How to understand what will be ball lightning. Secrets of ball lightning

Where does ball lightning come from and how to foresee its appearance? How long does it live and what secret dangers can it pose to a person? Is it true that she has her own mind? To understand this complex natural phenomenon, there is little knowledge of physics. Perhaps something more is hidden here?

What is ball lightning?

It is generally accepted that fireball- this is an extremely rare phenomenon of nature, which is an electric body in the form of a ball, capable of moving through the air along a completely unpredictable trajectory and overcoming great distances.

The size of this ball can be different - from a few centimeters in diameter to the size of a soccer ball. She "lives" for a short time, at most - two minutes, but even during this time she manages to do a lot of incomprehensible and inexplicable things that defy logical analysis.

Most often, ball lightning is born during a thunderstorm, when the air is filled with electrical particles. Connecting with each other, positively and negatively charged elements create a luminous electric ball. It can be not only white, but also red, yellow, and in rare cases even black.

Eyewitnesses say that lightning can occur in absolutely clear weather, and the time and place of its occurrence cannot be predicted. She can easily fly into an apartment through an open window, a fireplace, an outlet, a fan, and even a landline phone.

Lightning strike

Meeting with such an electric ball does not bode well. And if a lightning strike from the sky can be prevented with the help of a lightning rod, then there is no escape from ball lightning. It can pass through solid bodies - walls, stones, and when flying it makes strange sounds - buzzing, hissing. Her actions cannot be predicted, it is impossible to escape from her, and sometimes she behaves so strangely that some scientists consider her a sentient being.

Watching this phenomenon from the outside is safe enough, but there have been cases when lightning has pursued specific people throughout their lives. The most famous case is that of the British Major Summerford, who was struck by lightning three times in his entire life. This caused serious damage to his health. But even after death, evil fate did not leave him alone - a lightning strike in the cemetery completely destroyed the gravestone of the unfortunate major.

Hence the thought arises - is not lightning a punishment from above for some bad deeds? There are cases in history when lightning struck notorious sinners who could not be punished by ordinary, earthly justice. Not without reason in Russia the phrase: "To strike you with thunder!" - sounded like the most terrible curse.

In many ancient cultures, lightning and thunder were considered celestial omens and expressions of divine wrath sent against the guilty to intimidate or punish. Ball lightning called nothing more than "the coming of the devil" or "hell flames." But do they always cause harm?

There are many cases in history when a meeting with ball lightning brought good luck and even healing from diseases. A person who survives a lightning strike is considered righteous, "marked by God", who is promised heaven after death. Often, people who survived such an event discovered new abilities and talents in themselves that were not there before.

Consequences of a lightning strike

A lightning strike is dangerous primarily for aircraft, as it can disrupt radio communications, the operation of equipment and lead to an accident. Lightning striking a tree or building causes fires and severe damage. If a person is in her way, the consequences are most often tragic - severe burns or death.

A person who survives a lightning strike is considered lucky. But this is a very dubious happiness - the consequences of a fireball burn for the body will be sad. It happened that after such "luck" people lost their memory, speech, hearing and vision. The nervous system is especially affected by the electric current.

Ball lightning behaves quite differently. Even a lightning rod will not save from its appearance. It acts selectively: out of several people standing nearby, one can cause severe harm and even kill, but not the other. She is able to melt the coins in the wallet without damaging the paper money.

Passing through the human body, ball lightning may not leave marks on the skin, but burn all the insides. From contact with it, intricate patterns remain on the human body - from digital symbols to landscapes of the area where the fatal “meeting” took place.

It is this strange behavior of a luminous electric ball that causes some scientists to suspect and speculate - what if this is intelligent life? It acts too unpredictably, moreover, often after its appearance in open areas, the famous crop circles appeared. However, there is no direct evidence for such hypotheses.

How to behave when meeting with ball lightning

If you follow the safety precautions, then most likely, such a meeting does not threaten you. However, there are general recommendations that we advise you to listen to, even if you consider yourself a lucky person.

1. During thunderstorms, close windows, doors, stove vents, and other outlets where electrical discharge can enter. The ideal option would be to turn off the electricity.
2. If you see ball lightning in flight, don't wave it around or try to film it - chances are high that the lightning will be attracted to the metal object you're holding.
3. If lightning appears near you, never try to run away from it! Because ball lightning is lighter than air, the movement away from it will cause an air vortex that will cause the lightning to follow you. The best thing to do is to sit still and wait to see what happens.
4. Do not try to throw something into the fireball! From this, it can explode, and the consequences are difficult to even predict.
5. During thunderstorms, do not hide under trees or stay inside a vehicle.
6. It is estimated that 86% of people struck by lightning are men. Therefore, if your body has an excess of testosterone, be doubly careful during a thunderstorm.
7. If you are wearing wet clothes, the chances of lightning strikes increase. Electrical discharges are always attracted to water and moisture.

