, but also from the entire volume.
Many observers also report that the lightning is translucent and the contours of objects appear through it. And this means that its temperature is much lower - no more than 5,000 degrees, since with greater heating, a layer of gas several centimeters thick is completely opaque and radiates like an absolutely black body.
The fact that ball lightning is rather "cold" is also evidenced by the relatively weak thermal effect produced by it.
Ball lightning carries a lot of energy. True, deliberately overestimated estimates are often found in the literature, but even a modest realistic figure - 105 joules - is very impressive for a lightning bolt with a diameter of 20 cm. If such energy were spent only on light radiation, it could glow for many hours.
During the explosion of ball lightning, a power of a million kilowatts can develop, since this explosion proceeds very quickly. Explosions, however, a person can arrange even more powerful ones, but if compared with “calm” energy sources, then the comparison will not be in their favor.
In particular, the energy intensity (energy per unit mass) of lightning is much higher than that of existing chemical batteries. By the way, it was the desire to learn how to accumulate relatively large energy in a small volume that attracted many researchers to the study of ball lightning. To what extent these hopes can be justified, it is too early to say.
The complexity of explaining such contradictory and diverse properties has led to the fact that the existing views on the nature of this phenomenon have exhausted, it seems, all conceivable possibilities.
Some scientists believe that lightning is constantly receiving energy from outside. For example, P. L. Kapitsa suggested that it occurs when a powerful beam of decimeter radio waves is absorbed, which can be emitted during a thunderstorm.
In reality, for the formation of an ionized bunch, which is ball lightning in this hypothesis, the existence of a standing wave of electromagnetic radiation with a very high field strength in the antinodes is necessary.
The necessary conditions can be realized very rarely, so, according to P. L. Kapitza, the probability of observing ball lightning in a given place (that is, where the specialist observer is located) is practically equal to zero.
It is sometimes assumed that ball lightning is the luminous part of the channel connecting the cloud with the earth, through which a large current flows. Figuratively speaking, it is assigned the role of the only visible area for some reason invisible linear lightning. For the first time this hypothesis was expressed by the Americans M. Yuman and O. Finkelstein, and later several modifications of the theory developed by them appeared.
The common difficulty of all these theories is that they assume the existence of energy flows of extremely high density for a long time and it is precisely because of this that they doom ball lightning to the "position" of an extremely improbable phenomenon.
In addition, in the theory of Yuman and Finkelstein it is difficult to explain the shape of lightning and its observed dimensions - the diameter of the lightning channel is usually about 3-5 cm, and ball lightnings are also found in a meter diameter.
There are quite a few hypotheses suggesting that ball lightning itself is a source of energy. The most exotic mechanisms for extracting this energy have been devised.
As an example of such exoticism, one can cite the idea of D. Ashby and C. Whitehead, according to which ball lightning is formed during the annihilation of antimatter dust particles that enter the dense layers of the atmosphere from space and are then carried away by a linear lightning discharge to the earth.
This idea, perhaps, could be supported theoretically, but, unfortunately, so far not a single suitable antimatter particle has been discovered.
Most often, various chemical and even nuclear reactions are used as a hypothetical source of energy. But at the same time, it is difficult to explain the ball shape of lightning - if the reactions take place in a gaseous medium, then diffusion and wind will lead to the removal of "thunderstorm substance" (Arago's term) from a twenty-centimeter ball in a matter of seconds and deform it even earlier.
Finally, there is not a single reaction that is known to occur in air with the energy release necessary to explain ball lightning.
The following point of view has been repeatedly expressed: ball lightning accumulates the energy released during a linear lightning strike. There are also many theories based on this assumption; a detailed review of them can be found in the popular book by S. Singer "The Nature of Ball Lightning".
These theories, as well as many others, contain difficulties and contradictions, which are given considerable attention in both serious and popular literature.
Cluster hypothesis of ball lightning
Now let's talk about a relatively new, so-called cluster hypothesis of ball lightning, developed in recent years by one of the authors of this article.
Let's start with the question, why is lightning shaped like a ball? In general, this question is not difficult to answer - there must be a force capable of holding together the particles of the "thunderstorm substance".
Why is a water drop spherical? This shape is given by surface tension.
The surface tension of a liquid arises from the fact that its particles - atoms or molecules - strongly interact with each other, much stronger than with the molecules of the surrounding gas.
Therefore, if the particle is near the interface, then a force begins to act on it, tending to return the molecule to the depth of the liquid.
The average kinetic energy of the particles of a liquid is approximately equal to the average energy of their interaction, and therefore the molecules of the liquid do not scatter. In gases, the kinetic energy of the particles exceeds the potential energy of interaction so much that the particles turn out to be practically free and there is no need to talk about surface tension.
But ball lightning is a gas-like body, and the “thunderstorm substance” nevertheless has surface tension - hence the shape of the ball, which it most often has. The only substance that could have such properties is plasma, an ionized gas.
Plasma consists of positive and negative ions and free electrons, that is, electrically charged particles. The energy of interaction between them is much greater than between the atoms of a neutral gas, respectively, and the surface tension is greater.
However, at relatively low temperatures - say, at 1,000 degrees Kelvin - and at normal atmospheric pressure, ball lightning from plasma could exist only for thousandths of a second, since ions quickly recombine, that is, turn into neutral atoms and molecules.
