Ball lightning
My grandmother once told me that as a kid growing up, her and her family once experienced a glowing ball entering the kitchen by the window, whizzed around for a few seconds then hit a fork on the table, catapulting it into the air, before dissapearing.

I'm sure there is a rational explanation for this, but I'd love to know what it is.
(Half of Stephen Fry's right buttock pissed on your dog on, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 16:57, 8 replies)

Your Gran...
was smoking the wacky baccy!
(bazmorningstar efil4nat3b, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 17:03, closed)

Can your gran
*dalek voice*
Take me to her dealer!

(I've smoked some decent weed over the years, but never anything that makes me thing a ball of light has come through the window and flicked a fork across the room. Can I hav esome please?!)
(Greencloud Wanted to go fishing on, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 17:07, closed)

Smoke more
When you see the ball, you'll stop. I promise!
(bazmorningstar efil4nat3b, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 17:15, closed)

...
ball lightning?
( Madam Marlboro wonders if you've found her yet, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 17:25, closed)

To the person who said 'Ball Lightning'...
...that is, after all, what I said in the title.

But no-one actually knows what makes it happen.
(Half of Stephen Fry's right buttock pissed on your dog on, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 18:30, closed)

how very dare you!
I feel compelled to remonstrate with you sir, and protest in the strongest of terms that you should have the audacity to refer to Madam Malboro merely as a 'person' you should be ashamed. All right-minded people on this 'ere board know that she is in fact a Foxy Bitch

*adjusts britches*

PS and clearly your grandmother smokes crack
( spimf ™ is whoever you want him to be, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 19:49, closed)

There are theories...
...all a bit tenuous, but based on SCIENCE!, at least for the most part.

One I came across a few years ago is to do with lightning striking sandy soil. Small, tube-like silica structures do occasionally form in such soil, and I think the idea was that the energy from the lightning strike discharges this structure from the soil. Because it's just been struck by lightning, it's very energetic and heavily ionised, hence it glows. Because it's ionised, it will seek to earth itself through conductors, such as metal forks and of course it will dissipate its energy fairly quickly.

A bit tenuous, as I say, but not a bad explanation. Another one involved microwave discharges ionising parcels of air, though I think that was an attempt to explain the fireballs occasionally (rarely) seen in the upper troposphere.
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 21:59, closed)

I've seen it.
I was camping when I was maybe 15 with a thunderstorm nearby. I noticed this glowing ball about the size of a football floating through the tree branches, only to disappear after about 10 seconds with sort of a fizzy crackly noise. It was freaky, but since I'm a weather geek I thought it was the coolest thing ever.
( trintrin has jam for blood, Tue 8 Jul 2008, 17:58, closed)