Apparently, Zeus was in a bad mood a few weeks ago.
But the good news is we found this thunderbolt!
It’s in Florida.
In what can only be called – quite literally – “a bolt from the blue,” a sunny day lightning strike was recorded this month and is confusing everyone who sees the video.
The scene was peaceful before the random event.
The trees are minding their own business, and there’s not a soul in sight.
It’s bright and warm, there are just a few white, fluffy clouds, and it’s the middle of the day. No one could have predicted lightening.
In fact, no one would have known anything out of the ordinary had occurred had a security camera not caught the moment.
But boy did that tree light up when it got hit!
Here’s the first moment when the bolt found its target:
We’ll grant you, it’s pretty cool. Especially since no one got hurt.
And as far as we know, the tree just got a quick zap.
But seriously, where did that bolt come from?
We know there’s some pretty weird weather down in Florida, but we’ve never seen anything quite like this, partly because from what we understand, lightening requires precipitation to spark the electrical charge.
But this lightning bolt appeared with no visible precipitation.
When rogue lightning injured 13 people on a California beach back in 2014, experts explained how this works.
“This what we often call dry lightning,” William Patzert from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory told Business Insider.
He said that there was precipitation, but it evaporated before it hit the ground. And this type of lightning is actually pretty common in deserts or other dry, hot places – in fact, it’s one of the causes of forest fires.
After seeing the lightening travel down the tree, we can certainly believe that!
And you should hear the sound it made – it sounds like someone dropped a bomb on it!
Strange lightning is also pretty common in Florida simply because all lightning is common there.
Florida is the “lightning capital” of the U.S., according to the National Weather Service.
Why?
“Florida’s unique location, surrounded by warm water, provides the necessary ingredients for thunderstorms to form,” they say.
But the fact that Florida has the most lightning deaths in the country is partly due to the size of its population.
Of course, none of this is exactly comforting.
It might be interesting to watch a tree lose a branch from a lightning strike, but when it hits a living creature or causes property damage it’s not so much fun.
In Florida, it’s common to clear the beaches when lightning has been spotted – partly because the ocean’s saltwater helps conduct electricity and can zap people within 100 feet of the strike if it’s strong enough.
But if the precipitation stays in the clouds and you get “dry lightning,” there’s no way to know it’s coming.
In this case, the lightning did very little harm, despite looking like it was going to start a fire. All it managed to do was fell one branch that was already dangling from the large tree.
A scary moment, but we’re glad all they got out of it was some cool footage.
Be sure to scroll down below for the security video that captured the lightning strike – it’s better to watch (and hear) it in action!
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