Salt in sea spray significantly inhibits lightning

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16 pointstosh4 comments

Link to actual article instead of a small snippet on someone's Twitter feed.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-31714-5

Fun fact: Lightning and thunder are very rare in Hawaii despite (generally) a tremendous amount of storm activity (rain).

probably most common on the big island I'd imagine, due to the peak there.

I don't really have a proof for this, but it seems like atmospheric charge mostly builds up due to charged dust and other particulates being blown up from the ground and into the upper atmosphere. Since this requires wind + a lot of land surface area for particulate capture, it would follow that islands wouldn't get a lot of lightning.

But now I'm wondering how lightning in seaborne hurricanes and tropical storms originates.

> builds up due to charged dust and other particulates

My armchair guess is what you are right here, you need a path for the current.

> But now I'm wondering how lightning in seaborne hurricanes and tropical storms originates

Map them with a global wind currents, eg one from Africa bringing the sand all over the globe.

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