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Ball lightning


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A photo purportedly depicting natural ball lightning, taken in 1987 by a
student in Nagano 

*Ball lightning* is a proposed atmospheric electrical phenomenon of which
little is known. The term refers to reports of luminous , usually
spherical objects which vary from pea-sized to several meters in diameter.
It is usually associated with thunderstorms , but lasts considerably
longer than the split-second flash of a lightning bolt. Many of the early
reports say that the ball eventually explodes, sometimes with fatal
consequences, leaving behind the odor of sulfur .

Laboratory experiments have produced effects that are visually similar to
reports of ball lightning, but it is presently unknown whether these are
actually related to any naturally occurring phenomenon. Scientific data on
natural ball lightning are scarce owing to its infrequency and
unpredictability. The presumption of its existence is based on reported
public sightings, and has therefore produced somewhat inconsistent
findings. Given inconsistencies and the lack of reliable data, the true
nature of ball lightning is still unknown.^[1] Until recently, ball
lightning was often regarded as a fantasy or a hoax, but some serious
scientific discussions and theories have attempted to explain it.


Contents

[hide ]

* 1 Historical accounts 
o 1.1 The Great Thunderstorm of Widecombe-in-the-Moor

o 1.2 The Catherine and Mary 
o 1.3 The Montague 
o 1.4 Georg Richmann 
o 1.5 HMS Warren Hastings 
o 1.6 Ebenezer Cobham Brewer 
o 1.7 Wilfrid de Fonvielle 
o 1.8 Tsar Nicholas II 
o 1.9 Aleister Crowley 
o 1.10 Other accounts 
* 2 Characteristics 
* 3 Laboratory experiments 
o 3.1 Water discharge experiments 
o 3.2 Home microwave oven experiments

o 3.3 Silicon experiments 
o 3.4 Transcranial magnetic stimulation analogy

* 4 Possible scientific explanations

o 4.1 Vaporized silicon hypothesis 
o 4.2 Nanobattery hypothesis 
o 4.3 Black hole hypothesis 
o 4.4 Transcranial magnetic stimulation

o 4.5 Other hypotheses 
* 5 See also 
* 6 Notes 
* 7 Further reading 
* 8 External links 


[edit ]
Historical accounts

In a 1960 study, 5% of the US population reported having witnessed ball
lightning.^[2] ^[3] Another study analyzed reports of 10,000 cases.^[2]
^[4]



A contemporary woodcut of the 1638 thunderstorm at Widecombe

M. l'abbé de Tressan, in /Mythology compared with history: or, the fables
of the ancients elucidated from historical records/:

... during a storm which endangered the ship Argo, fires were seen to play
round the heads of the Tyndarides, and the instant after the storm ceased.
From that time, those fires which frequently appear on the surface of the
ocean were called the fire of Castor and Pollux. When two were seen at the
same time, it announced the return of calm, when only one, it was the
presage of a dreadful storm. This species of fire is frequently seen by
sailors, and is a species of /ignis fatuus/. (page 417)


[edit ] The Great Thunderstorm of Widecombe-in-the-Moor

One of the earliest descriptions was reported during The Great
Thunderstorm at a church in Widecombe-in-the-Moor , Devon , in England, on
21 October 1638. Four people died and approximately 60 were injured when,
during a severe storm, an 8-foot (2.4 m) ball of fire was described as
striking and entering the church, nearly destroying it. Large stones from
the church walls were hurled into the ground and through large wooden
beams. The ball of fire allegedly smashed the pews and many windows, and
filled the church with a foul sulfurous odor and dark, thick smoke.

The ball of fire reportedly divided into two segments, one exiting through
a window by smashing it open, the other disappearing somewhere inside the
church. The explanation at the time, because of the fire and sulfur smell,
was that the ball of fire was "the devil" or the "flames of hell". Later,
some blamed the entire incident on two people who had been playing cards
in the pew during the sermon, thereby incurring God's wrath.^[5]


[edit ] The /Catherine and Mary/

In December 1726 a number of British newspapers printed an extract of a
letter from John Howell of the sloop /Catherine and Mary/:

