Astro Hacker News - What causes lightning? The answer keeps getting more interesting

joshikarthikey |next [-]

Soooo you are telling me that we still haven't fully understood something as fundamental as lightning and it's still an active area of research...

nomilk |next |previous [-]

That 7 second video of a small rocket shot into a cloud to induce a lightning strike (about half way down the article) is incredible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BJIiX9_c_M

Any ideas why the lightning strike appears mostly green (and momentarily purple and orange)?

deepandmeaning |root |parent |next [-]

I'm imagining it's something related to the copper wire.

teh_infallible |root |parent |previous [-]

I always wanted to replicate this with a helium balloon and a long, wet string coated with copper filings.

batch12 |root |parent |next [-]

You'd probably need a very large balloon to overcome the weight of the string

CamelCaseCondo |root |parent |previous [-]

Maybe just salt water and skip the filings?

fguerraz |next |previous [-]

So, nothing new?

The cosmic ray hypothesis has been dominant for a few years now.

This magazine…

cinderelacinder |next |previous [-]

[flagged]

freehorse |next |previous [-]

Tl;dr lightings may be caused by electrons/positrons from outer space hitting a cloud and initiating an "avalanche" of electrons.

pfdietz |root |parent [-]

Cosmic rays are mostly protons, not electrons or positrons. You're mixing up to separate theories in the article.

metalman |previous [-]

just in case you missed it, all matter carrys a charge, and all space(and matter) has energy radiating through it, making the universe an energy gradient.

sometimes you can see it happening.