This contradicts observations - ball lightning lives longer. At high temperatures - 10-15 thousand degrees - the kinetic energy of the particles becomes too large, and ball lightning should simply fall apart. Therefore, researchers have to use potent means to "prolong the life" of ball lightning, to keep it for at least a few tens of seconds.
In particular, P. L. Kapitsa introduced into his model a powerful electromagnetic wave capable of constantly generating a new low-temperature plasma. Other researchers, who assume that the lightning plasma is hotter, had to figure out how to keep the ball from this plasma, that is, to solve a problem that has not yet been solved, although it is very important for many areas of physics and technology.
But what if we go the other way — we introduce into the model a mechanism that slows down the recombination of ions? Let's try to use water for this purpose. Water is a polar solvent. Its molecule can be roughly thought of as a rod, one end of which is positively charged and the other negatively charged.
Water is attached to positive ions with a negative end, and to negative ions - positive, forming a protective layer - a solvate shell. It can drastically slow down recombination. An ion together with a solvate shell is called a cluster.
So we finally come to the main ideas of the cluster theory: when a linear lightning is discharged, almost complete ionization of the molecules that make up the air, including water molecules, occurs.
The formed ions begin to quickly recombine, this stage takes thousandths of a second. At some point, there are more neutral water molecules than the remaining ions, and the process of cluster formation begins.
It also lasts, apparently, a fraction of a second and ends with the formation of a "thunderstorm substance" - similar in its properties to plasma and consisting of ionized air and water molecules surrounded by solvate shells.
However, this is still only an idea, and it remains to be seen whether it can explain the numerous known properties of ball lightning. Recall the well-known saying that at least a hare stew needs a hare, and ask ourselves the question: can clusters form in the air? The answer is comforting: yes, they can.
The proof of this literally fell (was brought) from the sky. At the end of the 1960s, with the help of geophysical rockets, a detailed study of the lowest layer of the ionosphere, the D layer, located at an altitude of about 70 km, was carried out. It turned out that despite the fact that there is very little water at such a height, all ions in the D layer are surrounded by solvate shells consisting of several water molecules.
The cluster theory assumes that the temperature of ball lightning is less than 1000°K, so there is no strong thermal radiation from it. Electrons at this temperature easily "stick" to atoms, forming negative ions, and all the properties of "lightning matter" are determined by clusters.
At the same time, the density of the lightning substance turns out to be approximately equal to the density of air under normal atmospheric conditions, that is, lightning can be somewhat heavier than air and go down, it can be somewhat lighter than air and rise, and, finally, it can be in a suspended state if the density of the "lightning substance" and air are equal.
All these cases have been observed in nature. By the way, the fact that the lightning goes down does not mean that it will fall to the ground - warming up the air under it, it can create an air cushion that keeps it suspended. Obviously, therefore, hovering is the most common type of ball lightning movement.
Clusters interact with each other much stronger than atoms of a neutral gas. Estimates have shown that the resulting surface tension is quite sufficient to give the lightning a spherical shape.
The density tolerance decreases rapidly with increasing lightning radius. Since the probability of an exact match between the density of air and the lightning substance is small, large lightning bolts - more than a meter in diameter - are extremely rare, while small ones should appear more often.
But lightning smaller than three centimeters is also practically not observed. Why? To answer this question, it is necessary to consider the energy balance of ball lightning, to find out where energy is stored in it, how much of it and what it is spent on. The energy of ball lightning is contained, naturally, in clusters. The recombination of negative and positive clusters releases energy from 2 to 10 electron volts.
Plasma usually loses quite a lot of energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation - its appearance is due to the fact that light electrons, moving in the field of ions, acquire very large accelerations.
The substance of lightning consists of heavy particles, it is not so easy to accelerate them, therefore the electromagnetic field is emitted weakly and most of the energy is removed from the lightning by the heat flux from its surface.
The heat flow is proportional to the surface area of ball lightning, and the energy storage is proportional to the volume. Therefore, small lightnings quickly lose their relatively small reserves of energy, and although they appear much more often than large ones, it is more difficult to notice them: they live too short.
So, lightning with a diameter of 1 cm cools down in 0.25 seconds, and with a diameter of 20 cm in 100 seconds. This last figure roughly coincides with the maximum observed lifetime of ball lightning, but significantly exceeds its average lifetime of several seconds.
The most real mechanism of "dying" of a large lightning is associated with the loss of stability of its boundary. During the recombination of a pair of clusters, a dozen light particles are formed, which at the same temperature leads to a decrease in the density of the "thunderstorm substance" and a violation of the conditions for the existence of lightning long before its energy is exhausted.
Surface instability begins to develop, lightning throws out pieces of its substance and, as it were, jumps from side to side. The ejected pieces cool almost instantly, like small lightning bolts, and the fragmented large lightning ends its existence.
But another mechanism for its decay is also possible. If for some reason the heat removal worsens, the lightning will start to heat up. In this case, the number of clusters with a small number of water molecules in the shell will increase, they will recombine faster, and the temperature will further increase. The end result is an explosion.
Why ball lightning glows
What facts must link scientists with a single theory in order to explain the nature of ball lightning?
During the recombination of clusters, the released heat is rapidly distributed among colder molecules.
