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 2002  Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. A

This journal is © 2002 The Royal Society
on October 6, 2010
rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org

Recently reported sightings of ball lightning:
observations collected by correspondence
and Russian and Ukrainian sightings

John Abrahamson, A. V. Bychkov and V. L. Bychkov

1Chemical and Process Engineering Department, University of Canterbury,
Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand

2Institute for High Temperature, Russian Academy of Science,
Izhorskaya 13/19, Moscow 127412, Russia

Published online 4 December 2001

The observations in the first section of this paper were sent to John
Abrahamson in response to the publication of a recent paper on ball
lightning, with the cor respondents either reading the original paper, or
reports of it in popular science articles. A selection of the cases has
been made, including those which showed inter esting detail possibly
useful in debating ball lightning mechanisms. Any inserted text within
parenthesis is the observer's response to follow-up queries from J.A.

The age of the observer (where noted) is that at the time of the
observation. Three obser vations ( §§ 1 q­s) did not show motion
independent of their surroundings, but have been included because of their
other similarities to ball lightning. It is interesting to note the high
proportion (greater than 0.5) of scientifically or technically trained
observers in this collection.

The data presented in the second section of this paper come from both
letters and interviews. Our interview questionnaire consisted of 46
questions and was mostly carried out in quiet conditions. Observations in
§§ 2 a, e, h, l, m, q­t were corrected during several (two or three)
interviews. Heading each observation case we note the most unusual
property of the object.

Ball lightning appears in Russia and the Ukraine usually in summer
(June­Au gust), and more rarely in spring (March­May), or autumn
(September­November). It appears usually during the daytime, 13:00­17:00
h, when most summer thunder storms take place.

Observers in their descriptions usually use the term `morning' to describe
the period from 06:00 to 11:00 h, `daytime' for 12:00­18:00 h, and
`evening' for 19:00­ 21:00 h. The term `time' means the local time, and
sometimes it is difficult to compare it with the local geographic time due
to frequent official state summer­winter time changes. The decree time in
Russia can in general differ from the geographic time by 1­2 h.

1. Observations collected by correspondence

The observations in this section of this paper were in response to the
publication of a recent paper on ball lightning (Abrahamson & Dinniss
2000), with the correspondents either reading the original paper, or
reports of it in popular science articles. The material in each subsection
is quoted directly from the correspondence, and has only been lightly
edited. Authorial comments are in square brackets.

(a) In non-stormy but windy conditions, possible contact of bamboo with
steel frame, penetration of walls

Ailsa Maihiesen, Port Moresby, PNG. Letter from Canberra, Australia, 2000.

I have seen ball lightning when I lived in Port Moresby PNG. I lived in a
house on the side of rather a steep rock face overlooking the ocean. The
house actually sat on a ledge of the rock face and we had a large balcony
of steel and wood construction (with very large and high steel
supports)--growing right beside this construction were very large and
numerous bamboo poles.

On the day I saw the ball lightning it was totally storm free, but quite
windy. The ball of lightning (which was actually about the size of a
cricket ball)  came out of the clumps of bamboo, passed through the front
wall of our house, moved very quickly through the lounge room and
disappeared out the back wall. The ball of lightning moved at about head
height and was clearly visible in ball form.

After it came through our front wall, it did not move in a straight line
to our back wall, in fact it seemed to do a few little detours around the
room before it passed through the back wall.

It was a beautiful sunny day with blue sky, and with the wind coming off
the ocean. At the time we did consider the friction caused by the bamboo
rubbing on the steel supports and railings as a cause, so we had some of
the bamboo cut back and as a result of that, we did not experience it
again--or at least that is what we believed at the time and which I still
consider to be the case today.

(b) Stable ball on an aeroplane wing-tip while landing

Alexandra Navrotsky (high temperature materials chemist), 1985. Letter from
University of California, Davis, USA, 2000.

To me, the model makes sense. I bring to your attention an occurrence
where the silicon reactions are perhaps less likely. Landing in a
thunderstorm in Dallas, Texas, in 1985 (when 'planes used to land in far
worse weather than now allowed), I had a window seat by the wing.
Lightning was all around but I don't know if the plane was struck.
Suddenly, a ball lightning appeared on the wingtip, lasted some 10­15
seconds, and extinguished explosively. Its size is hard to estimate (not
knowing the length of the wing; I think the plane was a Boeing 727), but
it looked like a soccer ball. I wonder if vaporized aluminum from the wing
might act similarly to silicon.

