What Types of Lightning are there?

There are all different types of lightning, lighting that occurs so fast that it is almost impossible to see with the naked eye!

• Normal Lightning- The lightning that you always see during thunder storms.

• Red Sprites- They are a dull, sort of reddish spurt of light that makes a ball shape. They  are HUGE! They occur high above thunderstorm clouds, and only appear for a couple thousandths of a second!
• Elves- They are very similar to Red Sprites, except that they appear in a doughnut shape instead. These occur so fast, that even with the technology we have, scientists are still not sure what the normal color of an Elve is!

• Blue Jets- Blue Jets are bigger than Red sprites, they make a blue cone shape. They shoot out from the middle of thunderstorms at about 100 killometers per second!

As you can see, there are a lot of different types of lightning, some that you have probably never heard of or seen before! Now go out and spend some money on some high tech equipment, and you will be able to see every type of lightning there is!

Radar of Lightning

The Yellow color is negatively charged lightning strikes and the Red color is positively charged strikes.

How is Lightning Formed?

First off, there has to be warm and cold air present for lightning to form. The hot air rises, making storm clouds. The water from the warm clouds and the ice from the cold clouds create static electricity. There are positive and negative charges to a cloud, similar to a battery. When there is a positive charge in a cloud and a negative charge nearby in a cloud or on the ground, lightning is made.

Pictures of Lightining

These are just some cool lookin' pictures that i found of lightining!