The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) certified the length of the lightning flash, which happened in East Texas back in 2017.
DALLAS — A lightning flash from East Texas back in October 2017 has been certified as the longest single lightning flash in recorded history, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
The WMO said in a press release Thursday that the megaflash originated in East Texas and spanned approximately 515 miles all the way to Kansas City. WMO’s Committee on Weather and Climate Extremes, which maintains official records of global, hemispheric and regional extremes, recognized the new record with the help of the latest satellite technologies. The findings were published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, WMO said.
The margin of error in recording this flash was ± 5 miles, which still broke the previous record of 477.2 ± 5 miles from a lightning flash across parts of the southern United States on April 29, 2020. The same maximum great circle distance methodology was used to measure each event, WMO said.
“The 2017 event is notable in that it was one of the first storms where NOAA’s newest Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-16) documented lightning ‘megaflashes‘ – extremely long duration/distance lightning discharge events,” WMO wrote in its release.
The 2017 lightning flash was not identified in the original 2017 analysis of the storm but was later discovered in a re-examination of the storm, WMO said.
“This new record clearly demonstrates the incredible power of the natural environment,” said Professor Randall Cerveny, rapporteur of Weather and Climate Extremes for WMO. “Additionally, WMO assessment of environmental extremes such as this lightning distance record testify to the significant scientific progress in observing, documenting and evaluating such events. It is likely that even greater extremes still exist, and that we will be able to observe them as additional high-quality lightning measurements accumulate over time.”
The WMO Archive of Weather and Climate Extremes maintains official records of the world, hemispheric and regional extreme records associated with a number of specific types of weather.
Other lightning-related records, according to the WMO archive, include:
- The greatest duration for a single lightning flash of 17.102 ± 0.002 seconds during a thunderstorm over Uruguay and northern Argentina on 18 June 2020.
- Direct strike: 21 people killed by a single flash of lightning as they huddled for safety in a hut in Zimbabwe in 1975.
- Indirect strike: 469 people killed in Dronka Egypt when lightning struck a set of oil tanks, causing burning oil to flood the town in 1994.
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