(c) Stormy conditions, moved inside, heated metal bucket

Mrs Jennifer Bunting, mid 1960s, Johannesburg, South Africa. Letter from West
Sussex, UK, 2000.

It was in the mid '60s in Johannesburg. We had just returned by road from
a holiday in the Cape and were enjoying a welcome cuppa in the kitchen of
our rented house in Norwood. The luggage, including a tin seaside bucket,
had been dumped in the hall. Outside it was stormy and as you may know
conditions on the highveld produce lots of static and spectacular
lightning displays. I'll do you a small sketch map to illustrate what
happened next. [J.A.: The sketch showed the path of the ball through the
house from the pantry window towards the closed front door, in a straight
line except for ca. 1 m deviation into the kitchen, via two open doors.]

The window into the pantry, just next to the kitchen, was open. This
bright ball of lightning came in through the pantry, entered the kitchen
around the corner then sped out of the kitchen again round another corner
and into the passage and the hall where it hit the tin bucket with a
clang! Certainly when we ran to check, the bucket was too hot to pick up
and its paint had blistered!

(d ) Lightning on power transformer, attached to underside of power line,
penetration of glass pane, splattered on interior wall

Eddie Sines (electronic technician), 14­15 years old, western Maryland, USA.
Email from Navy Research Laboratories, Washington, DC, USA, 2000.

I was about 14­15 years of age and staying with my grandparents in western
Maryland for a few weeks one summer. A large thunder storm came up and I
ran into the house to watch it from the safety of cover. I recall that I
was in the living room looking out one of the windows. In my view was the
main telephone pole about 50 ft away from the house and off to the left.
The telephone pole had a large transformer mounted on it. I recall the
pole had two lines stacked one above the other and stretched from the pole
to the corner of the house where it was attached to the house. These power
cables just happened to pass directly in front of the window I was
standing in front of (off to the left side). The power leads had a water
droop in the connection between the house and the main transformer so the
water would not run over to the house and would drop off the power line
about halfway to the house. The power line was on my left and connected to
the house at my shoulder level.

Lighting struck the main transformer that I was looking at. Naturally
there was a very bright flash, but my eyes adjusted very quickly and to my
amazement, I saw what looked like a small ball, the size of a tennis ball,
light green in colour, spinning around on the top of the transformer. This
ball then bounced off and seemed to couple to one of the power leads
coming toward the house. The ball lightning was rolling downhill at this
time. Picture a ball on the underside of a large cable bouncing along on
the bottom side. The ball lightning made about 3 or 4 bounces and finally
stabilized on the underside of the power cable and seemed to be moving at
30 ft s-1.

When the ball lightning reached the bottom of the power cable dip, it came
off, with a trajectory directly at the window I was standing at. The
impact was just to my left and above my shoulder. Naturally I was
surprised, but the speed was so fast I had no time to react. The ball
lighting hit the window, in the upper left section. It made no sound and
seemed to slow as it passed right through the window. 

I turned as fast as I could to see where it went and it had already hit
the back wall of the living room (about 16 ft away). After hitting the
wall, it made a small crackle sound and seemed to dissipate evenly in all
directions, with small bright trails of static electricity dancing all
over the wall. Total time of this event was less than 2 sec. That was the
one and only time I have ever seen ball lighting made by nature. [I do
remember looking through the window after the event, but I do not remember
any change in the window or wall. It was left untouched, no marks of any
kind. The back wall was free of any obstruction (pictures, etc.)  and the
ball lightning hit about centre. The bright trails on the wall fanned out
just like lightning for about 3 or 4 feet in all directions leaving light
blue trails, while the rest of the light was very light green in colour.]

(e) Lightning strike on a power pole distribution box, entered house,
caused light bulb to fail

David M. Benstead (military serviceman), 22 years old, 1953, Singapore. Letter
from Norwich, UK, 2000.

An experience of ball lightning which I had in 1953 in Singapore may be of
interest to you, as in this case the strike was to an electricity
distribution pole and the ball first appeared at the top of the pole.

