by Tom Shafer
July 2, 2023
I love nothing more than to slip into the hot tub just after a nice thunderstorm has rolled through our area.
Now, that’s quite the hyperbolic statement, but hyperbole has taken a significant hit in the age of Trump. I actually love many things more than popping into bubbling, warm water after a storm. But caught up in a post-Trump world, even a wordsmith like me can let down his guard and slip into hyperbolic malaise. Given that the greatest hits of hyperbole according to Trump (“I alone can fix it,” “everything is rigged” or “everything is a scam,” something is “the best it’s ever been,” another thing “is a total disaster,” “I’m a very stable genius” — think “person, woman, man, camera, TV”) are now entrenched in verbal and written etymology, perhaps I can be forgiven for my most egregious error ever.
Anyway, this entry is not about Trump or hyperbole — it’s about thunderstorms. And, everybody loves a good thunderstorm! — sorry, more hyperbole, and no, everybody does not love a good thunderstorm. My cats, in general, hate them, and so do lots of non-cats. But I find them fascinating and am drawn to them like moths to a flame or kids to cotton candy.
Last night’s storm blew in quickly and was gone less than an hour later. Before the sun set and as neighbors were sparking a splendid fireworks display in advance of Declaration Day, low gray clouds were scudding in from the west, precursors to Mother Nature’s more impressive fireworks that would follow. Then, just as the artificial pyrotechnics were ending, low gutteral booms could be heard in the distance, undeniable signs that our weather was due for a change.
Of course, that thunder was generated by lightning which wasn’t quite visible yet. The creation of lightning is complicated, but is not unlike the little zap you might get from touching a doorknob after shuffling across some shag carpeting. That “shuffling” creates a “static charge” on your skin, and static charges are constantly seeking escape and will do so (that “zap”) when they find another thing (that “doorknob”) which conducts — or receives — electricity.
Inside a cumulonimbus cloud, winds are very turbulent, and many water droplets at the base of the cloud are lifted to the upper heights (as high as 65,000 feet!) where colder temperatures freeze them. As these frozen drops fall, they collide with other droplets heading up (shuffling), and electrons are stripped off in the process. Once the bottom of the cloud becomes negatively charged enough (as compared to the positively charged top), that imbalance (like a static charge) starts looking for an escape route, and when it finds one (the doorknob), ZAP!, a bolt of lightning occurs.
Sometimes that escape happens inside the cloud or with another one nearby (cloud to cloud lightning), and other times that negative charge in the cloud seeks a positive charge on the ground, perhaps a tall tree or telephone pole or building (cloud to ground lightning). Either way, the result is an electrical discharge that produces nature’s most impressive and powerful energy source — enough energy, at least 1.21 gigawatts worth, to power the flux capacitor of a DeLorean that will take you through a wormhole Back to the Future!
Now, the thunder that you hear is fashioned by the lightning itself. The flash that you see is incredibly hot, as much as 50,000ºF, and as it explosively heats the air around it, a shockwave is produced. As the air cools, it contracts rapidly, which creates that familiar CRACK sound, and the rumbles which follow are audible proof that the column of air is still vibrating from the initial shockwave.
Back in my hot tub, I wasn’t thinking about any of this science. I was merely enjoying an incredible light show Mother Nature style. And, in case you were wondering, I was perfectly safe soaking in my bubbling water — which is actually a good conductor of electricity. Because light travels faster than sound, I could estimate the distance between me and the storm by counting the number of seconds between a flash and its companion thunder. It takes about five seconds for sound to travel one mile, so the thirty seconds that I counted told me the storm was at least six miles away. So, I was relatively safe — barring some rogue, human-seeking thunderbolt!
Because our weather here is entering an unsettled period, we have quite a few chances for thunderstorms over the next week or so, and I look forward to more light shows starring the dynamic duo of Lightning and Thunder. In fact, one of those storms is rumbling into our area right now, so I need to consult my NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) weather app to see where it is and when it may arrive. For those of you who are like me, I wish you a happy thunderstorming. The rest of you are more than welcome to join my cats under the bed!