As we were coming thro’ the Gulf of Florida on the 29th of August, a
large ball of fire fell from the Element and split our mast in Ten
Thousand Pieces, if it were possible; split our Main Beam, also Three
Planks of the Side, Under Water, and Three of the Deck; kill’d one man,
another had his Hand carried of,[sic] and had it not been for the violent
rains, our Sails would have been of a Blast of Fire.^[6] ^[7]


[edit ] The /Montague/

One particularly large example was reported "on the authority of Dr.
Gregory" in 1749:

Admiral Chambers on board the Montague, November 4, 1749, was taking an
observation just before noon...he observed a large ball of blue fire about
three miles distant from them. They immediately lowered their topsails,
but it came up so fast upon them, that, before they could raise the main
tack, they observed the ball rise almost perpendicularly, and not above
forty or fifty yards from the main chains when it went off with an
explosion, as great as if a hundred cannons had been discharged at the
same time, leaving behind it a strong sulphurous smell. By this explosion
the main top-mast was shattered into pieces and the main mast went down to
the keel. Five men were knocked down and one of them much bruised. Just
before the explosion, the ball seemed to be the size of a large
mill-stone.^[8]



[edit ] Georg Richmann

A 1753 report depicts ball lightning as being lethal, when Professor Georg
Richmann of Saint Petersburg , Russia, created a kite-flying apparatus
similar to Benjamin Franklin 's proposal a year earlier. Richmann was
attending a meeting of the Academy of Sciences when he heard thunder, and
ran home with his engraver to capture the event for posterity. While the
experiment was under way, ball lightning appeared and traveled down the
string, struck Richmann's forehead and killed him. The ball left a red
spot on Richmann's forehead, his shoes were blown open, and his clothing
was singed. His engraver was knocked unconscious. The door frame of the
room was split and the door was torn from its hinges.^[9]


[edit ] HMS /Warren Hastings/



A 19th-century depiction of ball lightning

An English journal reported that during an 1809 storm, three "balls of
fire" appeared and "attacked" the British ship HMS /Warren Hastings/. The
crew watched one ball descend, killing a man on deck and setting the main
mast on fire. A crewman went out to retrieve the fallen body and was
struck by a second ball, which knocked him back and left him with mild
burns. A third man was killed by contact with the third ball. Crew members
reported a persistent, sickening sulfur smell afterward.^[10] ^[11]


[edit ] Ebenezer Cobham Brewer

Ebenezer Cobham Brewer , in his 1864 US edition of /A Guide to the
Scientific Knowledge of Things Familiar /, discussed "globular lightning".
He describes it as slow-moving balls of fire or explosive gas that
sometimes fall to the earth or run along the ground during a thunderstorm.
He said that the balls sometimes split into smaller balls and may explode
"like a cannon ".^[12]



[edit ] Wilfrid de Fonvielle

In his book /Thunder and Lighting/,^[13] translated into English in 1875,
French science writer, Wilfred de Fonvielle wrote that there had been
about 150 reports of globular lightning:

Globular lighting seems to be particularly attracted to metals; thus it
will seek the railings of balconies, or else water or gas pipes etc, It
has no peculiar tint of its own but will appear of any colour as the case
may be...at Coethen in the Duchy of Anhalt it appeared green. M. Colon,
Vice-President of the Geological Society of Paris, saw a ball of lightning
descend slowly from the sky along the bark of a poplar tree; as soon as it
touched the earth it bounced up again, and disappeared without exploding.
On 10th of September 1845 a ball of lightning entered the kitchen of a
house in the village of Salagnac in the valley of Correze. This ball
rolled across without doing any harm to two women and a young man who were
here; but on getting into an adjoining stable it exploded and killed a pig
which happened to be shut up there, and which, knowing nothing about the
wonders of thunder and lightning, dared to smell it in the most rude and
unbecoming manner. The motion of such balls is far from being very rapid
— they have even been observed occasionally to pause in their course,
but they are not the less destructive for all that. A ball of lightning
which entered the church of Stralsund, on exploding, projected a number of
balls which exploded in their turn like shells.^[14]