Three others and I were sitting in the lounge of my bungalow when a
violent tropical storm started. Lighting struck a distribution box on a
tall wooden pole to the rear of the property in full view of the lounge
window. Electricity (supply lines) to the bungalow were overhead from this
pole and not underground as is usually the case.

A white ball, the size of a cricket ball, appeared to roll along the lines
towards my home at about walking pace. It passed through the iron security
bars of the kitchen window past the entrance to the kitchen from the
lounge. After entering the dining area it `backtracked' out through the
window, proceeded along the electric cable and exploded. The `ball' was
sizzling loudly all the time we observed it. While it was passing through
the kitchen the fridge went into `overdrive', house lights which were
switched OFF at the time flickered and then extinguished. With the
exception of one 240 volt light bulb, there was no damage to be found
anywhere.

Needless to say this was a frightening experience. Not knowing at the time
what the explanation was I reported it the following morning to my
Squadron Commander, who said he thought that it must have been ball
lightning. The newspaper article states that one in a hundred people has
had experience of ball lightning. At 69 years of age and well-travelled, I
have never met a person who has.

[J.A.: The observer provided a sketch of the ball, describing it as
`having a brilliant white centre, the size of a cricket ball, appearing
solid surrounded by fuzz'.  His sketch indicated a fuzz layer of around
0.3­0.5 the radius. A sketch of the path indicated the strike on a
`junction box/transformer', and that the ball exploded as it reached the
power line again.]

(f ) Lightning strike on power pole, longer strike period

David Mackey (police officer), 50 years old, 1998, Pittsfield, MA, USA. Letter, 
2000.

During the fall of 1998 while fishing an area in Wellfleet Harbour on Cape
Cod, I found myself trapped and isolated on the dunes by a fast moving and
violent thunderstorm tearing through the area. With no chance of making it
back to my vehicle in time, I dug in, and by using a piece of a board I
dug out a shallow, hollow depression in the soft sand as I wanted to get
as low as possible. I huddled down and bundled and watched one of the
wildest and most bizarre thunderstorms that I can ever recall.

The wind was out of the west 30­40­50 mph and then would shift east or
northeast back at about the same velocity causing a racking effect. The
rain came in torrents. Though the sand was wet the wind whipped up large
columns and sent them through the air with enough force to sting exposed
skin. Lightning strikes became more frequent. The dunes were struck to my
west and then another behind me to the south.

About mid-way through this storm, which lasted about 20 minutes, I
witnessed a lightning strike which was like no other I have ever seen and
there were three things which I found unusual about it. First, I have
never seen lightning strike in three separate areas simultaneously from
what appeared to be from the same bolt which had three prongs to it.
Across the channel directly in front of me, while looking towards a golf
course off a Chequessette Neck Road, I observed this lightning bolt making
two strikes to the ground on top of this golf course and the third struck
a telephone pole on Chequessette Neck Road.

The second thing I found unusual about this strike was it was two
different colours. The two bolts which struck the golf course area were
brilliant white and lasted only a split second, while the third which
struck the pole was a brilliant and glowing orange, with the entire strike
lasting longer than the other two. This kind of faded out leaving a dark
shadow of itself in the sky overhead. The crash of thunder was immediate.

The third thing about the strike that was unusual and bizarre, was that
the top of this telephone pole was left with a glowing orange ball on top
of it after the bolt burned away. My first impression was that the pole
was now on fire; that was until this ball of fire moved off the top of the
pole and started floating down to the ground while also heading east. The
ball of fire then began to zig-zag and go up and down and floated like a
feather in the wind, which was what obviously was controlling the path.
This glow stayed brilliant for about 8 or 10 seconds and then vanished as
if someone flicked off a light switch, and this was followed about a
second later with a loud bang. This bang I heard I would equate to the
sound made by a shotgun blast.

[Further details: the dark shadow of the orange lightning bolt that had
burned out slowly began to disappear and was breaking up and moving east.
I could see the different speeds of the wind currents above by watching
different sections moving faster than others as it broke up. What this
dark shadow was comprised of, I haven't got a clue--smoke? The pole itself
was made of wood. At the top it contains a small T bar made of wood, upon
which it carries two, I believe, electrical wires, connected by insulators
made of glass or ceramic. Below these wires the pole carries, I believe,
TV and telephone wires several feet below the primary wires atop the pole.
There is at least one set of stabilizing metal guide wires connecting from
the pole to the ground.]

