Understanding Severe Weather Processes
Lightning Climatology
Studying the climatology surrounding thunderstorms helps us understand storm morphology and evolution for individual events. It also helps us pinpoint areas and conditions that create higher risks for lightning injuries.
Local Climatology
Data from the National Lightning Detection Network (NLDN) has been used by NSSL scientists to produce climatologies of lightning in different states including Arizona, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, New Mexico, Kansas, Colorado, and Oklahoma.
Cell-Scale Relationships
NSSL scientists have studied the relationships between the types of storms and the kinds of lightning that they produce. Their studies show that:
- a simple one-pulse storm has less CG lightning than other cells;
- Cells with other lightning-producing cells nearby have more CG lightning than if there is not a nearby cell;
- Cells embedded within storm complexes have more lightning than if they are not embedded;
- The amount of CG lightning increases as the cell extends higher in altitude above the freezing level.
Hail and Lightning Relationships
Storms with large hail typically produce high densities of positive flashes in Oklahoma and Kansas. Lightning rates can increase to a maximum just after the start of hail.