[edit ] Tsar Nicholas II

Tsar Nicholas II , the last Emperor of Russia, reported witnessing what he
called "a fiery ball" while in the company of his grandfather, Tsar
Alexander II : "Once my parents were away," recounted the Tsar, "and I was
at the all-night vigil with my grandfather in the small church in
Alexandria . During the service there was a powerful thunderstorm, streaks
of lightning flashed one after the other, and it seemed as if the peals of
thunder would shake even the church and the whole world to its
foundations. Suddenly it became quite dark, a blast of wind from the open
door blew out the flame of the candles which were lit in front of the
iconostasis , there was a long clap of thunder, louder than before, and I
suddenly saw a fiery ball flying from the window straight towards the head
of the Emperor. The ball (it was of lightning) whirled around the floor,
then passed the chandelier and flew out through the door into the park. My
heart froze, I glanced at my grandfather – his face was completely calm.
He crossed himself just as calmly as he had when the fiery ball had flown
near us, and I felt that it was unseemly and not courageous to be
frightened as I was ... After the ball had passed through the whole
church, and suddenly gone out through the door, I again looked at my
grandfather. A faint smile was on his face, and he nodded his head at me.
My panic disappeared, and from that time I had no more fear of
storms."^[15]


[edit ] Aleister Crowley

British occultist Aleister Crowley reported witnessing what he referred to
as "globular electricity" during a thunderstorm on Lake Pasquaney^[16] in
New Hampshire in 1916. He was sheltered in a small cottage when he
"noticed, with what I can only describe as calm amazement, that a dazzling
globe of electric fire, apparently between six and twelve inches (15–30
cm) in diameter, was stationary about six inches below and to the right of
my right knee. As I looked at it, it exploded with a sharp report quite
impossible to confuse with the continuous turmoil of the lightning,
thunder and hail, or that of the lashed water and smashed wood which was
creating a pandemonium outside the cottage. I felt a very slight shock in
the middle of my right hand, which was closer to the globe than any other
part of my body."^[17]


[edit ] Other accounts

* On 30 April 1877, a ball of lightning entered the Golden Temple at
Amritsar , India, and exited through a side door. Several people observed
the ball, and the incident is inscribed on the front wall of Darshani
Deodhi.^[18]

* In July 1907 the Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse in Western Australia was
hit by ball lightning. Lighthouse keeper Patrick Baird was in the tower at
the time and was knocked unconscious. His daughter Ethel recorded the
event.^[19]

* An early fictional reference to ball lightning appears in a children's
book set in the 19th century by Laura Ingalls Wilder .^[20] The books are
considered historical fiction, but the author always insisted they were
descriptive of actual events in her life. In Wilder's description, three
separate balls of lightning appear during a winter blizzard near a cast
iron stove in the family's kitchen. They are described as appearing near
the stovepipe, then rolling across the floor, only to disappear as the
mother (Caroline Ingalls ) chases them with a willow-branch broom.^[21]

* Pilots in World War II described an unusual phenomenon for which ball
lightning has been suggested as an explanation. The pilots saw small balls
of light moving in strange trajectories, which came to be referred to as
foo fighters .

* Submariners in WWII gave the most frequent and consistent accounts of
small ball lightning in the confined submarine atmosphere. There are
repeated accounts of inadvertent production of floating explosive balls
when the battery banks were switched in or out, especially if mis-switched
or when the highly inductive electrical motors were mis-connected or
disconnected. An attempt later to duplicate those balls with a surplus
submarine battery resulted in several failures and an explosion.^[22]

* On 6 August 1944, a ball of lightning went through a closed window in
Uppsala , Sweden, leaving a circular hole about 5 cm in diameter. The
incident was witnessed by residents in the area, and was recorded by a
lightning strike tracking system^[23] on the Division for Electricity and
Lightning Research at Uppsala University.^[24]


[edit ] Characteristics

Descriptions of ball lightning vary wildly. It has been described as
moving up and down, sideways or in unpredictable trajectories, hovering
and moving with or against the wind; attracted to,^[25] unaffected by, or
repelled from buildings, people, cars and other objects. Some accounts
describe it as moving through solid masses of wood or metal without
effect, while others describe it as destructive and melting or burning
those substances. Its appearance has also been linked to power lines ^[26]
as well as during thunderstorms and also calm weather. Ball lightning has
been described as transparent , translucent , multicolored, evenly lit,
radiating flames, filaments or sparks, with shapes that vary between
spheres, ovals, tear-drops, rods, or disks.^[27]

The balls have been reported to disperse in many different ways, such as
suddenly vanishing, gradually dissipating, absorption into an object,
"popping," exploding loudly, or even exploding with force, which is
sometimes reported as damaging. Accounts also vary on their alleged danger
to humans, from lethal to harmless.

