This translates to approximately 3 s/km (4.8 s/mi) saying 'one thousand and one. This is a consequence of the speed of light being much greater than the speed of sound. The most noticeable aspect of lightning and thunder is that the lightning is seen before the thunder is heard. Problems playing these files? See media help. Later return strokes have greater acoustic energy than the first. Ĭloud-to-ground lightning (CG) typically consists of two or more return strokes, from ground to cloud. Within a temperature inversion, the sound energy is prevented from dispersing vertically as it would in a non-inversion and is thus concentrated in the near-ground layer. In an inversion, the air near the ground is cooler than the higher air inversions often occur when warm moist air passes above a cold front. Inversion thunder results when lightning strikes between cloud and ground occur during a temperature inversion the resulting thunder sounds have significantly greater acoustic energy than from the same distance in a non-inversion condition. Rumbles are less loud, last for longer (up to more than 30 seconds), and are of low pitch. Rolls are irregular mixtures of loudness and pitches. Peals are sounds changing in loudness and pitch. Claps are loud sounds lasting 0.2 to 2 seconds and containing higher pitches. (n.d.) reported that the sounds of thunder fall into categories based on loudness, duration, and pitch. Even if not, it can lead to temporary deafness. Thunder can rupture the eardrums of people nearby, leading to permanently impaired hearing. The shock wave in thunder is sufficient to cause property damage and injury, such as internal contusion, to individuals nearby. Other causes have also been proposed, relying on electrodynamic effects of the enormous current acting on the plasma in the bolt of lightning. Įxperimental studies of simulated lightning have produced results largely consistent with this model, though there is continued debate about the precise physical mechanisms of the process. Near the source, the sound pressure level of thunder is usually 165 to 180 dB, but can exceed 200 dB in some cases. The resultant outward-moving pulse is a shock wave, similar in principle to the shock wave formed by an explosion, or at the front of a supersonic aircraft. This heating causes a rapid outward expansion, impacting the surrounding cooler air at a speed faster than sound would otherwise travel. The temperature inside the lightning channel, measured by spectral analysis, varies during its 50 μs existence, rising sharply from an initial temperature of about 20,000 K to about 30,000 K, then dropping away gradually to about 10,000 K. In the 20th century a consensus evolved that thunder must begin with a shock wave in the air due to the sudden thermal expansion of the plasma in the lightning channel. In the mid-19th century, the accepted theory was that lightning produced a vacuum and that the collapse of that vacuum produced what is known as thunder. The Roman philosopher Lucretius held it was from the sound of hail colliding within clouds. Early thinking was that it was made by deities, but the ancient Greek philosophers attributed it to natural causes, such as wind striking clouds ( Anaximander, Aristotle) and movement of air within clouds ( Democritus). The cause of thunder has been the subject of centuries of speculation and scientific inquiry. The shared Proto-Indo-European root is * tón-r̥ or * tar-, also found in Gaulish Taranis. The name of the Nordic god Thor comes from the Old Norse word for thunder. In Latin the term was tonare 'to thunder'.

Middle Dutch donre also Old Norse þorr, Old Frisian þuner, Old High German donar, all ultimately descended from Proto-Germanic * þunraz). The d in Modern English thunder (from earlier Old English þunor) is epenthetic, and is now found as well in Modern Dutch donder (cf. The scientific study of thunder is known as brontology and the irrational fear ( phobia) of thunder is called brontophobia. In turn, this expansion of air creates a sonic shock wave, often referred to as a 'thunderclap' or 'peal of thunder'.

The sudden increase in temperature and hence pressure caused by the lightning produces rapid expansion of the air in the path of a lightning bolt. Depending upon the distance from and nature of the lightning, it can range from a long, low rumble to a sudden, loud crack. Thunder is the sound caused by lightning. Problems playing this file? See media help.

Mountain view lady thunder