Satellites Reveal 'Hot Lightning' Strikes Are Most Likely To Start Wildfires (ieee.org) 43
Scientists are using new satellite sensor data, combined with info from the terrestrial U.S. National Lightning Detection Network, to help identify the most dangerous lightning strikes. They found that "hot lightning" is the most dangerous as it can ignite wildfires, damage electrical equipment, and even kill people. Slashdot reader Wave723 shares a report from IEEE Spectrum: With new tools, researchers can now distinguish the most damaging lightning strikes from the many millions of others that occur every year. Already, the U.S. National Lightning Detection Network keeps a record of virtually all lightning that strikes the ground anywhere in the United States. That network is maintained by Helsinki-based Vaisala, which built it 30 years ago and sells the data to the National Weather Service and to utilities, airports, seaports, mines, and sporting arenas. Vaisala operates a global lightning detection network, as well. But the company hasn't been able to make one specific measurement that could provide clues as to how dangerous a given strike is likely to be -- until now.
Before the end of this year, Vaisala will debut a beta product that will make this valuable measurement available to clients for the first time. The product (which is now running but is not yet commercially available) combines data from its terrestrial U.S. and global lightning detection networks with new information from a pair of optical sensors, known as Geostationary Lightning Mappers (GLMs). The sensors are currently orbiting Earth aboard two weather satellites that belong to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The company's goal is to use all of this data to detect the presence of a single phenomenon: something called a continuing current, which is thought to occur in about 11 percent of lightning strikes. Lightning that harbors a continuing current is more likely to start fires and damage homes or equipment. Such "hot lightning," as it's called, can be spotted by the Geostationary Lightning Mappers, which detect rapid changes in brightness in the 777.4-nanometer (near infrared) band associated with lightning.
Before the end of this year, Vaisala will debut a beta product that will make this valuable measurement available to clients for the first time. The product (which is now running but is not yet commercially available) combines data from its terrestrial U.S. and global lightning detection networks with new information from a pair of optical sensors, known as Geostationary Lightning Mappers (GLMs). The sensors are currently orbiting Earth aboard two weather satellites that belong to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The company's goal is to use all of this data to detect the presence of a single phenomenon: something called a continuing current, which is thought to occur in about 11 percent of lightning strikes. Lightning that harbors a continuing current is more likely to start fires and damage homes or equipment. Such "hot lightning," as it's called, can be spotted by the Geostationary Lightning Mappers, which detect rapid changes in brightness in the 777.4-nanometer (near infrared) band associated with lightning.
Study Funded by California Power Company (Score:2)
Most likely.
Re:Study Funded by California Power Company (Score:5, Interesting)
No real study needed. It's been known in the forestry industry for about 90 years, it's simply getting worse because we've got large swaths of forest with dense ground clutter that hasn't been burnt out in 30-50+ years, and millions of dead pines from pine beetles.
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How many millions of dollars and countless man hours did it take to understand that lightening can cause forest fires? Wonder how many millions of dollars will it take to understand there is no way to stop lightening or fire safe every forest on the planet?
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The answer is going to be hundreds of millions, that could have been used for something else. It's like all those flavor studies(eggs are bad, butter is bad, bacon is bad, fat is bad), and a few years down the road we find out that the alternatives are twice or more times bad.
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That's a pretty poor analogy. Firstly, that is a list of foodstuffs and food groups (or food component groups, if you prefer), not flavours (which are 90% smell, and are the result of the shape of a "flavour" molecule docking with a receptor in your mouth/ nose/ pharynx. But that aside, pretty much all of those studies are carried out from the marketing budgets of companies (trade groups, etc) promoting a different food
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It's a pretty good analogy, especially prior to the current era of bullshit. All those studies that claimed butter, eggs, and bacon were bad came from studying correlation, similar to the who cholesterol fiasco, followed by the "salt r bad" BS that's been going on for years. Salt can be bad, for a very small subset of people similar to how dairy reacts poorly go some people.
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Most likely.
Very unlikely.
The California Power Company is bankrupt. They can't even fund themselves.
If they had any money, they would pay someone to clear the foliage around their towers in forested areas.
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"The California Power Company is bankrupt. They can't even fund themselves.
If they had any money, they would pay someone to clear the foliage around their towers in forested areas."
You fucking gibbering idiot corporate apologist, you could not be more wrong if you figured out how to shove a second head up your ass.
PG&E paid out hundreds of millions of dollars in executive compensation while failing to meet its contractual obligation to cut back trees around transmission lines. They had the money, but th
This is indeed important news! (Score:3)
"They found that 'hot lightning' is the most dangerous as it can ignite wildfires, damage electrical equipment, and even kill people."