A review of the available literature published in 1972^[28] identified the
properties of a “typical” lightning ball, whilst cautioning against
over-reliance on eye-witness accounts:

* They frequently appear almost simultaneously with cloud-to-ground
lightning discharge * They are generally spherical or pear-shaped with
fuzzy edges * Their diameters range from 1-100 cm, most commonly 10-20 cm
* Their brightness corresponds to roughly that of a domestic lamp, so they
can be seen clearly in daylight * A wide range of colors have been
observed, red, orange and yellow being the most common. * The lifetime of
each event is from 1 second to over a minute with the brightness remaining
fairly constant during that time * They tend to move, most often in a
horizontal direction at a few meters per second, but may also move
vertically, remain stationary or wander erratically. * Many are described
as having rotational motion * It is rare that observers report the
sensation of heat, although in some cases the disappearance of the ball is
accompanied by the liberation of heat * Some display an affinity for metal
objects and may move along conductors such as wires or metal fences * Some
appear within buildings passing through closed doors and windows * Some
have appeared within metal aircraft and have entered and left without
causing damage * The disappearance of a ball is generally rapid and may be
either silent or explosive * Odors resembling ozone , burning sulfur, or
nitrogen oxides are often reported


[edit ] Laboratory experiments

Scientists have long attempted to produce ball lightning in laboratory
experiments. While some experiments have produced effects that are
visually similar to reports of natural ball lightning, it has not yet been
determined whether there is any relation.

Nikola Tesla was reportedly able to produce artificially 1.5" (3.8 cm)
balls and conducted some demonstrations of his ability,^[29] but he was
really interested in higher voltages and powers, and remote transmission
of power, so the balls he made were just a curiosity.^[30]

The International Committee on Ball Lightning holds regular symposia on
the subject,^[31] the most recent of which took place in Kaliningrad ,
Russia in 2008.^[32] A related group uses the generic name "Unconventional
Plasmas".^[33]




A demonstration of the water discharge experiment


[edit ] Water discharge experiments

Some scientific groups, including the Max Planck Institute , have
reportedly produced a ball lightning-type effect by discharging a
high-voltage capacitor in a tank of water.^[34] ^[35]



[edit ] Home microwave oven experiments

Many modern experiments involve using a microwave oven to produce small
rising glowing balls, often referred to as "plasma balls".

Generally, the experiments are conducted by placing a lit or recently
extinguished match or other small object in a microwave oven. The burnt
portion of the object flares up into a large ball of fire, while "plasma
balls" can be seen floating near the ceiling of the oven chamber. The
effect is caused by electricity arcing between the conductive carbon
particles in the soot, similar to the way electricity arcs between the
tines of a fork. This can damage the oven by leaving burn marks and
causing high-voltage electrical discharge back into the oven's magnetron .

Some experiments describe covering the match with an inverted glass jar,
which contains both the flame and the balls so that they will not damage
the chamber walls. Other experimenters report that substituting a nickel
for the match produces better results. Some experimenters have posted
instructions, photos, and videos of these experiments.^[36]

The plasma balls vanish about 30 ms after the microwave power is turned
off, leaving uncertainty as to whether these are related to ball lightning
or are independent phenomena. Experiments by Eli Jerby and Vladimir
Dikhtyar in Israel revealed that microwave plasma balls are made up of
nanoparticles with an average radius of 25 nm. The Israeli team
demonstrated the phenomenon with copper, salts, water and carbon.^[37]


[edit ] Silicon experiments

Experiments in 2007 involved shocking silicon wafers with electricity,
which vaporizes the silicon and induces oxidation in the vapors. The
visual effect can be described as small glowing, sparkling orbs that roll
around a surface. Two Brazilian scientists, Antonio Pavão and Gerson
Paiva of the Federal University of Pernambuco ^[38] have reportedly
consistently made small long-lasting balls using this method.^[39] ^[40]
These experiments stemmed from the theory that ball lightning is actually
oxidized silicon vapors /(see vaporized silicon hypothesis , below)/.


