Upside-Down Lightning Bolt Sends Researchers Scrambling For An Answer

A rainstorm in Oklahoma on May 14, 2018, has left science with new discoveries and many unanswered questions. The most prevalent of all was the mysterious shot of violet lightning that pointed up into the sky instead of shooting down towards Earth. 

The blast of lightning, in fact, was so great that it managed to rise 50 miles to touch the edge of space. The phenomenon of upward lightning is known as gigantic jets and has plagued scientists with numerous questions about its origins and why it deviates from the usual pattern of lightning. 

Often, these reverse shots of lightning are even more powerful than their counterparts and can threaten to destroy spaceships or other devices floating in our orbit. 

This is the upside down https://t.co/yxj7m6tjvL

— Jerry James Stone (@jerryjamesstone) August 10, 2022

The gigantic jet that cracked through the Oklahoman sky was particularly intense and, as a result, drew researchers to it. The blast carried 300 coulombs of electrical charge, which is about 100 times more than a normal bolt of lightning would. 

While this occurrence has happened before, it was by sheer luck and happenstance that this particular jet was cast near a satellite and a lightning-mapping system. Sure, lightning doesn’t strike twice, but it just needs to strike once in the right location for everything to fall into place—or for scientists to get enough data. 

A team at the Georgia Tech Research Institute scrambled to study the collected data and turn it into 3D models for easier examination. They found that very high frequencies (VHF) were found at the tops of the thunderstorm clouds and not at the bottom like they usually would be. 

Lightning is created via a combination of leaders and streamers, which help manifest electricity formed in the clouds and create strokes of lightning that spark through the air.

Leaders are electrical charge differences that make up the lightning bolt, and streamers are found at the tips of the electrical discharge. 

However, on that night in Oklahoma, the leaders and streamers were situated at the top of the cloud causing a gigantic jet to chart its electric course up into space.   

In the study released in Science Advances, the researchers have settled on one possibility of why gigantic jets take place. It could be due to a buildup of negative energy in the clouds that it could no longer contain and hence resulting in a fantastic display of atmospheric curiosities.

[via CNET and Science Alert, cover image via Chris Holmes / Georgia Tech]