How thunder and lightning are formed on a rainy day?

Lightning and thunder are produced by the electrical discharge reaction caused by the collision of positively charged and negatively charged clouds in the sky.

Lightning and thunder happen at the same time, why do we always see lightning first and then hear thunder? This is because light travels much faster than sound. Light travels almost 300,000 kilometers per second in the air, and at such a speed, it can travel seven and a half times around the Earth's equator in one second.

Sound travels about 340 meters per second in the air, almost 1/900,000th of the speed of light.

The time it takes for light to travel from the place where lightning occurs to the ground is generally only a few hundredths of a second, while it takes a long time for sound to travel the same distance. Sometimes lightning is not thundering, because the discharge clouds are too far away from us, or because the sound is not loud enough. Because as the sound travels through the air, its energy becomes smaller and smaller, and in the end the sound is no longer audible.

Since there is a lightning bolt in the sky, there is a thunder sound, but sometimes the lightning we see only flashes of lightning, and the thunder we hear is rumbling and ringing for a long time before stopping. This is because the lightning in the sky is generally very long, and some linear lightning bolts are as long as 2 to 3 kilometers, or even about 10 kilometers. Because the lightning parts are different from us, the time for the noise to reach our ears in the form of thunder comes first.

On the other hand, lightning often does not stop once it happens, but often flashes several times in a row in a single moment, and when the thunder of the first discharge has not continued, it is heard again.

Second, the thunder of the third discharge, the successive thunder mixed together, it became a rumbling thunder.

In addition, when thunder hits the ground, buildings, mountains, or clouds in the sky, it is reflected and echoes. The timing of these echoes reaching our ears is also inconsistent, hence the rumbling of thunder. Sometimes, due to several reasons, the rumbling thunder can even sound for about 1 minute before stopping.

In fact, this is a very simple physics common sense, first we have to figure out how lightning is formed.

Thunder and lightning are generally generated in the cumulonimbus clouds with strong convection development, the distribution of charges in the clouds is more complex, there are both positive and negative charges, the positive charge and the negative charge form a potential difference, when the potential difference reaches a certain level, it will produce discharge, which is our common lightning phenomenon.

Secondly, we need to make it clear that the lightning we see is light, and the thunder we hear is sound. So we need to understand how fast they pass wrong.

Propagation of light. The velocity of light in a vacuum: The speed of light in water:. The velocity of light in glass:

The velocity of light in ice:. The velocity of light in the air: approximately, in fact should be less than 299792458 meters and seconds).

The speed of light in alcohol:.

Propagation of sound. Acoustic propagation is transmitted through a medium. Sound can only be produced due to the vibration of the object, and sound is the fluctuation produced by the vibration of matter, which needs to be transmitted by the medium to be heard.

The speed at which sound waves are transmitted in a medium is called the speed of sound (or speed of sound), and the reflection and refraction of sound occurs due to the different speeds at which sound travels in different media. The production of sound is due to the vibration of the object, and sound is the fluctuation produced by the vibration of the substance, which needs to be transmitted by the medium to be heard.

The magnitude of the speed of sound varies depending on the nature and state of the medium. Generally speaking, the value of the velocity of sound is greater in solids than in liquids, and in liquids it is greater than in gases. The speed of sound in the air is about 340 meters per second, or 1224 kmh, at standard atmospheric pressure.

The magnitude of the speed of sound also varies with the temperature of the atmosphere, and in the troposphere, as the altitude increases, the air temperature decreases and the speed of sound decreases. In the lower stratosphere, the air temperature does not change with altitude, and the speed of sound does not change, which is meter seconds.

We can see that the speed of light in the air is much greater than the speed of sound by 340 meters and seconds, so we see the light first and then hear the sound.

This is because light travels faster than electricity, and during a thunderstorm, lightning can usually be seen before sound can be heard.

Because the speed of light travels faster than the speed of sound, when thunder and lightning occur at the same time, we will see lightning first and then hear thunder.

I think it's just a natural phenomenon, so we must look at it rationally and don't speculate.

How do lightning and thunder occur?