Does lightning strike from the sky or ground?

Question

someone who knos a lot of science. this is a question for extra credit in my freshman science class. please explain if you know the answer.

Answer 1

depends
in fact a lighning strikes both from sky to ground and vice versa

the main part of a lighning (in most cases) strikes from the sky into the ground, but several highspeed recordings showed that there was a small lightning starting from the ground right before the main strike came from above

i don't know the english term, but in german it's called 'Fangentladung'

Answer 2

My family's cottage in Ontario Canada, was the last cottage on the electrical line. During the many intense summer thunderstorms my sisters and I would sit by the electical outlets and watch what I remember as blue bolts off light coming out of the outlets with each big lightning strike. There were two hanging lamps in the living room one had had some sort of electrical short a few weeks before and was damaged (not by lightning). After a big lightning strike an orange ball (sunlike) about the size of a basketball came out of the damaged lamp, moved across the room at a walking speed and disappeared into the other hanging lamp. This happened in the mid 70's and I was about 9 years old. Unfortunately the electrical line has now been extended and forms a loop. The blue zots no longer happen. Ernie Kovacs Pacific Grove, CA USA - Tuesday, September 04, 2001 at 15:02:25 (PDT)

Answer 3

Technically from the ground to the sky. The cloud bottoms have a negative charge. As the clouds move across the surface of earth, they collect positive charges on the ground. A stepped leader made of a series of stepped negative charges comes down from the cloud, each around 150 ft. long. When the stepped leader comes within 150 ft. a positvely charged streamer is sent up from the ground to make a channel. An electric current from an object on the ground goes up through the channel creating a bright return stroke. This return stroke is the lightning you see.

Answer 4

Lightning is caused by electricity moving in between clouds or between the clouds and the ground. The electricity is formed when ice and water particles move around rapidly inside the clouds. As the particles move they become oppositely charged and they separate. The positively charged particles go to the top of the cloud and the negatively charged particles sit along the bottom of the cloud. The negative particles along the cloud bottoms grow large and are attracted to the positive charges on the ground. When the attraction between the different charges becomes strong enough, electricity flows from the cloud to the ground. This flow of electricity is a lightning strike.
I hope this helps

Answer 5

Lightning is cause by positive and negative electrical charges. The clouds are charged one way and the ground is charged the other way. When the different charges build up sufficiently, there is a huge static electricity jolt. That is what the lightning is. The electrical jolt equalizes the charge between the cloud and earth. Usually the cloud has the negative charge and the earth the positive one so it appears the lightning is going from cloud to earth.

Answer 6

From the sky, thunder clouds with positive eletricity force when two +'s collide, they seperate from each other( jus like two norths of a magnet seperates from each other) and the ground's negative electric force - attracts the +'s and a bolt of lightning streams down to the ground.

Answer 7

Lighting is created from friction in the clouds. The release of the energy originates in the clouds and terminates on the ground. Sorry, I'm not a science major but I have witnessed it many times.

Answer 8

Both ways. Lightning comes from the clouds
and is met by lightening from the ground.
We as ham operators ground our equipment
and when a storm comes we disconnect our
antennas,but we fail to disconnect our ground
wires. Sometimes lightening can come from
the ground up thru the ground wire and ruin
the radio equipment.

Answer 9

It's a trick question. Sometimes from the ground, sometimes from the cloud. About 90% of cloud/ground lightning is negative lightning, which goes from ground to cloud. The rest is positive lightning which is from cloud to ground.

Answer 10

Actually, lightning comes from charges originating both in the ground and the sky. Then, they meet halfway.