But at some point, the temperature of the "volume" near the recombined particles can exceed the average temperature of the lightning substance by more than 10 times.
This "volume" glows like a gas heated to 10,000-15,000 degrees. There are relatively few such "hot spots", so the substance of ball lightning remains translucent.
It is clear that, from the point of view of the cluster theory, ball lightning can appear frequently. Only a few grams of water is needed to form lightning with a diameter of 20 cm, and during a thunderstorm there is usually plenty of it. Water is most often dispersed in the air, but in extreme cases, ball lightning can "find" it for itself on the surface of the earth.
By the way, since electrons are very mobile, during the formation of lightning, some of them can be “lost”, ball lightning as a whole will be charged (positively), and its movement will be determined by the distribution of the electric field.
The residual electrical charge explains such interesting properties of ball lightning as its ability to move against the wind, be attracted to objects and hang over high places.
The color of ball lightning is determined not only by the energy of the solvate shells and the temperature of the hot "volumes", but also by the chemical composition of its substance. It is known that if ball lightning appears when linear lightning strikes copper wires, then it is often colored blue or green - the usual "colors" of copper ions.
It is quite possible that excited metal atoms can also form clusters. The appearance of such "metal" clusters could explain some experiments with electric discharges, as a result of which luminous balls appeared, similar to ball lightning.
From what has been said, one may get the impression that, thanks to the cluster theory, the problem of ball lightning has finally received its final solution. But it is not so.
Despite the fact that behind the cluster theory there are calculations, hydrodynamic calculations of stability, with its help it was possible, apparently, to understand many properties of fireballs, it would be a mistake to say that the riddle of ball lightning no longer exists.
In confirmation of one stroke, one detail. In his story, V. K. Arseniev mentions a thin tail stretching from ball lightning. While we can not explain either the cause of its occurrence, or even what it is ...
As already mentioned, about a thousand reliable observations of ball lightning are described in the literature. This is, of course, not very much. It is obvious that each new observation, if carefully analyzed, makes it possible to obtain interesting information about the properties of ball lightning and helps in verifying the validity of one theory or another.
Therefore, it is very important that as many observations as possible become the property of researchers and that the observers themselves actively participate in the study of ball lightning. This is precisely what the Ball Lightning experiment is aimed at, which will be discussed later.
Fireball. This mysterious phenomenon of nature is still very little studied. There are many cases when this clot of crushing energy enters our homes. It penetrates the room through the slightest cracks, chimneys and even through smooth glass. Ball lightning is a fleeting phenomenon, but sometimes it can be observed for 20 seconds.
Ball lightning is considered a special type of lightning, which is a luminous fireball floating through the air (sometimes it looks like a mushroom, drop or pear).
Getting into the apartment, ball lightning behaves differently: it either goes out, or "splashes" with a crash. Its sizes vary. The most common lightning is about 15 cm in size. But there are times when it reaches 1 meter or more in diameter. In contact with a person, in general, the matter ends tragically. But in rare cases this does not happen. Not so long ago, such a contact happened in China: surprisingly, having hit the same person 2 times, she did not kill him (the incident was shown on TV).
A case of such a meeting with ball lightning is described: in Zimbabwe (Africa), a young woman escaped with such contact with only the loss of her dress and hairstyle. In Pyatigorsk, a roofing worker burned his hands while trying to brush off a small ball that seemed to be hovering over him. I had to be treated for a long time, because such burns do not heal for a long time. But there are many more cases that end tragically. In the summer there was a case when a still not old man was killed, who was grazing public cattle in the pasture. Ball lightning destroyed him along with his horse.
There have been instances where aircraft encounter these fireballs. But the death of the aircraft or the crew has not yet been recorded (only minor damage to the skin was noted).
What does ball lightning look like?
Ball lightnings come in different shapes: round, oval, conical, etc. The color of lightning also has a full range of colors. There are red with different shades, green, orange, white. Some types of lightning have a luminous "tail". What is this natural phenomenon? Scientists say that ball lightning is a clot of plasma, the temperature of which can be 30,000,000 degrees. This is higher than the solar temperature at its center.
Why does this happen, what is its nature of occurrence. Observations of the appearance of these "balls" from nowhere were noted - on a sunny clear day, mysterious orange balls moved close to the surface, in a place where there were no high-voltage wires and other types of energy sources. Maybe they arise deep in the bowels of our planet, maybe in its faults. In general, this mysterious phenomenon has not yet been studied by anyone. Our scientists know more about the origin of stars than about what goes on under their noses from age to age.
Types of ball lightning
Based on eyewitness accounts, two main types of ball lightning are distinguished:
- The first is a red fireball descending from a cloud. When such a heavenly gift touches some object on earth, such as a tree, it explodes. Interesting: ball lightning can be the size of a soccer ball, it can hiss and buzz menacingly.
- Another type of ball lightning travels along the earth's surface for a long time and glows with a bright white light. The ball is attracted to good conductors of electricity and can touch anything - the ground, a power line, or a person.
Time of existence of ball lightning
Ball lightning exists from a few seconds to several minutes. Why is it so?
One theory claims that the ball is a small copy of a thundercloud. Here's how it might happen. The smallest dust particles are constantly in the air. Lightning can impart an electrical charge to dust particles in a certain area of the air. Some dust particles are positively charged, others are negatively charged. In a further light representation lasting up to many seconds, millions of small lightnings connect oppositely charged dust particles, creating in the air the image of a sparkling fireball - ball lightning.