By the way, later on that same day I went over to this pole on
Chequessette Neck Road to check out any damage. There was absolutely
nothing, not even a burn mark, which left me wondering if the pole itself
had actually directly been struck. I was approximately 200 yards away from
this strike when it occurred and though my view was unobstructed, maybe
with the depth perception I could be off slightly. At this yardage I
cannot estimate the size of this glowing object, as it was so bright I
could not make out an object, as when someone shines a flash-light into
your eyes it is difficult to see what's behind the light. I can say it did
not appear to be large and it did travel approximately 100 feet from the
pole to where I last marked it as it blew in the wind.'

(g) Lightning strike on steel window, detailed description of close
encounter inside building, penetrated building surface

Thad Piotrowski (computer analyst), 15 years old, 1963, New York City,
USA. Email 2000.

I have had a very `close encounter' with a ball lightning that may be of
interest to you. (It was late spring 1963 and about 5 p.m.) I was sitting
on a marble and steel staircase on the fifth floor of a New York City
apartment house, when above me on a landing a lightning bolt hit the
window with a loud crash. As I looked up toward the sound, a ball formed
in the half open double hung window. It was pale yellow, not bright, and
about the size of a typical basketball. It made a subdued and continuous
hissing sound. 

[The floor was marble tile of some sort, the stairs were marble on the
steps and steel underneath and on the back vertical part of the steps. The
window was a large double-hung steel frame window that had a top and
bottom pane of glass. The glass was unusual in that there were two glass
layers, and in between was a wire metal hexagonal lattice.  The glass was
nearly opaque. The steel frame of the windows was painted with a red and,
I am pretty sure, lead based paint.] At first it hovered and moved with
slight `jerky' motions, reminding me of a Brow nian motion demonstration
that I had seen. It slowly (about 5­7 seconds, I think) made its way to
the floor of the landing (about 3 feet at most).

Now here you may not believe me, but it went into the floor completely for
a second and then popped up quickly almost back to the level of the
window. At this point it started moving at a slightly accelerated pace. It
started bouncing towards me down the stairs that I was sitting on. It
bounced on a couple of the stairs and bounced near me (my back was toward
the wall, my feet toward the railing) near my chest. I was able to clearly
see that it was composed of what I thought were `sparks'.

The sparks were either pure yellow or pure white and on the outer surface
of the ball were about 1 cm. They did not touch each other and each yellow
spark was surrounded by a white spark and each white spark was surrounded
by a yellow spark, if that's possible. The sparks lasted for perhaps a 1/4
second or less and were replenished by new ones. The ball itself was
composed of layers of these disappearing sparks: the second layer of
sparks below was a fraction of the size (of the) outer layer, and the
layer below that the sparks were so small as to be nearly invisible.

The three or so layers that I could discern were only about a half-inch
into the ball, but my impression was that that kind of structure continued
all the way down. The sparks each had a spike which pointed down toward
the centre of the ball and a Y shaped top that was kind of perpendicular
to the centre. [To try and clarify this, at the top level the sparks were
about 1/2 inch in size (I was looking down slightly at the ball, which was
also rotating slowly so it was hard to fixate at one spot on it) looking
at the Y shaped part. 

If you make a V for victory sign with your index and
middle finger that Y part was 45 degrees. And if you put your index finger
of the other hand at the point of the V, that part (the spike) was the
same size as each of the V parts. Each spark was interlocked with every
other spark on the same level in a very orderly way as I said, with a
yellow interlocked with a white and the pattern continued all the way
around the ball. The spacing between the sparks was perhaps 1/3 inch or
less on the top layer. The second layer below the sparks `fitted' in the
space between the spikes of the top layer;  they were much smaller than
the top layer but the pattern continued. Even though each spark lasted
only a brief time the ball had a very high degree of order and pattern.]

I felt like touching it, but decided not to. It passed over my legs and
within 6 inches of my chest; I did not feel any heat or static electricity
sensation or notice an odor. As the ball bounced onto the landing a stair
or two below me, it hit a wall between two doorways on that floor. It
disappeared without a sound. I went to where it hit and touched the wall.
It was not hot, and there was no visible damage or mark on the paint or
wall anywhere.