The person affected by lightning strike, it is necessary to transfer to a warm room, wrap it in a blanket, if necessary, apply artificial respiration and take it to the hospital as soon as possible.

The facts collected here are given more for a general idea of ​​the nature of ball lightning than for practical application, and are unlikely to ever be useful to you in real life. After all, the chance to see such a phenomenon is extremely small. According to statistics, the probability of meeting a person with ball lightning is 1 in 600,000.

About the phenomenon of ball lightning, its study, eyewitness accounts you can see in this video:

Human fear most often comes from ignorance. Few people are afraid of ordinary lightning - a spark of electrical discharge - and everyone knows how to behave during a thunderstorm. But what is ball lightning, is it dangerous, and what to do if you encounter this phenomenon?

It is very easy to recognize ball lightning, despite the variety of its types. Usually it has, as you can easily guess, the shape of a ball, glowing like a 60-100 watt light bulb. Much less often there are lightning similar to a pear, a mushroom or a drop, or such an exotic form as a pancake, bagel or lens. But the variety of colors is simply amazing: from transparent to black, but shades of yellow, orange and red are still in the lead. The color can be uneven, and sometimes fireballs change it like a chameleon.

There is no need to talk about the constant size of the plasma ball either, it varies from a few centimeters to several meters. But usually people encounter ball lightning with a diameter of 10-20 centimeters.

Worst of all in describing lightning is their temperature and mass. According to scientists, the temperature can be in the range from 100 to 1000 °C. But at the same time, people who encountered ball lightning at arm's length rarely noticed at least some heat emanating from them, although logically, they should have received burns. The same mystery is with the mass: no matter what size the lightning was, it weighs no more than 5-7 grams.

If you have ever seen from afar an object similar to what MirSovetov described, congratulations - it most likely was ball lightning.

The behavior of ball lightning is unpredictable. They refer to phenomena that appear when they want, where they want and do what they want. So, earlier it was believed that ball lightnings are born only during thunderstorms and always accompany linear (ordinary) lightning. However, it gradually became clear that they can appear in sunny clear weather. It was believed that lightning was "attracted" to places of high voltage with a magnetic field - electrical wires. But there were cases when they actually appeared in the middle of an open field ...

Fireballs erupt in an incomprehensible way from electrical outlets in the house and "leak" through the smallest cracks in the walls and glass, turning into "sausages" and then again taking their usual form. At the same time, there are no melted traces left ... They either hang quietly in one place at a short distance from the ground, or rush somewhere at a speed of 8-10 meters per second. Having met a person or an animal on its way, lightning can stay away from them and behave peacefully, they can curiously circle nearby, or they can attack and burn or kill, after which they either melt as if nothing had happened, or explode with a terrible roar. However, despite the frequent stories about those injured or killed by ball lightning, their number is relatively small - only 9 percent. Most often, lightning, having circled the area, disappears without causing any harm. If she appeared in the house, then it usually “leaks” back into the street and only melts there.

Also, many inexplicable cases have been recorded when fireballs are "attached" to a particular place or person, and appear regularly. At the same time, in relation to a person, they are divided into two types - those that attack him in each of their appearances and those that do no harm or attack people who are nearby. There is another mystery: ball lightning, having killed a person, is completely without any trace on the body, and the corpse does not stiffen or decompose for a long time ...

Some scientists say lightning just "stops time" in the body.

Ball lightning is a unique and peculiar phenomenon. Over the history of mankind, more than 10 thousand evidence of meetings with "intelligent balls" has accumulated. However, until now, scientists cannot boast of great achievements in the study of these objects.

There are many disparate theories about the origin and "life" of ball lightning. From time to time, in laboratory conditions, it turns out to create objects that are similar in appearance and properties to ball lightning - plasmoids. Nevertheless, no one could provide a coherent picture and a logical explanation for this phenomenon.

The most famous and developed before the rest is the theory of Academician P. L. Kapitsa, which explains the appearance of ball lightning and some of its features by the occurrence of short-wave electromagnetic oscillations in the space between thunderclouds and the earth's surface. However, Kapitsa failed to explain the nature of those very short-wave oscillations. In addition, as noted above, ball lightning does not necessarily accompany ordinary lightning and can appear in clear weather. However, most of the other theories are based on the findings of Academician Kapitsa.