Ball lightning is a rare and little-studied phenomenon, but no less dangerous for that. The first mention of it dates back to the 2nd century BC, when the annals told about mysterious phenomena that took place in Rome. Similar precedents also occurred in the Middle Ages. In the modern world, the study of the nature of the occurrence of ball lightning began in the 19th century, when D. Arago described this phenomenon. Since then, there have been many studies, but humanity still cannot unravel its secret, and therefore it is so afraid. We will try to figure out why ball lightning is dangerous, as well as how to protect yourself from it.
The specifics of the impact of ball lightning
Such a phenomenon is usually striking in its brightness. In this case, the color of lightning can be very different:
- dazzling white;
- blue-blue;
- black;
But the most common shades are:
- orange;
- red;
- yellow.
Ball lightning can appear both in good weather, for example, on a sunny July morning, and during a thunderstorm. Science does not fully know the nature of its occurrence, because it can manifest itself both in open space: inside the clouds, in the air, above the ground; and indoors, including residential buildings, through a socket or window glass. The actual temperature of ball lightning is also unknown to scientists. According to their forecasts, it can fluctuate greatly: some experts believe that it is equal to 1000 ° C, while others think that it is a little more than 100 ° C. Lightning can abruptly change its direction in the process of movement. There are cases of the appearance of ball lightning simultaneously with the usual linear one. This relationship has not yet been accurately described, but this fact exists. This variability explains the difficulty in studying ball lightning. Many experts believed that such a phenomenon does not exist at all, but this is just some kind of optical illusion.
People who have encountered this effect say (and scientists echo them) that the phenomenon can be divided into 2 types:
- A red object descends from the sky. When it hits something, it explodes.
- It moves parallel to the earth's surface, power plants, transmission lines and even household appliances serve as a source of attraction for it.
The inhabitants, albeit unreliable, but the most informed source, so scientists often turn to them when studying this issue. Many people point out that it "hisses", and the duration of its glow ranges from fractions of a second to half a minute. For scientists, it is still a big mystery how ball lightning is formed, because we can observe it only at the final stage of its existence. Also of particular interest is its shape. That is why a number of hypotheses regarding this phenomenon are put forward.
Where does ball lightning come from
It is extremely difficult for scientists to describe the nature of its occurrence, since it is very difficult to capture it. It is not easy to take a photo of ball lightning, because this phenomenon sometimes lasts for a fraction of a second. Some witnesses claim to have seen a long glow. Sometimes it just quietly disappears, but there are times when it explodes and you can get a real ball lightning strike.
Many important points need to be explained:
- Creation conditions. After all, there is evidence indicating that it appeared not only in a thunderstorm, but also on an ordinary sunny day.
- The structure of matter. Ball lightning can pass through glass, walls, openings and at the same time restore its original shape.
- The nature of radiation. Whether energy is taken only from the surface or from the entire volume of the ball.
D. Arago, who was one of the first to become seriously interested in this issue, believed that this phenomenon arises due to the fact that nitrogen and oxygen interact with the release of energy. This hypothesis was developed by another scientist - Ya. Frenkel. He argued that the ball contains active gases formed as a result of this reaction. Based on this, we can say that the energy is located inside the object.
The physicist P. Kapitsa did not agree with this assumption. He believed that the reason for everything was the additional energy in the form of radio waves resulting from electromagnetic oscillations between the clouds and the earth during a thunderstorm. It accumulates and at some point begins to interact with a natural phenomenon. But this theory is also imperfect, because does not explain the appearance of ball lightning on sunny days.
Thanks to observations from the ground and air, the dimensions of existing spark charges are now well known. Their size ranges from 1 cm to 1 m or more. Most often, people have to deal with lightning with a diameter of 10-20 cm.
M. Yuman tried to repeat this process in the laboratory, but his experience failed. In order to find out the speed of ball lightning, its structure and features, it is necessary to regularly conduct experiments. However, since they are all very complex and costly, their implementation in practice is constantly delayed.
How to escape from ball lightning
Ball lightning poses a great danger to humans. As a result of contact with it, you will at best get off with a serious burn, and more often there are incidents with a fatal outcome. Most importantly - do not twitch sharply and panic. If you do not know what to do, if there is a ball lightning nearby, then the simplest advice is not to run. She is very susceptible to various fluctuations in the air, so she will immediately follow you, and her speed is much higher.
It is necessary to try to get away from the path along which the object is moving, while it is strictly forbidden to turn your back on it. Stay as far away from all your gadgets as possible, and also avoid contact with synthetic materials, as they are very electrifying. If you are wearing such clothes, then it is better to just freeze and stay in place. Then there is a chance that the threat will simply pass by. If this could not be avoided, and the victim has burns, then you need to send him to a ventilated room, and then wrap him up warmly. It is necessary to try to help the victim by giving artificial respiration, if necessary. This will help to stabilize his condition a little. However, the first thing you need to immediately contact the ambulance. Now you know what to do when meeting with ball lightning.
