Merrie Olde

[Cole Parker]

Any of you guys witness this:

https://weather.yahoo.com/photos/electrical-storms-hit-the-uk-after-the-hottest-day-of-the-year-with-more-bad-weather-forecast-for-1405677171-slideshow/

[gwilym.pocock]

Yes!

It was pretty awesome. One thunder went on for over ten seconds. Some of the lighting was red!

It was pretty epic.

My dog didn't think it was epic, though.

[Camy]

What a fantastic photo!

Most parts of England saw some thunder and lightning. Ours wasn't that epic: we had sheet lightning above a roiling black cloud bank, but little thunder. The cats snoozed through it, so I'd give it a 3/10.

[colinian]

There was a daytime series of lightning strikes at Venice Beach near Los Angeles that killed a 20 year old man and critically injured a 55 year old surfer. Story from the LA Times here.

Colin

[The Pecman]

Yeah, this was the lead story locally all day yesterday and today. Everybody really got freaked out about it.

I grew up in Tampa, and that's well-known as the lightning capital of the world. I think more people die in that area from being hit by lightning than anywhere else, often as many as 10-12 people a year, usually on golf courses and other flat pieces of land. Everybody would always come charging out of the water the moment lightning was around, and if there were public lifeguards on the beach, they'd sound the bullhorns and gets us all out.

They're a little more lackadasical and casual about this in LA because it doesn't happen nearly as frequently. In the 30+ years I've lived here, I don't think I've been through more than 5 or 6 severe lightning storms. In Tampa, that described a typical summer.

[Nigel Gordon]

What a fantastic photo!

Most parts of England saw some thunder and lightning. Ours wasn't that epic: we had sheet lightning above a roiling black cloud bank, but little thunder. The cats snoozed through it, so I'd give it a 3/10.

Wish we had, still having to carry the watering can out each night to water the garden. For some reason the storms seem to be avoiding Leicester.

[Merkin]

So huge and awe-inspiring. No wonder an earlier age believed such displays were the gods hurling thunderbolts.

[Cole Parker]

There was a daytime series of lightning strikes at Venice Beach near Los Angeles that killed a 20 year old man and critically injured a 55 year old surfer. Story from the LA Times here.

Colin

Yeah, this was the lead story locally all day yesterday and today. Everybody really got freaked out about it.

They're a little more lackadasical and casual about this in LA because it doesn't happen nearly as frequently. In the 30+ years I've lived here, I don't think I've been through more than 5 or 6 severe lightning storms.

It was a very localized storm. Violent enough to injure several people and kill one with lightning strikes, but so localized that, while I live in LA, I wasn't even aware there was a storm till I read about it the next day. Where I was there were blue skies, no clouds, and no sounds of thunder whatsoever.

C

[The Pecman]

No thunder out here in Chatsworthless, either, but we did see some black skies on the extreme southwest horizon. The storm at the beaches was 30 miles away, so we didn't even feel it.

[FreeThinker]

Those pictures look like a typical spring day in Oklahoma.

[Merkin]

Those pictures look like a typical spring day in Oklahoma.

No, no; in Oklahoma that is the wrath of Jehovah.