A hypothesis different from Kapitsa's theory was created by B. M. Smirnov, who claims that the core of ball lightning is a cellular structure with a strong frame and low weight, and the frame is made of plasma filaments.

D. Turner explains the nature of ball lightning by thermochemical effects occurring in saturated water vapor in the presence of a sufficiently strong electric field.

However, the theory of the New Zealand chemists D. Abrahamson and D. Dinnis is considered the most interesting. They found that when lightning strikes soil containing silicates and organic carbon, a ball of silicon and silicon carbide fibers is formed. These fibers gradually oxidize and begin to glow. This is how a "fire" ball is born, heated to 1200-1400 ° C, which slowly melts. But if the temperature of the lightning goes off scale, then it explodes. However, even this coherent theory does not confirm all cases of lightning occurrence.

For official science, ball lightning still continues to be a mystery. Maybe that's why so many near-scientific theories and even more fictions appear around her.

We will not tell stories here about fiery-eyed demons that leave a smell of brimstone, hell-hounds, and "firebirds" as fireballs are sometimes represented. However, their strange behavior leads many researchers of this phenomenon to assume that lightning "thinks". At a minimum, fireballs are considered instruments for the study of our world. As a maximum - energy entities that also collect some information about our planet and its inhabitants.

An indirect confirmation of these theories is the fact that any collection of information is work with energy.

And the unusual property of lightning to disappear in one place and appear instantly in another. There are suggestions that the same ball lightning "dives" into a certain part of space - another dimension that lives according to other physical laws - and, having dropped information, appears again in our world at a new point. Yes, and the actions of lightning on the living beings of our planet are also meaningful - they do not touch some, they “touch” others, and some simply tear out pieces of flesh, as if for genetic analysis!

The frequent appearance of ball lightning during thunderstorms is also easily explained. During bursts of energy - electric discharges - portals from a parallel dimension open, and their collectors of information about our world get into our world ...

The main rule when ball lightning appears - whether in an apartment or on the street - do not panic and do not make sudden movements. Don't run anywhere! Lightning is very susceptible to air turbulence, which we create when running and other movements, and which pull it along. You can break away from ball lightning only by car, but by no means on your own.

Try to quietly move out of the way of the lightning and stay away from it, but do not turn your back on it. If you are in an apartment - go to the window and open the window. With a high degree of probability, lightning will fly out.

Ball lightning - a beautiful myth or? Thousands of people around the world claim to have personally seen it - a luminous, approximately spherical ball of light. As a rule, this phenomenon is noted during a thunderstorm, but the details of observations vary greatly. The fireballs range in size from a few centimeters to a meter or more. They can be red, blue, yellow, white or even green. The time of their existence is from several seconds to several minutes. They disappear without a trace or explode, creating destruction and causing harm. What is ball lightning and what to do when meeting with it?

Characteristics of a natural phenomenon

They can wander above the earth or descend from the sky, hang motionless or fly at impressive speed, radiate heat or appear completely cold. There are reports of fireballs appearing in flying planes and traveling over the heads of stunned passengers. Some eyewitnesses even claim that the shining balls move and behave like living beings. Sometimes they keep aloof, sometimes, as if circling around with curiosity, and often they “attack”.

Contact with the mysterious ball can be fraught with burns or even death. If a thunderstorm is raging outside the window, can ball lightning pass through the glass? Yes, and even through the wall, as numerous witnesses of such incidents say. Therefore, it is not surprising that people ask a natural question: if ball lightning really exists in nature, how to behave in it and protect yourself?

Eminent philosophers and scientists such as Lucius Seneca, Niels Bohr and Peter Kapitsa carefully studied the phenomenon of ball lightning. Modern physicists, who for a long time doubted the reliability of this amazing phenomenon, are now trying to formulate a plausible explanation for its existence, which is no longer in doubt. So far, it has not been possible to get clear answers to the accumulated questions.

What is ball lightning and what should be done when meeting with it? Why does it move along unpredictable trajectories and "behave" so strangely? What energy source supports it? In what cases does it pose a threat to people, and in what cases is it harmless?

What to do if ball lightning has flown?

Many scientific and amateur versions have been put forward about the physics and origin of the strange phenomenon, but so far none of them has been confirmed. It has not yet been possible to obtain ball lightning in the laboratory either. To date, we can only guess what this mysterious luminous sphere is.

All that remains for people is to follow all the recommendations regarding a possible encounter with the phenomenon. They boil down to the utmost caution.