It doesn’t matter if you encounter a phenomenon on the street or in an apartment, do not try to disturb its structure in any way (for example, by throwing something inside). By doing this, you can only harm yourself, since the probability of an explosion is greatly increased. How to escape from ball lightning in the house?
Immediately warn your loved ones or colleagues (if you are at work) about the existing threat. Also try to prevent panic. It is necessary to approach the window as carefully as possible and open the window. There is a good chance that the ball will just come out. At the same time, you need to be as collected as possible, not to hesitate, but also not to allow sudden movements.
Ball lightning not only easily passes through walls, but is also capable of completely destroying even a strong building. In order to prevent this, it is better to make sure that your home is safe in advance. We recommend that you read the article “Protecting your home from a direct lightning strike. Lightning protection: lightning rod, lightning rod, grounding device. It contains all the relevant security measures.
Places where fireballs happen
It is simply impossible to predict any specific place of appearance, so no one is protected from such a threat. There were cases when the repeated appearance of this effect in one area was recorded. Ball lightning in the city near Pskov was seen several times a year. But at the same time, the nature of its occurrence remained unknown. Scientists even tried to calculate it, but the destructive power was so great that all the instruments became unusable. There is a chronicle from other places confirming the danger of this phenomenon, for example, INCREDIBLE shots with ball lightning (5 videos):
The consequences can be dire. You already know what ball lightning looks like, so you can imagine the extent of its destructive effect. At best, it will take a long time to heal. It all depends on the degree of burns received and on the strength of the discharge. Hearing and vision are severely damaged. As mentioned earlier, the flash can be blindingly bright.
Naturally, this also negatively affects the cardiac and muscular systems. The main rule in such cases is to provide prompt and qualified assistance. This will help to save the victim not only life, but also a full physical condition. Photos of eyewitnesses of ball lightning are amazing.
At the same time, history knows interesting cases when, after contact with such an object, people discovered unusual abilities in themselves, their illnesses disappeared. But these are exceptions and miracles, but in reality, if ball lightning hit a person, then he is in big trouble. The probability of receiving a dangerous electrical discharge remains not only while thunder rumbles, but also after. There is a video "Ball Lightning - unique eyewitness videos", in which people are amazed by the phenomenon, not being afraid to film what is happening. In this case, the usual radius is on average 10 km.
Ball lightning, the voltage of which is much higher than ordinary lightning, can permanently cripple life. Therefore, it is worth thinking about your safety right now. This will help you with products and services from the company "Alef-Em", where real professionals work who will take care of you. You need to think about ways to improve the protection of your apartment and not be afraid to face danger.
How to protect yourself from ball lightning with the help of the services we provide
Lightning rods from Alef-Em are reliable protection in emergency situations. It is enough to go to our website and choose the necessary products in order to protect yourself. Our sales consultants, who have extensive experience, will help you with this. You can talk with them on various topics related to the safety of your home, both during a thunderstorm and when ball lightning appears.
You already know how to behave if ball lightning has flown into the house. But using our services, you will be able to minimize, if not completely avoid this probability. The charges will be directed to the ground, such lightning rods have already been tested many times. The main evidence of their quality is not certificates at all, but grateful customer reviews.
Ball lightning can easily fly into a window, but this is ruled out thanks to our systems. They consist of the following parts:
- metal base;
- a device that is located on the roof of the building;
- cable acting as a connector.
It is not enough to know how to behave during ball lightning, you must always be prepared for the worst case scenario. Reliable lightning protection from Alef-M will help to avoid troubles from this natural phenomenon.
Having been working for about ten years, they managed to become real leaders in this market segment. We guarantee a result that will serve you for many years. The methods of our work can be found in the article "Traditional lightning protection of buildings: lightning rod (lightning rod)".
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We only work with reliable materials, because the safety of our customers comes first.
Our site contains a lot of useful materials, where you can read articles about ball lightning. Everyone risks meeting her, but it is important to be prepared and remain just an eyewitness. After watching a video about ball lightning, you can see how dangerous it is. Contact our company, where you are always welcome. Qualified staff will help and quickly make the apartment much safer. They will show a video about ball lightning in the house, point out the main mistakes and tell you how to behave in an emergency.
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Where does ball lightning come from and what is it? Scientists have been asking themselves this question for many decades in a row, and so far there is no clear answer. A stable plasma ball resulting from a powerful high-frequency discharge. Another hypothesis is antimatter micrometeorites.
In total, there are more than 400 unproven hypotheses.
…A barrier with a spherical surface can appear between matter and antimatter. Powerful gamma radiation will inflate this ball from the inside, and prevent the penetration of matter to the alien antimatter, and then we will see a glowing pulsating ball that will soar above the Earth. This view appears to have been confirmed. Two British scientists methodically inspected the sky with gamma-ray detectors. And registered four times an abnormally high level of gamma radiation in the expected energy region.
The first documented case of the appearance of ball lightning took place in 1638 in England, in one of the churches in Devon. As a result of the atrocities of a huge fireball, 4 people died, about 60 were injured. Subsequently, new reports of such phenomena periodically appeared, but there were few of them, since eyewitnesses considered ball lightning an illusion or an optical illusion.