[Facing the stairs I was on were two steel doorways of the four apartments
on that floor. The ball struck between these doorways actually on the
steel frame of the door between the two, about 4 inches up from the
floor.]

Two people were in one of the four apartments, had their door open to the
landing and saw the ball briefly as it bounced on the landing and
vanished. They were not in a position to see the original lightning strike
on the floor above. I find it difficult to guess the total time of this
mesmerizing event but I would say it lasted perhaps 12­15 seconds in
total.

[There was no damage to the interior or visible part of the steel windows
frame or glass, I forgot to look outside but I don't remember anyone
seeing any damage to the building. Q: How could you tell that the
lightning had struck there? A: Hmm, I heard the giant crash of the bolt
and as I looked to the direction of the window I saw the ball form there.
I guess I do not know exactly where the bolt struck.]

(h) In basement during thunderstorm

George Helcke (Dr) (physicist). Email from the UK, 2000.

My observation occurred a few years ago in Northern Italy in the foothills
of the Alps. I was about to get my car out from the basement garage, to go
to work, when a violent thunderstorm blew up. Since the rain was
torrential, I decided to wait in the basement until it eased up. There
were lightning strikes all around but none hit my house. However, after
one near strike, an orange glow began to develop in the basement about a
metre from the concrete floor and a metre from the nearest outside wall,
also of (reinforced) concrete. It was in the form of a ball, about 30 cm
in diameter, which grew steadily brighter and shimmered but remained
otherwise stationary.

Its brightness reached about that of a 20 watt bulb and then faded very
slowly until, after around 30 seconds, it became invisible. At that point,
the alarm on the gas detector in my central heating plant, situated about
10 metres from where the ball had been, began to sound and the heating
plant was shut down. There had been no further lightning strikes during
these few seconds. Presumably, a gaseous product of the `discharge' had
diffused throughout the basement and reached the detector in sufficient
concentration to trigger its alarm.

As far as I was aware, the ball made no sound (remember, however, that it
was raining hard and that could have masked any small sound it made) and I
detected no odour of ozone as one might expect with a discharge. Whatever
had triggered the gas detector was not discernible with my nose, although
I consider my sense of smell to be quite good.

I think the fact that there was no lightning strike in the basement itself
and that the ball formed there, rather than coming in ready-formed from
outside, makes my observation rather different from others I have read.
Can your theory explain this? 

(i ) Inside building, passed through glass, left opaque circle

Indira Murthy, Bangalore, India.

A Professor Ramasheshan (physicist), formerly of Raman Research Institute,
Ban galore, told me that a ball lightning he witnessed had this unusual
feature associated with it. It passed through a glass window and after
that the window turned opaque.

Do you think this is possible?

[I met Professor Ramaseshan and he has given these explanations for your
queries on the ball lightning he saw. He saw it some 50 years back as a
boy of around ten along with two others, who are now no more. There was a
severe thunderstorm on that day. The place was South Calcutta, and the
time around 5 in the evening (17:00 h). It was May or June, most probably.
He was in a room 12 ft by 12 ft, on the third floor (it was a three storey
house). There was a large number of pieces of wooden furniture in the
room. A luminous ball 300 to 400 mm across, luminosity about 50 to 100
watts, came right through the glass of a closed window. The opaque part
was around 200­300 mm, after its passage.

The colour was bluish white. It came in contact with some wooden things
and they were charred. It came in contact with the arm of a person in the
room, and that part charred and became black. But no death occurred.
Somebody opened a window and it moved out, he remembers. Since he was
quite young and it happened so many years ago, he said don't give too much
credence to the numbers given. The other details you wanted, he simply
cannot recall--whether the window glass was weak, etc.]

(j ) Formed inside at electric plug after lightning strike, passed through 
window

Jean-Jacques Grimaud (electrical engineer), 1963, Toulouse, France. Email
2000.

My parents have a home on top of a hill near Toulouse in southern France.
When ever a storm follows the valley, it ends up being blocked by the hill
and we have experienced many lightning strikes over the years. In early
1963, my mother and my cousin were in the dining room when a lightning
bolt struck the home. A ball of lightning came out of the electrical wall
plug located above a switch which com mands the light. The ball was about
100 to 150 mm in size, it moved quite slowly, remained at the height where
it originated (about 1.2 m), turned around the dining room in a
counterclockwise motion, as seen from above, without touching anything.