To reduce the dangerous phenomenon, during a thunderstorm you need to keep the windows and doors in the house closed. Can ball lightning pass through window glass? Unfortunately yes. However, it is believed that it mainly moves in air currents and “loves” drafts, so you should not create them.

It is important for every person to know how ball lightning is formed and how to behave, because no one is immune from meeting with it. Scientists believe that ball lightning is a special type of lightning. It moves through the air in the form of a luminous fireball (it can also look like a mushroom, a drop or a pear). Ball lightning is about 10-20 cm in size. Those who have seen it close up say that small fixed details are visible inside ball lightning.

Ball lightning can easily penetrate enclosed spaces: it appears from a socket, from a TV, it can appear in a pilot's cockpit. There are cases when fireballs occur in the same place, flying out of the ground.

Ball lightning remains a mystery to scientists

For a long time, scientists generally did not recognize the fact that ball lightning exists. And when there was information that someone saw her, everything was attributed to an optical illusion or hallucinations. However, the report of the physicist Francois Arago changed everything. The scientist systematized and published eyewitness accounts of such a phenomenon as ball lightning.

Since then, many scientists have recognized the existence of the phenomenon of ball lightning in nature, but because of this, the mysteries have not become less, on the contrary, they only become more with time.

Everything about ball lightning is incomprehensible: how this amazing ball appears - it appears not only during a thunderstorm, but also on a clear, fine day. It is not clear what it consists of - what kind of substance that can penetrate through a tiny slit, and then become round again. Physicists currently cannot answer all these questions.

There are many theories regarding ball lightning today, but no one has yet succeeded in substantiating the phenomenon from a scientific point of view. In scientific circles, there are two opposite versions that are popular today.

Ball lightning and its formation in accordance with hypothesis No. 1

Dominic Arago managed not only to systematize all the collected information regarding the plasma ball, but also to make explanations about the mystery of this object. The scientist's version is that ball lightning is formed as a result of a specific effect between nitrogen and oxygen. The process is accompanied by the release of energy, which causes the formation of lightning.

According to another physicist, Frenkel, this version can be added by another theory. It involves the formation of a plasma ball from a spherical vortex, the composition of which is dust particles and active gases created by an electric discharge. This causes the existence of a vortex-ball for a sufficiently long time.

This version is confirmed by the fact that the appearance of a plasma ball occurs after an electric discharge exactly where the air is dusty, and when the ball lightning disappears, a certain haze and a specific smell remain after it. From this hypothesis, we can conclude that all the energy of ball lightning is inside it, which means that this substance is an energy storage device.

Ball lightning and its formation in accordance with hypothesis No. 2

According to Kapitza, ball lightning is fed by radio waves, the length of which can be 35-70 cm. The reason for their occurrence is associated with electromagnetic oscillations - the result of the interaction of thunderclouds and the earth's crust.

The academician suggested that ball lightning explodes at the moment when the energy supply suddenly stops. This may look like a change in the frequency of the electromagnetic wave. There is a so-called "collapse" process.

There were supporters of the second hypothesis, however, by its nature, ball lightning refutes it. To date, with the help of modern equipment, the radio waves mentioned by Kapitsa have not been detected after discharges in the atmosphere.

The scale of the event during the explosion of ball lightning also contradicts the second hypothesis: objects of high strength are melted or blown to pieces, logs of enormous thickness are broken, and a tractor was once overturned by a shock wave.

Ball lightning requires special behavior from the one who met it

If there is a chance to meet with ball lightning, it is not necessary to panic, and even more so to rush about. You have to treat her like a rabid dog. No sudden movements or running, because at the slightest whirl of air, lightning can go to this place.

Human behavior should be unhurried, calm. You should try to stay as far away from the lightning as possible, but you should not turn your back on it. If the plasma ball is in the room, it is advisable to get to the window and open the window. The ball can succumb to the movement of air and end up on the street.

Nothing should be thrown at the plasma ball, because it is fraught with an explosion, after which big problems associated with injuries and burns are inevitable. Sometimes people's hearts even stop.

Once next to a person who was unlucky and the lightning touched him, bringing him to a loss of consciousness, he should provide first aid and call an ambulance. The victim should be moved to a ventilated area and wrapped warmly. In addition, a person needs to do artificial respiration.