The first generalization of cases of a unique natural phenomenon was made by the Frenchman F. Arago in the middle of the 19th century; about 30 testimonies were collected in his statistics. The growing number of such meetings made it possible to obtain, based on the descriptions of eyewitnesses, some of the characteristics inherent in the heavenly guest. Ball lightning is an electrical phenomenon, a fireball moving in the air in an unpredictable direction, luminous, but not radiating heat. This is where the general properties end and the particulars characteristic of each of the cases begin. This is due to the fact that the nature of ball lightning has not been fully understood, since so far it has not been possible to investigate this phenomenon in the laboratory or to recreate a model for study. In some cases, the diameter of the fireball was several centimeters, sometimes reaching half a meter.
For several hundred years, ball lightning has been the object of study by many scientists, including N. Tesla, G. I. Babat, P. L. Kapitsa, B. Smirnov, I. P. Stakhanov and others. Scientists have put forward various theories of the occurrence of ball lightning, of which there are over 200. According to one version, an electromagnetic wave formed between the earth and clouds reaches a critical amplitude at a certain moment and forms a spherical gas discharge. Another version is that ball lightning consists of high-density plasma and contains its own microwave radiation field. Some scientists believe that the fireball phenomenon is the result of the focusing of cosmic rays by clouds. Most of the cases of this phenomenon were recorded before a thunderstorm and during a thunderstorm, therefore the hypothesis of the emergence of an energetically favorable environment for the appearance of various plasma formations, one of which is lightning, is considered the most relevant. The opinions of experts agree that when meeting with a heavenly guest, you must adhere to certain rules of conduct. The main thing is not to make sudden movements, not to run away, try to minimize air vibrations.
Their "behavior" is unpredictable, the trajectory and speed of flight defy any explanation. They, as if endowed with reason, can go around the obstacles facing them - trees, buildings and structures, or they can “crash” into them. After this collision, fires can start.
Often fireballs fly into people's homes. Through open windows and doors, chimneys, pipes. But sometimes even through a closed window! There is a lot of evidence of how CMM melted window glass, leaving behind a perfectly even round hole.
According to eyewitnesses, fireballs appeared from the outlet! They “live” from one to 12 minutes. They can simply disappear instantly without leaving any traces behind, but they can also explode. The latter is especially dangerous. Fatal burns can result from these explosions. It was also noticed that after the explosion, a rather persistent, very unpleasant smell of sulfur remains in the air.
Fireballs come in different colors - from white to black, from yellow to blue. When moving, they often hum like high-voltage power lines hum.
It remains a big mystery what affects the trajectory of its movement. It's definitely not the wind, as she can move against it as well. It is not a difference in the atmospheric phenomenon. These are not people and not other living organisms, since sometimes it can peacefully fly around them, and sometimes “crash” into them, which leads to death.
Ball lightning is evidence of our very unimportant knowledge of such a seemingly ordinary and already studied phenomenon as electricity. None of the previously put forward hypotheses has yet explained all its quirks. What is proposed in this article may not even be a hypothesis, but only an attempt to describe the phenomenon in a physical way, without resorting to exotics, such as antimatter. The first and main assumption: ball lightning is a discharge of ordinary lightning that has not reached the Earth. More precisely: ball and linear lightning are one process, but in two different modes - fast and slow.
When switching from a slow mode to a fast one, the process becomes explosive - ball lightning turns into a linear one. The reverse transition of linear lightning into ball lightning is also possible; In some mysterious, or perhaps accidental way, this transition was managed by the talented physicist Richman, a contemporary and friend of Lomonosov. He paid for his luck with his life: the ball lightning he received killed its creator.
Ball lightning and the invisible atmospheric charge path connecting it with the cloud are in a special state of "elma". Elma, unlike plasma - low-temperature electrified air - is stable, cools down and spreads very slowly. This is due to the properties of the boundary layer between the elm and ordinary air. Here the charges exist in the form of negative ions, bulky and inactive. Calculations show that elms spread in as much as 6.5 minutes, and they are replenished regularly every thirtieth of a second. It is through such a time interval that an electromagnetic pulse passes in the discharge path, replenishing Kolobok with energy.
Therefore, the duration of the existence of ball lightning is, in principle, unlimited. The process should stop only when the charge of the cloud is exhausted, more precisely, the “effective charge” that the cloud is able to transfer to the path. This is exactly how the fantastic energy and relative stability of ball lightning can be explained: it exists due to the influx of energy from outside. Thus, neutrino phantoms in Lem's science fiction novel Solaris, possessing the materiality of ordinary people and incredible strength, could exist only when colossal energy was supplied from the living Ocean.
The electric field in ball lightning is close in magnitude to the level of breakdown in a dielectric, whose name is air. In such a field, the optical levels of atoms are excited, which is why ball lightning glows. In theory, weak, non-luminous, and hence invisible ball lightning should be more frequent.
The process in the atmosphere develops in the mode of ball or linear lightning, depending on the specific conditions in the path. There is nothing incredible, rare in this duality. Consider ordinary combustion. It is possible in the regime of slow flame propagation, which does not exclude the regime of a rapidly moving detonation wave.
…Lightning descends from the sky. It is not yet clear what it should be, ball or ordinary. It greedily sucks the charge out of the cloud, and the field in the track decreases accordingly. If the field in the path falls below a critical value before it hits the Earth, the process will switch to the ball lightning mode, the path will become invisible, and we will notice that ball lightning descends to the Earth.
