# Does lightning go from ground to cloud or vice versa? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 6, 2000, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842 "2000-04-06T18:02:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![sethdallob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@sethdallob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sethdallob)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/1 "2000-04-06T18:02:00Z")
Until recently, I thought that lightning went either from cloud-to-cloud or cloud-to-ground…but I read somewhere (can’t remember) that the visual bolt actually eminates from the ground and goes up to the cloud. If this is true, what is the point of not standing under a tree? Does it become a transmission tower for all the charge in the ground?? Very confused. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/2 "2000-04-06T19:01:00Z")
From [www.exploratorium.edu/ronh/weather/weather.html](http://www.exploratorium.edu/ronh/weather/weather.html) > [@](#): > > This initial exploratory mission forms what is called a “stepped leader,” named for its start-stop motion. The stepped leader takes about 5/1000 of a second, moving at about 240 miles per second, to reach from cloud to ground. When the leader gets near the ground, it may draw a stream of positive charges (called a streamer) up from the ground to meet it. When either the stepped leader reaches the ground or a streamer runs up to join the stepped leader, an electrical connection is completed between the cloud and the ground. The ionized air molecules of the leader conduct electricity quite well, and the path of charged particles acts as a wire, connecting the highly negative cloud and the positive ground. This ionized air becomes the path of the main bolt of lightning. > The first charges to feel the connection are those near the ground. The light and mobile negative charges quickly accelerate along the wire of ionized air. In their mad rush to the ground the negative charges collide with the air, causing it to glow like a neon sign–only thousands of times brighter and with a bluish-white color. The air near the ground is the first to start glowing, but as the electrons further and further up feel the connection and begin to accelerate, the air further and further up also starts to glow. Even though the negative charges all move from cloud to ground, the bright flash of lightning moves from ground to cloud in a speedy 1/10,000 of a second, moving 61,000 miles per second! The super-heated air expands outward explosively, producing the shock wave we hear as thunder. The bright flash of glowing air is called the return stroke since it moves from ground to cloud, opposite to the moving charges. Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work. - Mark Twain * * * Sig! Sig a Sog! Sig it loud! Sig it Strog! – Karen Carpenter with a head cold ---
**Author:** ![Farmer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e495f1/32.png) [@Farmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/3 "2000-04-06T19:05:00Z")
Lighting can work both ways. Cloud to cloud, cloud to ground, ground to cloud, or from ground and from cloud meeting each other. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/4 "2000-04-06T19:13:00Z")
Oops, almost forgot: > [@](#): > > If this is true, what is the point of not standing under a tree? Because the tree (or any other high point) is the closest point of contact to the earth. The leader stroke from the cloud will always take the path of least resistance, and that usually means the shortest route as well. * * * Sig! Sig a Sog! Sig it loud! Sig it Strog! – Karen Carpenter with a head cold ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/5 "2000-04-06T19:20:00Z")
Someone much sharper than I will probably answer this but I’ll give it a go. Lightening travels in **two** directions. Th cloud base wiil charge up to a huge potential which will draw tracers from ground based objects. These tracers tend to form around pointy things-a rounded point is the best hence the shape of lightening conductors-and form a charged path toward the cloud potential. At some point the tracer gets near enough to the cloud for the cloud potential to draw itself across the air gap which then fires its charge earthwards. Usually there are several return strikes as not all the cloud will release its charge in one go,these extra strikes take the already established path down to earth. You can see this happening in photographs some intrepid individuals have managed to obtain, the main strike is visible and so too are tracers which have been drawn up but never made it to the cloud base. Tracers can form on anything ,for instance, if you are the highest object around during a storm you may feel your hair being drawn vertically upward,you are now in very grave danger as a tracer has formed from your head. In the absence of very nearby shelter you must lie down in the hope another tracer from elswhere makes it to the cloud first.It it does not then at least the strike is going to travel through less of your body and the strike area will be more spread out giving you,hopefully ,a better chance of survival. DO NOT stand near a tree.If it is struck the fluids in it will heat up incredibly rapidly,these expand explosively .If the blast does not kill you then the falling material probably will. ---
**Author:** ![Myron\_Van\_Horowitzski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@Myron\_Van\_Horowitzski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Myron_Van_Horowitzski)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/6 "2000-04-06T19:26:00Z")
And that’s why a number lightning-strike survivors have reported feeling their hair stand on end just before the strike. I saw a picture taken with extremely fast shutter showing streamers rising from objects just before a strike. You could see these thin, crooked lines of light rising from a telephone pole, tree, etc., but only one actually hooked up the the lightning bolt. (This was from _Acts of God_, a fascinating book of weather anecdotes published by the Farmer’s Almanac) ## Your brain-in-a-jar, Myron Imbibo, ergo sum. ---
**Author:** ![Myron\_Van\_Horowitzski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@Myron\_Van\_Horowitzski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Myron_Van_Horowitzski)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/7 "2000-04-06T19:36:00Z")
Curses! Simulpost! ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/8 "2000-04-06T20:44:00Z")
In [this picture](http://www.highvoltagephotography.com/) you can see a pair of streamers rising from ground-based sources - one from the tree and one from the house’s television antenna. Bet this was the picture y’all were talking about, eh? ---
**Author:** ![MrKnowItAll](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrknowitall/32/87_2.png) [@MrKnowItAll](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrKnowItAll)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2000, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lightning-go-from-ground-to-cloud-or-vice-versa/9842/9 "2000-04-06T21:29:00Z")
Just rehashing what everyone else has already said: Here’s the Weather Channel’s webpage with information on what occurs during lightning strikes. [http://www.weather.com/breaking\_weather/encyclopedia/thunder/light.html](http://www.weather.com/breaking_weather/encyclopedia/thunder/light.html) * * * _God is my co-pilot. Blame Him._