What Actually Causes And Actual Lightning Flash??

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        Okay Guys,  so remember Yesterday I talked about the Birth of Lightning. Stepped Leaders, and Upward Streamers. I talked about what has to happen before a Bolt of Lightning to happen. Now as for a Lightning Strike itself. How does That Process Work?

Well The entire Stepped Leader Process happen. Now once the Stepped Leader and Upward Streamer actually meet, In which they generally tend to meet about 30-40 meters above the Ground,  I call this the "Point Of Contact" see Below

Now once this Point of Contact is established, at this point there is a clear link between the cloud and the ground (Electric Wise)  this is a clear Path for the Lightning Strike to take through the air. So after this point there is what meteorologist call a "Return Stroke". See the Negative Charges have already dispersed from within the Cloud base through the Stepped Leader Process. Remember they couldn't handle all that charge. So Now at this point, the Build Up of Positive Charges on the ground has become way to much for them to handle. So they Shoot Up to the Cloud. Ground can't hold anymore so they gotta gp somewhere. And that's up to the Cloud. When this happens, This is what we call "Lightning".  This is the actual Huge bolt of Lightning that you see Light up the entire Thunderstorm. Its that Return Stroke. Now this entire Process happens soooo fast that it actually looks like Lightning comes from clouds when it doesn't. A Real Lightning Flash actually comes from the Ground. A actual Lightning Flash comes from those Positive Charges Shooting up into the cloud. Now that Flicker that you see are usually weaker Strokes after the First initial Strike. Sometimes depending on how much charge has built up in the ground it may Flicker 3-4 times as those charges move through the air to the cloud. The more the lightning tend to flicker is usually a sign that there was a huge amount of positive charge buildup in that area and if you are located there the chances of getting struck are pretty good because those flashes tend to be the stronger and brighter ones. This is the entire process of a actual Lightning Strike.  This entire process often times occur in less than a Half a second. Way too fast for us to see. That's what pictures and slow mo video is for.

As Always I Appreciate You Guys for Choosing me to be your go to guy for Severe Weather, and Weather information. It means a lot.  I am The Arkansas Weather Hawk. #ARWX

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