How can you figure out how far away lightning struck?

Check out this podcast from HowStuffWorks to learn how to gauge the distance of a lightning strike with a simple equation.

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to brain Stuff from how stuff works dot com
where smart Happens. Hi, I'm Marshall Brain with today's question,
how can you figure out how far away lightning struck?
If you can see the bolt of lightning actually strike
the ground, or if you can see a flash from
a bolt of lightning, you can calculate how far away

(00:20):
it's struck by timing the arrival of the thunder. Let
me show you how to do this with miles first,
and then we'll do it in kilometers. The sound of
thunder travels through the air at the speed of sound. Officially,
the speed of sound is about feet per second, so
sound travels one mile in roughly five seconds. When you
see the flash of a lightning bolt, you can start

(00:43):
counting seconds and then divide by five to see how
far away the lightning struck. For example, if it takes
ten seconds for the thunder to roll in, you divide
by five and you know that the lightning struck about
two miles away. Now let's do it in metric Officially,
this either sound is about three meters per second, so

(01:03):
sound travels one kilometer in roughly three seconds. When you
see the flash of a lightning bolt, you can start
counting seconds and then divide by three to see how
far away the lightning struck. If it takes ten seconds
for the thunder to roll in, you can divide by
three and you know that lightning struck about three kilometers away.

(01:24):
Do you have any ideas or suggestions for this podcast?
If so, please send me an email at podcast at
how stuff works dot com. For more on this and
thousands of other topics, go to how stuff works dot
com