Lightning can KILL people??? I'm shocked! Shocked, I tell you!
Re:This is indeed important news! (Score:4, Informative)
"They found that 'hot lightning' is the most dangerous as it can ignite wildfires, damage electrical equipment, and even kill people."
Lightning can KILL people??? I'm shocked! Shocked, I tell you!
Well, the mortality rate among lightning strike victims is only between 15-20% so it is indeed kind of unusual to be killed when you are struck by lighting. The famous Roy Sullivan was struck by lightning on seven occasions and survived them all.
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what the fuck is your point, that you do not understand what the word CAN means?
Definition of 'can':
1 : a usually cylindrical receptacle:
a : a vessel for holding liquids specifically : a drinking vessel.
b : a usually metal typically cylindrical receptacle usually with an open top, often with a removable cover, and sometimes with a spout or side handles.
c : a container (as of tinplate) in which products (such as perishable foods) are hermetically sealed for preservation until use
d : a jar for packing or preserving fruit or vegetables
Why do you work sexual intercourse into everyth
Yes. (Score:3)
Like "The Can of water Roy Sullivan carried with him always, in case his hair caught on fire again."
Can you dig it?
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I love your positive attitude!
Wait (Score:1)
Current is the difference. (Score:2)
Some lightning strikes carry about as much current as you do, walking across a carpet on a dry day.
Others carry enough current they melt steel or tungsten lightning rods into puddles, or puffs of vapor.
If you get hit by "Hot Lightning", you are likely to disappear in a cloud of carbonized steam.
The nice part is you'll literally never know what hit you. :)
Really? I thought.... (Score:2)
How to use this data? (Score:2)
So how exactly do we make use of this data? Presumably the idea is that we can then more closely monitor those particular areas for any small, easily overlooked early signs of fire to put out the fire earlier, or maybe even preemptively scramble fire control teams before we even know if there is a fire.
That's great, except we know that fires also perform a critical role in forest management, and that stopping smaller fires now generally results in larger fires later. We don't have the manpower to perform en
Journalistic low (Score:3)
I *think* what they're saying - though it is not expressed as clearly as it might have been - is not the obvious fact that lightning is dangerous and more energetic lightning is more dangerous, but rather that they can detect, from satellites, lightning strikes with the higher probability of igniting fires or causing damage.
Knowing that a forest fire has possibly just started is probably an improvement over waiting for the fire itself to be reported by witnesses, at which time it might have become quite substantial in size.
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The best way to find lightning fires would be to use a satellite to search for it. IR blooms in regions with lighting activity.
Shouldn't slow walker be able to do that for us, in between looking for missile launches?
Re:Journalistic low (Score:4, Informative)
When I was a wildland firefighter in 1994, that was already what they did.
They know exactly how many lightning strikes happen, where they happen, when they happen, and then they do flyovers with IR to see where fires started. Most of the lightning strikes don't result in forest fires, even if they caused burn damage to one tree.
In the olden days, before that, they had manned fire watch outposts on the tops of the ridges with the best view. Now you can rent some of them as remote recreation cabins.
A lot of people don't realize that golly, we have forest fires every year we probably have full time people that work on this, and they're probably not sitting around in a firehouse waiting for somebody to call and tell them a tree is on fire.
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So... someone figured out how to use satellites to solve something that wasn't a problem?
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No, somebody used satellites to do research, and it simply doesn't have much to do with current firefighting operations.
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Unfortunately, if 11% of lightning strikes are of this "hot lightning" type, that's not a terribly helpful result. Even with the low number of lightning storms around here (by coincidence, we've just had our 6th or 7th of the year), we get dozens of strikes per storm if not hundreds. So essentially every storm becomes a threatening one, with more than one strike in the
Lightning Starts Fires (Score:1)
no shit sherlock, how much grant money did we piss away on this one
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Dear Dumbass,
This story is not about grant money, it is about utilizing new satellite sensors to supplement the data from ground stations.
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Unless I'm out of date on fashion - nothing unusual there - and looking like an ignorant idiot is fashionable, this week.
What nobody else has noticed is ... (Score:2)
Now, I've got nothing against that at all - obviously they've got better tech for this than the US government - but I do find it slightly surprising given the US government's unending desire to sever relationships with other countries, to break international agreements and presumably to stop paying for this contract as soon as they notice the waste of taxpayer's money.
I am sure the loss of "The most scientific
Duh, cold lightning wouldn't start a fire! (Score:2)
Of course it has to be hot!