Midnight storm 12 January 2012

This was one hell of a night I'll never forget. It was just under an hour after midnight and I had only just fallen asleep when I was woken up by a loud rumble of thunder. As I looked out the window I could already see the bolts of lightning streaking across the sky and even though it hadn't gotten that intense at the time, something in me just told me that this is a storm I do not want to miss. Well, boy am I glad I followed my instincts, cause within barely a few minutes of me grabbing my camera this thing just went ballistic. 

This was one of the closest strikes. The thunder clap from
this one was absolutely deafening.

 For the next half hour or so, I had the privilege of witnessing and photographing one of, if not the most intense and most breathtaking lightning storm I've ever experienced. The strikes were almost continuous for nearly the entire duration of the storm and as you can see in the photos, often a little too close for comfort. The thunder was spectacularly deafening, rattling the windows so hard it almost felt like an earth tremor. Fortunately I was indoors the entire time although I'm aware that's not always a guarantee of safety, especially if you're pressing the camera against the window and holding on to steel burglar proof bars. Interestingly, for a storm of this intensity, there was very little to no wind. I found that very strange indeed.    

A lone but very intense strike. 

Pretoria and Johannesburg are located in what's known as the Summer rainfall belt region, an area encompassing basically the entire eastern half of South Africa. One particular region though, in which Pretoria and Johannesburg are located, is especially legendary when it comes to thunderstorms. Known as the Highveld, it's a region located in the inland central region of South Africa and is basically a high altitude plateau encompassing parts of the Northern Cape, Northwest Province, Limpopo, Mpumalanga and pretty much all of Gauteng and the Free State: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highveld. Thunderstorms like the one covered in this and the previous post are a common feature of the highveld during the spring and summer months. But I must admit though that the one covered in this post was quite insane, even for a Highveld thunderstorm.

Lightning ground flash density map for South Africa (Courtesy of http://www.wattronics.co.za/wp/page/2/ and the CSIR ) 

As you can see in the lightning ground flash density map above, much of the lightning activity in South Africa, which in turn translates to thunderstorm activity is concentrated mostly in the eastern half of the country (the summer rainfall belt). As is evident in the map, the Highveld makes up a significant portion of this area with a high density of lightning ground flashes. Cooler colours indicate a higher density of lightning ground strikes while the warmer colours indicate a lower density of strikes. As you can see, Johannesburg and Pretoria both fall inside the blue area, cementing their reputation as high density lightning strike locations. The areas with the highest density of ground strikes, shaded in black, are in the central Drakensberg region of north eastern Lesotho and southern Kwazulu-Natal and northern Kwazulu-Natal, the south of Swaziland and south easten Mpumalanga. 

Massive double strike. This one just took my breath away. I
couldn't believe how beautiful it was.

I'm sure some or most of us have experienced a storm that was either the most exciting, intense or most terrifying. I would very like you to share your experience of a storm you consider to be any of, or a combination of those three things and tell me what is like for you to go such an event.