In this case, the external field is much smaller than the ball lightning's own field and does not affect its motion. That is why bright lightning moves randomly. Between flashes, ball lightning glows weaker, its charge is small. The motion is now directed by the external field and therefore rectilinear. Ball lightning can be carried by the wind. And it's clear why. After all, the negative ions that it consists of are the same air molecules, only with electrons attached to them.
The rebounding of ball lightning from the near-Earth "trampoline" layer of air is simply explained. When ball lightning approaches the Earth, it induces a charge in the soil, begins to release a lot of energy, heats up, expands and quickly rises under the action of the Archimedean force.
Ball lightning plus the Earth's surface form an electrical capacitor. It is known that a capacitor and a dielectric attract each other. Therefore, ball lightning tends to be located above dielectric bodies, which means it prefers to be above wooden bridges, or above a barrel of water. The long-wavelength radio emission associated with ball lightning is generated by the entire path of ball lightning.
The hissing of ball lightning is caused by bursts of electromagnetic activity. These flashes follow with a frequency of about 30 hertz. The hearing threshold of the human ear is 16 hertz.
Ball lightning is surrounded by its own electromagnetic field. Flying past a light bulb, it can inductively heat up and burn out its coil. Once in the wiring of the lighting, radio broadcasting or telephone network, it closes its entire route to this network. Therefore, during a thunderstorm, it is desirable to keep the networks grounded, say, through discharge gaps.
Ball lightning, "flattened" over a barrel of water, together with the charges induced in the ground, constitutes a capacitor with a dielectric. Ordinary water is not an ideal dielectric, it has a significant electrical conductivity. A current begins to flow inside such a capacitor. Water is heated by Joule heat. The "barrel experiment" is well known, when ball lightning heated about 18 liters of water to a boil. According to a theoretical estimate, the average power of ball lightning during its free soaring in the air is approximately 3 kilowatts.
In exceptional cases, for example, under artificial conditions, an electrical breakdown can occur inside ball lightning. And then plasma appears in it! In this case, a lot of energy is released, artificial ball lightning can shine brighter than the Sun. But usually the power of ball lightning is relatively small - it is in the Elma state. Apparently, the transition of artificial ball lightning from the Elma state to the plasma state is possible in principle.
Knowing the nature of the electric Kolobok, you can make it work. Artificial ball lightning can greatly surpass natural in power. By drawing an ionized trace in the atmosphere with a focused laser beam along a given trajectory, we can direct the fireball to the right place. Now let's change the supply voltage, transfer the ball lightning to the linear mode. Giant sparks obediently rush along the trajectory we have chosen, crushing rocks, felling trees.
Thunderstorm over the airport. The air terminal is paralyzed: the landing and takeoff of planes is prohibited ... But the start button is pressed on the control panel of the lightning dissipative system. From a tower near the airfield, a fiery arrow shot up to the clouds. It was the artificial controlled ball lightning that had risen above the tower, switched to the linear lightning mode and, rushing into the thundercloud, entered it. The lightning path connected the cloud with the Earth, and the electric charge of the cloud was discharged to the Earth. The process can be repeated several times. There will be no more thunderstorms, the clouds have cleared. Planes can land and take off again.
In the Arctic, it will be possible to light an artificial sun. From the 200-meter tower, a 300-meter charge path of artificial ball lightning rises up. Ball lightning switches to plasma mode and shines brightly from a height of half a kilometer above the city.
For good illumination in a circle with a radius of 5 kilometers, ball lightning is sufficient, emitting a power of several hundred megawatts. In an artificial plasma regime, such a power is a solvable problem.
The Electric Gingerbread Man, which has avoided close acquaintance with scientists for so many years, will not leave: sooner or later it will be tamed, and it will learn to benefit people. B. Kozlov.
1. What is ball lightning is still not known for certain. Physicists have not yet learned how to reproduce real ball lightning in the laboratory. Of course, they get something, but scientists don’t know how similar this “something” is to a real fireball.
2. When there is no experimental data, scientists turn to statistics - to observations, eyewitness accounts, rare photographs. In fact, rare: if there are at least one hundred thousand photographs of ordinary lightning in the world, then there are much fewer photographs of ball lightning - only six to eight dozen.
3. The color of ball lightning can be different: red, dazzling white, blue, and even black. Witnesses saw fireballs in all shades of green and orange.
4. Judging by the name, all lightning should have the shape of a ball, but no, both pear-shaped and egg-shaped were observed. Particularly lucky observers were lightning in the form of a cone, ring, cylinder, and even in the form of a jellyfish. Someone saw a white tail behind the lightning.
5. According to the observations of scientists and eyewitness accounts, ball lightning can appear in a house through a window, a door, a stove, or even just appear out of nowhere. And it can also “blow out” from an electrical outlet. Outdoors, ball lightning can come from a tree and a pole, descend from clouds, or be born from ordinary lightning.
6. Usually ball lightning is small - fifteen centimeters in diameter or the size of a soccer ball, but there are also five-meter giants. Ball lightning does not live long - usually no more than half an hour, it moves horizontally, sometimes rotating, at a speed of several meters per second, sometimes it hangs motionless in the air.
7. Ball lightning shines like a hundred-watt light bulb, sometimes crackles or squeaks, and usually causes radio interference. Sometimes it smells - nitric oxide or the hellish smell of sulfur. With luck, it will quietly dissolve into the air, but more often it explodes, destroying and melting objects and evaporating water.