[edit ] Transcranial magnetic stimulation analogy

Theoretical calculations from University of Innsbruck researchers suggest
that the magnetic fields involved in certain types of lightning strokes
could potentially induce visual hallucinations resembling ball
lightning.^[41] Such fields, which are found within close distances to a
point in which multiple lightning strikes have occurred over a few
seconds, can directly cause the neurons in the visual cortex to fire,
resulting in Magnetophosphenes (magnetically-induced visual
hallucinations).^[42]


[edit ] Possible scientific explanations

An attempt to explain ball lightning was made by Nikola Tesla in
1904,^[43] but there is at present no widely-accepted explanation for the
phenomenon. Several theories have been advanced since it was brought into
the scientific realm by the English Physician and electrical researcher
William Snow Harris in 1843,^[44] and French Academy scientist François
Arago in 1855.^[45]


[edit ] Vaporized silicon hypothesis

This hypothesis suggests that ball lightning consists of vaporized silicon
burning through oxidation. Lightning striking Earth's soil could vaporize
the silica contained within it, turning it into pure silicon vapor. As it
cools, the silicon could condense into a floating aerosol, bound by its
charge, glowing due to the heat of silicon recombining with oxygen . An
experimental investigation of this effect, published in 2007, reported
producing "luminous balls with lifetime in the order of seconds" by
evaporating pure silicon with an electric arc.^[46] ^[47] ^[48] Videos of
this experiment have been made available.^[49]


[edit ] Nanobattery hypothesis

Oleg Meshcheryakov suggests that ball lightning is made of composite nano
or submicrometre particles, each particle constituting a battery . A
surface discharge shorts these batteries, resulting in a current which
forms the ball. His model is described as an aerosol , but not aerogel ,
model that explains all the observable properties and processes of ball
lightning.^[50] ^[51]


[edit ] Black hole hypothesis

Another hypothesis is that some ball lightning is the passage of
microscopic primordial black holes through the Earth's atmosphere as
proposed by Mario Rabinowitz in Astrophysics and Space Science journal in
1999.^[52] Inspired by M. Fitzgerald’s account of ball lightning on 6
August 1868, in Ireland that lasted 20 minutes and left a 6 meter square
hole, a 90 meter long trench, a second trench 25 meters long, and a small
cave in the peat bog , Pace VanDevender, a plasma physicist at Sandia
National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico , and his team found
depressions consistent with Fitzgerald’s report and inferred that the
evidence is inconsistent with thermal (chemical or nuclear) and
electrostatic effects. An electromagnetically levitated, compact mass of
over 20,000 kg would produce the reported effects but requires a density
of more than 2000 times the density of gold, which implies a miniature
black hole. He and his team found a second event in the peat-bog witness
plate from 1982 and are currently trying to geolocate electromagnetic
emission consistent with the hypothesis. His colleagues at the institute
agreed that, implausible though the hypothesis seemed, it was worthy of
their attention.^[53]


[edit ] Transcranial magnetic stimulation

Cooray and Cooray (2008)^[54] stated that the features of hallucinations
experienced by patients having epileptic seizures in the occipital lobe
are similar to the observed features of ball lightning. The study also
showed that the rapidly changing magnetic field of a close lightning flash
has a strength which is large enough to excite the neurons in the brain
strengthening the possibility of lightning-induced seizure in the
occipital lobe of a person located close to a lightning strike
establishing the connection between epileptic hallucination mimicking ball
lightning and thunderstorms. More recent research with Transcranial
magnetic stimulation has been shown to give the same hallucination results
in the laboratory (termed magnetophospenes ), and these conditions have
been shown to occur in nature near lightning strikes.^[55] ^[56]



[edit ] Other hypotheses

Several other hypotheses have been proposed to explain ball lightning:

* Spinning electric dipole hypothesis. A 1976 article by V. G. Endean
postulated that ball lightning could be described as an electric field
vector spinning in the microwave frequency region.^[57]

* Electrostatic Leyden jar models. Stanley Singer discussed (1971) this
type of hypothesis and suggested that the electrical recombination time
would be too short for the ball lightning lifetimes often reported.^[58]

