Lightning, as a natural phenomenon, often leaves a moment of shocking scene. But it is not a good thing to encounter hundreds of millions of lightning times a year. According to foreign media reports, data from the national lightning detection network of the US environmental measurement system Vaisala (Vaisala) shows that in 2020, the United States encountered nearly 200 million lightnings, while Texas ranked first in all states with 33 million times. The
report shows that in 2020, the total number of lightning events recorded, including cloud lightning, was 170549822, down from 22298888 in 2019. Of the 50 states, 39 have lower lightning strikes than last year's average.
Ranking by states, Texas ranked first again with 33 million times, and Florida ranked second with 12 million times, up three places compared to 2019. Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri were third, fourth and fifth respectively.
The report points out that cloud lightning is simply what we usually call lightning strike. When lightning current is discharged from the cloud to the ground, it will hit buildings, structures, other objects, and people and animals directly, creating electrical effects, thermal effects and mechanical forces, causing damage and casualties.
This year's decrease in lightning meant a decrease in rainfall, which also led to the vegetation being more likely to be ignited when some arid areas were hit by lightning events. Last year's wildfire incident in California illustrates this problem.
Chris Vagasky, a meteorologist and lightning application manager at Vaisala, pointed out in a statement that there were less than 300,000 lightning incidents in California in 2020, a 48% decrease from the previous five-year average.
However, 20% of the lightning events occurred in the four days in August. Due to the sparse rainfall, these lightning strikes triggered four local wildfires, causing at least 1.8 million acres of land to be burned.
Lightning strikes not only brought about wildfires. Last June, the world's largest American flag in Wisconsin, USA, was hit by a lightning bolt and burned half of it. Last July, American netizens took a shocking scene of lightning "hitting" the Statue of Liberty .
