Rensselaer Union, Volume 11, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 October 1878 — Electricity in Thunder-Clouds. [ARTICLE]

Electricity in Thunder-Clouds.

The great development of electricity in thunder-storms has been a subject of much speculation. Its explanation, however, is still an unsettled question. Some views on this subject are presented in this paper. We have no evidence that the production of fogs or clouds—the change from invisible to visible vapor, or from combined to uncombined moisture - produces any electricity. All experiments to establish such a supposition havehad a negative result. These particles of vapor we may suppose to be small spherules, each with its normal portion of electricity that surrounds or occupies the surface of the sphere. When two of these particles unite and form one, the combined particles will have twice the electricity of either of the separate parts, but not twice the surface. There will then be an accumulation of electricity upon the surface of the combined particle; and still more will this be so. when thousands of those spherules unite to form a drop of water. .We may well conceive, therefore, that a cloud forming water should become surcharged with electricity, that will escape in violent explosions when the accumulation is too rapid or the circumstances are unfavorable to its being carried off by the surrounding moist air. It is not, then, the formation of vapor, but its condensation to rain, that produces thunder and lightning. And this, it is believed, accords with all our experience. Clouds are constantly forming and disappearing; fogs and vapors are accumulated in some places in great abundance, but no electrical excitement has ever been observed. But, on the other hand, there is never a flash of lightning without a manifest deposition of rain. To this there is no exception. There is, indeed, a manifest relation between the tw*d. The more sudden and rapid the condensation, the more violent and terrific the explosion. Sometimes, in thunder-storms we hear a loud crash, and then, soon after, comes an increased pouring down of water. Sound travels more rapidly than rain, and, although the report reaches us first, the interval between the events and the distance traveled plainly indicate that the explosion succeeded the condensation; and we naturally infer that it was caused by it. The loud crash and simultaneous lightning shows the nearness of the explosion, at the origin of the rain-drops.— Hon. Elisha Foote, in Popular Science Monthly for October.