* J. Pace VanDevender separates extreme ball lightning of the highly
energetic violent kind, and proposes a theory of neutrinos and heavy
neutrinos.^[59]

* Smirnov proposed (1987) a fractal aerogel hypothesis.^[60]

* Fedosin S.G. and Kim A.S. proposed (2000) Electron-ionic model.^[61]

* Torchigin proposed (2003) considering ball lightning as a form of
self-confined intense light.^[62]


[edit ] See also

* St. Elmo's fire * Naga fireballs * Hessdalen light * Will-o'-the-wisp *
Hitodama * Foo fighter * Spontaneous human combustion * Red sprite * Marfa
lights


[edit ] Notes

1. *^ * ABC.net.edu: /Ball lightning bamboozles physicist/

2. ^ ^/*a*/ ^/*b*/ "Ask the experts" . Scientific American.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=periodically-i-hear-stori.
Retrieved 4 April 2007.  3. *^ * McNally, J. R. (1960). "Preliminary
Report on Ball Lightning". /Proceedings of the Second Annual Meeting of
the Division of Plasma Physics of the American Physical Society/ (Paper
J-15 ed.). Gatlinburg. pp. 1–25.  4. *^ * Grigoriev, A. I. (1988). Y. H.
Ohtsuki. ed. "Statistical Analysis of the Ball Lightning Properties".
/Science of Ball Lightning/ (Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co.):
88–134.  5. *^ * Amery, Peter Fabyan Sparke; John S. Amery, Joshua
Brooking Rowe (1905). /Devon Notes and Queries/ . J. G. Commin. p. viii.
http://books.google.com/?id=nBFJAAAAMAAJ&pg=PR8&dq=Wykes+Rothwell#PPR12,M1.  
6. *^ * Anon. "Foreign Affairs: Bristol 17 December". /Weekly Journal or
British Gazetteer/ (24 December 1726).  7. *^ * Anon (24 December 1726).
"Foreign Affairs: London 24 December". /London Journal/ (London).  8. *^ *
Norton, Andrews, ed (1813). /The General Repository and Review/ . *Vol 3*.
Cambridge, Massachusetts: William Hilliard. pp. 157.
http://books.google.com/?id=RV4oAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA157&dq=Globular+lightning&cd=43#v=onepage&q=Globular%20lightning.
Retrieved 10 May 2010.  9. *^ * Clarke, Ronald W. (1983). /Benjamin
Franklin, A Biography/. Random House. pp. 87.  10. *^ * Simons, Paul (17
February 2009). "Weather Eye Charles Darwin the meteorologist" . /The
Times/ (London).
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/weather/article5747952.ece.
Retrieved 16 April 2010.  11. *^ *
http://www.thenational.ae/article/20090223/FRONTIERS/646186738/1036 12. *^
* Brewer, Ebenezer Cobham (1864). /A Guide to the Scientific Knowledge of
Things Familiar/ . pp. 13–14.
http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=moa;cc=moa;idno=ajn0728.0001.001;view=toc;frm=frameset.  
13. *^ * de Fonvielle, Wilfrid (1875). "Chapter X Globular lightning" .
/Thunder and lightning (full text)/. translated by T L Phipson. pp.
32–39. ISBN 9781142612559) .
http://books.google.com/?id=hukDAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover&q=Globular.  
14. *^ * Anon (24 December 1867). "Globular lightning". /The Leeds
mercury/. Leeds, UK.  15. *^ * "Tsar-Martyr Nicholas II And His Family" .
Orthodox.net.
http://www.orthodox.net/russiannm/nicholas-ii-tsar-martyr-and-his-family.html.
Retrieved 13 July 2009.  16. *^ * There is no present-day /Lake Pasquaney/
in New Hampshire. New Hampshire's Newfound Lake has a /Camp Pasquaney/.
17. *^ * Crowley, Aleister (5 December 1989). "Chp. 83" . /The Confessions
of Aleister Crowley: An Autobiography/ . Penguin. ISBN 0140191895 .
http://www.hermetic.com/crowley/confess/chapter83.html.  18. *^ * Miracle
saved panth