It finally disappeared through one of the small glass panes of a French
window without breaking the glass or leaving a trace on the window or on
the glass. The whole experience lasted probably less than 5 seconds. The
conductors to the plug and light switch were charred up to the junction
box and had to be replaced. The porcelain plug had some black marks but
was structurally unscathed. The conductors to the light itself were not
damaged.

(k ) Video of two ball lightning, formed just before lightning strike

Ermanno Ceniccola, 1997, St. Catharines, ON, Canada.

While in Italy a couple of years ago [written in 1999], I was standing on
my deck at home in the mountains south of Rome one evening and was able to
capture an incredible event on Hi-8 film. A huge storm was coming in and
lightning was striking everywhere. What I recorded was two huge balls of
light appear on the ground about 3 miles away, followed by a lightning
strike in the dead centre of them. It was very incredible to see. The film
of this event is of high quality.

While at my home in Italy, I was on my roof deck recording an incoming
storm. Being surrounded by mountains, the lightning in the area seemed to
be consistently severe. I was shooting straight ahead of me when I
recorded something I have never seen before. Two balls of light which look
to be about a half a kilometre apart and quite large appeared suddenly on
the ground. They were followed by a huge lightning strike right in the
middle of both balls. The footage I captured is high resolution and looks
incredible. If anyone has an explanation for this, I would be interested
in hearing it.

(l ) Inside, burned hole through screen, wrecking machine

Kevin Smith, 1960, Hillsborough, OR, USA. Email 2000.

My one and only `ball lightning' experience happened in East Cleveland,
Ohio, in 1960. My family was enjoying lunch in the kitchen during a great
lightning storm (we all loved a great storm) when a bright light appeared
with an immediate boom.

We all looked out the screen door, but couldn't react fast enough. A large
white ball came through the screen (leaving a hole about the size of a
basketball), passed just behind me (about two feet!), travelled through
the doorway to the basement, down four stairs, turned 90 degrees left,
went down ten stairs, turned left again through another doorway and
smashed into an old gas mangle (a machine used to iron sheets) `killing'
it outright. It never worked after that. I was amazed that there were no
scorch marks on any of the stairs because it did seem to bounce at least
once before going out of sight.

(m) Laboratory discharge across a metal oxide varistor

Warren Buckles (Senior Technologist, American Superconductor Corp.), 1993,
Madison, WI, USA. Email 2000.

In 1993 I was testing a superconducting energy storage magnet in my
company's laboratory and accidentally discharged the unit into a metal
oxide varistor. The resulting flash­bang was spectacular and yielded a
ball of plasma-like material that persisted for several seconds while
rising out of the apparatus. I recall the ball being about 300 mm in
diameter and blue-white to yellow but such recollections under stress are
unreliable.

The magnet's stored energy was about 1 MJ and the varistor had a nominal
rating of 10 kJ and was manufactured by Harris in the US. The magnet's
circulating current at the time of the discharge was about 1 kA. As these
varistors use a silicon oxide compound as their working element, I find
your argument relating to filamentary chains of silicon oxides
interesting.

(n) Inside building, internal ball structure, fizzing noise, explosive end

Richard Taylor (physicist), 12 years old, 1943, London, UK. Letter 2000.

The event I witnessed occurred in Fulwood, Lancashire, 1943, when I was 12
years old. Our house was of Victorian design and origin and was positioned
halfway up the slope of a small hill, the top of which was not much more
than 150 feet above an open area of gently undulating terrain which lay
between Fulwood and the main town. The house stood adjacent to a similar
house, the facing walls of which were separated by a rather small
distance--around 30 feet.

I cannot recall the exact date of the event more accurately than to say
that it was either the last week of July or the first week of August 1943.
It was mid-afternoon around 3 p.m., when it became very dark and a very
violent thunderstorm com menced, accompanied by hail and very heavy
rainfall. I was in my activities room just beneath the roof at the time
and the noise immediately under the roof made me decide to go downstairs.

