WaPo has a report on that mysterious phenomenon known as extreme lightning:
The World Meteorological Organization announced on Monday that it had confirmed two new mind-blowing lightning “megaflash” records. The findings, which come after careful data-checking and rigorous certification processes, include one record event that occurred over the Lower 48 states.
On April 29, 2020, a sprawling mass of strong to severe thunderstorms produced a 477.2-mile-long lightning strike over the southern United States. It stretched from near Houston to southeast Mississippi, a distance equivalent to that between Columbus, Ohio, and New York City.
The record beats out a 440-mile-long megaflash that occurred over southern Brazil on Halloween of 2018.
The WMO also identified a new world record for the long-lasting lightning flash. It lit up the skies over Uruguay and northern Argentina for 17.1 seconds on June 18, 2020, surpassing a 16.73-second flash recorded over northern Argentina on March 4, 2019.
And that question would be: are these phenomena sensitive to climate change?