8. “... A red-cherry spot is visible on the forehead, and a thunderous electrical force came out of it from the legs to the boards. The legs and toes are blue, the shoe is torn, not burnt ... ". This is how the great Russian scientist Mikhail Vasilievich Lomonosov described the death of his colleague and friend Richman. He was also worried “that this case should not be interpreted against the increments of the sciences,” and he was right in his fears: in Russia, research on electricity was temporarily banned.
9. In 2010, Austrian scientists Josef Pier and Alexander Kendl of the University of Innsbruck suggested that evidence of ball lightning could be interpreted as a manifestation of phosphenes, that is, visual sensations without exposure to light on the eye. Their calculations show that the magnetic fields of certain lightning bolts with repeated discharges induce electric fields in the neurons of the visual cortex. Thus, fireballs are hallucinations.
The theory was published in the scientific journal Physics Letters A. Now supporters of the existence of ball lightning must register ball lightning with scientific equipment, and thus refute the theory of Austrian scientists.
10. In 1761, ball lightning entered the church of the Vienna Academic College, tore off the gilding from the eaves of the altar column and laid it on a silver spit. People have a much harder time: at best, ball lightning will burn. But it can also kill - like Georg Richmann. Here's your hallucination!
Ball lightning is a unique natural phenomenon: the nature of occurrence; physical properties; characteristic
To date, the only and main problem in the study of this phenomenon is the inability to recreate such lightning in scientific laboratories.
Therefore, most assumptions about the physical nature of a spherical electric bunch in the atmosphere remain theoretical.
The first to suggest the nature of ball lightning was the Russian physicist Pyotr Leonidovich Kapitsa. According to his teachings, this kind of lightning occurs during a discharge between thunderclouds and the earth on the electromagnetic axis along which it drifts.
In addition to Kapitsa, a number of physicists put forward theories about the sound and frame structure of the discharge or about the ionic origin of ball lightning.
Many skeptics have argued that this is just a visual illusion or short-term hallucinations, and such a natural phenomenon does not exist. At present, modern equipment and apparatus has not yet recorded the radio waves necessary to create lightning.
How ball lightning is formed
It is formed, as a rule, during a strong thunderstorm, however, it has been noticed more than once in sunny weather. Ball lightning occurs suddenly and in a single case. It can appear from clouds, from trees or other objects and buildings. Ball lightning easily overcomes obstacles in its path, including falling into confined spaces. Cases are described when this type of lightning arose from a TV, aircraft cockpit, sockets, indoors ... At the same time, it can bypass objects in its path, passing through them.
Repeatedly, the occurrence of an electric clot was recorded in the same places. The process of movement or migration of lightning occurs mainly horizontally and at a height of about a meter above the ground. There is also a sound accompaniment in the form of a crunch, crackle and squeak, which leads to interference in the radio.
According to the descriptions of eyewitnesses of this phenomenon, two types of lightning are distinguished:
Characteristics
The origin of such lightning is still unknown. There are versions that an electric discharge occurs either on the surface of lightning, or comes out of the total volume.
Scientists do not yet know the physical and chemical composition, thanks to which such a phenomenon of nature can easily overcome doorways, windows, small cracks, and again acquire its original size and shape. In this regard, hypothetical assumptions were put forward about the structure of gas, but such a gas, according to the laws of physics, would have to fly into the air under the influence of internal heat.
- The size of ball lightning is usually 10 - 20 centimeters.
- The color of the glow, as a rule, can be blue, white or orange. However, witnesses of this phenomenon report that a permanent color was not observed and it always changed.
- The shape of ball lightning is in most cases spherical.
- The duration of existence was estimated to be no more than 30 seconds.
- The temperature has not been fully investigated, but according to experts, it is up to 1000 degrees Celsius.
Without knowing the nature of the origin of this natural phenomenon, it is difficult to make assumptions about how ball lightning moves. According to one theory, the movement of this form of electric discharge can occur due to the force of the wind, the action of electromagnetic oscillations, or the force of attraction.
Why ball lightning is dangerous
Despite the many different hypotheses about the nature of the occurrence and characteristics of this natural phenomenon, it must be taken into account that interaction with ball lightning is extremely dangerous, since a ball filled with a large discharge can not only injure, but also kill. An explosion can lead to tragic consequences.
- The first rule to follow when meeting with a fireball is not to panic, do not run, do not make quick and abrupt movements.
- It is necessary to slowly leave the trajectory of the ball, while keeping a distance from it and not turn your back.
- When ball lightning appears in a closed room, the first thing to do is to try to carefully open the window in order to create a draft.
- In addition to the above rules, it is strictly forbidden to throw any objects into the plasma ball, as this can lead to a fatal explosion.
So in the Lugansk region, lightning the size of a golf ball killed a driver, and in Pyatigorsk, a man, trying to brush off a luminous ball, received severe burns on his hands. In Buryatia, lightning descended through the roof and exploded in the house. The explosion was so strong that the windows and doors were knocked out, the walls were damaged, and the owners of the household were injured and received a shell shock.
Video: 10 Facts about ball lightning
This video presents to your attention the facts about the most mysterious and amazing natural phenomenon.