As I began to descend to the next floor there was a colossal flash of
lightning and a virtually simultaneous crash of thunder. From where I was
on the stairs I was looking at a landing on the level of the next lower
floor. The landing was flanked by a very large window facing towards a
blank region of the wall of the adjoining house. As the blinding
illumination of this window died away I became aware of a faint fizzing
sound and found myself staring at a bluish-green ball of light about the
size of a grapefruit, hovering about three and a half feet above the
landing and about 15 inches from the inside of the window glass. 

The ball looked for all the world like a coloured globe of an oil lamp and
you could see a yellow-orange glow which appeared to be within it. I had a
distinct impression that the whole thing was spinning about a vertical
axis, although I cannot be sure that this was not an illusion. What
happened next was just as unexpected.

The ball moved at first very slowly sideways across the landing until it
was midway over the stairs leading down into the main entrance hallway. In
those days telephones were still in the age of large transformers,
lacquered coils, and brass fittings, and at the foot of the stairs on the
inside wall about 4 feet from the end of the stair was a small shallow
wooden cupboard with a press button latch that housed all the quite bulky
and unsightly electrics for the telephone.

When the ball reached the midpoint from the top of the stair to the hall
it at first stopped and hovered before descending parallel to the slope of
the stairway, its motion accelerating very rapidly. It shot from the end
of the stairs and appeared to pass straight through the wooden door of the
telephone equipment cupboard when it then exploded violently, blowing the
cupboard open and filling the hallway with the acrid smell of burning
varnish. 1943 was war time and it took a couple of days for the telephone
engineers to come and fix things. The event I witnessed seemed to show a
response to electrically conducting devices--i.e. it homed in on the
telephone transformer and associated electrics.

(o) Appeared in air outside, three increases in size, decreases in optical
thickness, from opaque to translucent

Guthenberg, Paul (IT worker), 34 years old, observed about 1990. Letter
2000, Unionville, ON, Canada.

Approximately 10 years ago just south of where I live now I was home from
work due to a bad cold. My family lived on the 21st floor of an apartment
building facing west. It was a day of approaching thunderstorms and so I
could not resist going out onto the balcony to try and capture some shots
of lightning. I let you know now that

I did not manage to take a shot of what I witnessed due to my awe-struck
condition. While I was scanning the skies to the west of the approaching
storm I happened to see something in front of the building one block over
to the west. Keep in mind that the building is a data collection centre
for one of the banks. It has no windows and a very large grassy area
surrounding it on all sides.

I noticed a solid silver ball on the east side of the building, which
seemed to appear out of nowhere. Then I noticed (all this time with the
camera hanging around my neck) that it was hovering over the lawn and not
attached to the building in any manner. It seemed to vibrate briefly and
then expand. This process occurred three times. Each time this process
took place the ball would grow in size and appear more translucent. Each
time it grew in size I could see some sort of energy moving around on the
surface of the ball or inside of the ball. By the final stage I remember I
could see the building through the ball due to its translucency. The ball
slowly changed from a silvery skin (first stage) to a blue/white moving
sphere.

I would say that from the distance I was from the sphere on its first
appearance it was approximately 4 feet across and then expanded 2 feet
each of the three times it vibrated.

Now when the ball was at its maximum size and hovering about 5­8 feet
above the ground but still about 20­40 feet away from the building over
the lawn, it disappeared and then was followed by a very loud boom.

Because I also work in the IT world I contacted the authorities due to the
electrical sensitivities of what the building may house. I was then called
back from the police or fire department and was told that I had probably
just witnessed a very rare phenomenon called `ball lightning'.  They said
that the building and its contents appeared to be intact.

(p) Outside origin, many balls falling from cloud, internal structure

Neil Stouffer, 1954, Belmont, Canada.

My interest was aroused many years ago, 1954 actually, when on a motor
trip from Mexico to Winnipeg, Mb., I was privileged to observe, at close
range, a spectacular series of these `great balls of fire'. At the time I
had never heard of ball lightning and had no idea what I was seeing, but
it was such an intense experience that in my mind's eye I can relive it
whenever I want. I'll try to tell it exactly as I saw it.

I was travelling through Iowa, toward Minneapolis and I had the top on my
MGTD because it was a hot very close day and had been threatening rain,
although none had fallen. It's a land of many soft, rounded hills and the
clouds were heavy and seemed to be only a couple of hundred feet above my
head. There had been `sheet lightning' in the clouds for most of the day,
but I heard no thunder. The `sheet lightning' seemed to be getting closer
and yet I heard no thunder.