19. *^ * "The Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse" . Lighthouse.net.au.
http://www.lighthouse.net.au/lights/WA/Cape%20Naturaliste/Cape%20Naturaliste.htm#History.
Retrieved 13 July 2009.  20. *^ * Wilder, Laura Ingalls (1937). /On the
Banks of Plum Creek/. Harper Trophy.  21. *^ * Getline, Meryl (17 October
2005). "Playing with (St. Elmo's) fire" . USA Today.
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/columnist/getline/2005-10-17-ask-the-captain_x.htm.  
22. *^ * "Ball lightning – and the charge sheath vortex" .
Peter-thomson.co.uk.
http://www.peter-thomson.co.uk/tornado/fusion/Ball_lightning_and_the_charge_sheath_vortex.html.
Retrieved 13 July 2009.  23. *^ * This may be an incorrect translation of
the word "blixtlokaliseringssystem" from the university article cited in
the sources 24. *^ * Larsson, Anders (23 April 2002). "Ett fenomen som
gäckar vetenskapen" (in Swedish). Uppsala University.
http://www.hvi.uu.se/Lightning/blixtar/Klotblixt.html. Retrieved 19
November 2007.  25. *^ * "BL_Info_10" . Ernmphotography.com.
http://www.ernmphotography.com/Pages/Ball_Lightning/BL_Info_10.html.
Retrieved 13 July 2009.  26. *^ * "Unusual Phenomea Reports: Ball
Lightning" . Amasci.com. http://amasci.com/weird/unusual/blold2.html.
Retrieved 13 July 2009.  27. *^ * Barry, James Dale: /Ball lightning and
bead lightning: extreme forms of atmospheric electricity/, ISBN 0306
402726 , 1980, Plenum Press (p.35) [1]

28. *^ * Charman, Neil (14 December 1972). "The enigma of ball Lightning"
. /New Scientist/ (Reed Business information) *56* (824): 632–635. ISSN
0262-4079 .
http://books.google.com/?id=TCTpu1UVFsYC&pg=PA633&dq=Ball+lightning&cd=1#v=onepage&q=Ball%20lightning.
Retrieved 10 May 2010.  29. *^ * "The New Wizard of the West" .
Homepage.ntlworld.com.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/forgottenfutures/tesla/tesla.htm. Retrieved
13 July 2009.  30. *^ * Tesla, Nikola (1978). /Nikola Tesla - Colorado
Springs Notes 1899-1900/. Nolit (Beograd, Yugoslavia), 368-370. ISBN
978-0913022269 31. *^ * Anon (2001). "VII. International symposium on ball
Lightning (ISBL'01)" . /International Committee on Ball Lightning/. St
Louis, Missouri: ICBL. http://www.umsl.edu/~handelp/BLConference.html.
Retrieved 10 May 2010.  32. *^ * "First Call for Papers" . /Tenth
International Symposium on Ball Lightning/ (Kant University of
Kaliningrad, Russia). July 2008.
http://plasma.karelia.ru/events/info/isbl2008.doc. Retrieved 13 July 2009.  
33. *^ * Anon (2008). "Tenth international syposium on ball lightning/
International symposium III on unconventional plasmas" . ICBL.
http://home.planet.nl/~icblsec/noscript.html. Retrieved 10 May 2010.  34.
*^ * "'Ball lightning' created in German laboratory | COSMOS magazine" .
COSMOS magazine. 2006-06-07. http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/334.
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[edit ] Further reading

* Barry, James Dale (1980). /Ball Lightning and Bead Lightning/. New York:
Plenum Press.  * Cade, Cecil Maxwell; Delphine Davis (1969). /The Taming
of the Thunderbolts/. New York: Abelard-Schuman Limited.  * Coleman, Peter
F. (2004). /Great Balls of Fire—A Unified Theory of Ball Lightning,
UFOs, Tunguska and other Anomalous Lights/. Christchurch, NZ: Fireshine
Press.  * Coleman, P.F. 2006, J.Sci.Expl., Vol. 20, No.2, 215–238. *
Golde, R. H. (1977). /Lightning/. Bristol: John Wright and Sons Limited.  
* Golde, R. H. (1977). /Lightning Volume 1 Physics of Lightning/. Academic
Press.  * Uman, Martin A. (1984). /Lightning/. Dover Publications.  *
Viemeister, Peter E. (1972). /The Lightning Book/. Cambridge: MIT Press.