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Case from the life of Nicholas II: The last Russian emperor, in the presence of his grandfather Alexander II, observed a phenomenon that he called a "ball of fire." He recalled: “When my parents were away, my grandfather and I performed the rite of the all-night vigil in the Alexandria Church. There was a strong thunderstorm; it seemed that lightning, following one after another, was ready to shake the church and the whole world right to the ground. It suddenly became completely dark when a gust of wind opened the gates of the church and put out the candles in front of the iconostasis. There was more thunder than usual, and I saw a fireball fly through the window. The ball (it was lightning) circled on the floor, flew past the candelabra and flew out through the door into the park. My heart sank with fear and I looked at my grandfather - but his face was completely calm. He crossed himself with the same calmness as when the lightning flew past us. Then I thought that it was inappropriate and unmanly to be afraid, like me. After the ball flew out, I looked at my grandfather again. He smiled slightly and nodded at me. My fear disappeared and I was never afraid of a thunderstorm again. A story from the life of Aleister Crowley: The famous British occultist Aleister Crowley spoke of a phenomenon he called "ball-shaped electricity" that he observed in 1916 during a thunderstorm on Pasconee Lake in New Hampshire. He took refuge in a small country house when “he noticed in silent astonishment that at a distance of six inches from his right knee a dazzling ball of electric fire three to six inches in diameter had stopped. I looked at him, and he suddenly exploded with a sharp sound that could not be confused with what was rampant outside: the noise of a thunderstorm, the sound of hail, or streams of water and crackling wood. My hand was closest to the ball and it only felt a slight impact." Case in India: April 30, 1877 ball lightning flew into the central temple of Amristar (India) Harmandir Sahib. The phenomenon was observed by several people until the ball left the room through the front door. This incident is depicted on the Darshani Deodi gate. Case in Colorado: On November 22, 1894, in the city of Golden, Colorado (USA), ball lightning appeared, which lasted an unexpectedly long time. As the Golden Globe newspaper reported: “On Monday night, a beautiful and strange phenomenon could be observed in the city. A strong wind arose and the air seemed to be filled with electricity. Those who happened to be near the school that night could watch the fireballs fly one after another for half an hour. This building houses electric dynamos from possibly the finest factory in the state. Probably, last Monday a delegation arrived at the dynamos directly from the clouds. Certainly, this visit was a success, as well as the frantic game that they started together. Case in Australia: In July 1907, on the west coast of Australia, the lighthouse at Cape Naturalist was struck by ball lightning. Lighthouse keeper Patrick Baird lost consciousness, and the phenomenon was described by his daughter Ethel. Ball lightning on submarines: During World War II, submariners repeatedly and consistently reported small fireballs occurring in the confined space of a submarine. They appeared when the battery was turned on, turned off or incorrectly turned on, or in the event of a disconnection or incorrect connection of highly inductive electric motors. Attempts to reproduce the phenomenon using the submarine's spare battery ended in failure and explosion. Case in Sweden: In 1944, on August 6, in the Swedish city of Uppsala, ball lightning passed through a closed window, leaving behind a round hole about 5 cm in diameter. The phenomenon was observed not only by local residents - the system for tracking lightning discharges at Uppsala University, created at the department for the study of electricity and lightning, worked. Case on the Danube: In 1954, the physicist Tar Domokosh observed lightning in a severe thunderstorm. He described what he saw in sufficient detail. “It happened on Margaret Island on the Danube. It was somewhere around 25–27°C, the sky quickly covered with clouds and a strong thunderstorm began. Nearby there was nothing to hide, there was only a lone bush nearby, which was bent by the wind to the ground. Suddenly, about 50 meters away from me, lightning struck the ground. It was a very bright channel 25-30 cm in diameter, it was exactly perpendicular to the surface of the earth. It was dark for about two seconds, and then at a height of 1.2 m a beautiful ball with a diameter of 30–40 cm appeared. bush. The ball sparkled like a small sun and rotated counterclockwise. The axis of rotation was parallel to the ground and perpendicular to the line "bush - impact site - ball". The ball also had one or two red curls, but not so bright, they disappeared after a fraction of a second (~0.3 s). The ball itself slowly moved horizontally along the same line from the bush. Its colors were clear, and the brightness itself was constant over the entire surface. There was no more rotation, the movement took place at a constant height and at a constant speed. I didn't notice any size changes. About three more seconds passed - the ball disappeared abruptly, and completely silently, although due to the noise of the thunderstorm I might not have heard it. Case in Kazan: In 2008, ball lightning flew through the window of a trolleybus in Kazan. The conductor, using a ticket checking machine, threw it to the end of the cabin, where there were no passengers, and a few seconds later an explosion occurred. There were 20 people in the cabin, no one was hurt. The trolley bus was out of order, the ticket checking machine got hot and turned white, but remained in working condition.