It's fair to say Britain isn't best known for its excellent weather and roaring sunshine. Over the past week or so, we haven't been far off the roaring sunshine - it's just it's quickly followed with rather dramatic thunderstorms! Thunder causes lightning - this is essentially a stream of electrons flowing either between clouds or from a cloud to the ground. The air surrounding this electron stream is heated to around 50,000 degrees Farhenheit. It's a staggering three times hotter than the surface of the sun. When the lightning is within our sight, we see it first as the speed of sound in air is considerably slower that that of the electron flow. The light from the flash reaches us in a fraction of a second, whereas the sound lags along like a snail following an interplanetary rocket.
Follow the rest of my #SummerofScience and me on Twitter @Sci_Sparks. Don’t forget to download my charity eBook, Science Bites: A Short Tour of the Universe HERE.
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