I was wondering about this as I rounded the top of another hill, very much
the same as all the other hills, when suddenly strange events began to
happen.

A glowing ball, about the size of a basketball, fell from the clouds,
about twenty feet in front of my car, and to the left side of the road. It
bounced about three times, and I was completely amazed by it, when, the
next time it touched the earth, it detonated with a noise unlike anything
I had ever experienced! My engine quit cold and I coasted to a stop on the
very top of the hill. I was in shock! To my horror, more balls continued
to fall around me, some to the side, very close. I remember wondering what
would happen if one of them were to land on the canvas top of my car.

There was nothing I could do but watch and hope that they would go away! I
didn't have the wits to count them, but in recollection it must have been
somewhere between twelve and twenty of them and I don't know how long it
lasted but it seemed like an eternity.

That's what happened, now I'll try to describe them. As I said, they were
about the size of a basketball and they all fell from the clouds. When I
say fell, it was not as a stone falls or a ball. They fell in slow motion.
They seemed to have buoyancy.

And when they bounced it was the same kind of motion. Like a balloon
bouncing. The closest thing to the colour of them is a good strike of
lightning, close by. Bright, but not bright like the Sun. There was
movement within a surface tension. It was like lightning, writhing within
a contained area. I remember writhing, I could see it.

When they detonated, it was not like an explosion exactly, because there
did not appear to be any damage done to the grass or flowers, no gravel
was thrown from the road, no crater, nothing displaced. Nothing burned.
But the sound was tremendous.

This was all the lightning there was. There were no lightning `bolts' from
the clouds to the earth. I've been close to lightening `bolts' striking
the earth and this was nothing like that. It was many years before I ever
heard the term `ball lightning' but when I heard it, I knew immediately
that this is what I had seen and it was a relief to know it had a name.

(q) 100 m size, anchored to ground, several minutes duration, colour photograph

Brett Porter (Ranger, Research & Planning), Queensland National Parks,
Australia, 1987.

On the evening of 20 November 1987 at approximately 8.05 p.m. I was in the
company of Mr Gordon Maag carrying out fieldwork on stage I of the
Kangaroo Population Model Validation Project II. We were working near the
southern bound ary of a property named Ranchall, owned by Mr Des Whittle
and family. Our posi tion was approximately 28 09 30 N, 149 39 18 E
(northwest of Goondiwindi).

The nearest main road was the Lapgate Road, running north­south and
forming the eastern boundary of Ranchall six kilometres east of our
position. Individual storm clouds were passing over us from the southwest.
The clouds did not form a single large front, but were separated, showing
clear night sky between them and display ing independent electrical
activity. No rain fell on our position or any of the country we
subsequently traversed that night, although Goondiwindi received a severe
storm that night which caused major damage to some properties. 

[Wind speed at ground level during the following event was zero, humidity
100% RH, with moisture in a warm relatively transparent mist, making one's
skin wet.]

At 8.13 p.m., in order to observe the peculiar behaviour of a conspicuous
setting star, we turned our vehicle towards it, stopped the engine and
turned out all vehicle lights. At 8.23 p.m., less than thirty seconds
after the star had set, I noticed a pink-orange reflection on the inside
of my open door. I looked behind me and saw a pink-orange glow emanating
from behind the near horizon, a ridge that ran north­ south about 300
metres east of our position.

This light was not visible only minutes before as I had been making quick
scans of the entire horizon while watching the star. Consequently, I
believe that I saw this light no more than one minute after it would have
first been visible from our position.

From the first instant of sighting the light, it increased in intensity
and size. After approximately three minutes the light reached its maximum
intensity and size.  This was approximately 2­3 times that shown in the
accompanying slide (printed in fig ure 1a) which was taken as the light
was fading. At its brightest the light had a base along the horizon of
approximately 100 m and the glow rose skyward in a fan shape about 200 m
high. There was a distinct mistiness surrounding the glow which was
possibly associated with the storm activity.

[The deep red colour of the early stages changed to orange-yellow and then
at its brightest the central emission zone appeared near-white with a
brilliant red halo. The cloud formations were remarkably low and clearly
reflected the light and this is apparent in the photograph.]

However, after about 40 s at its brightest the light began to fade at
approximately the same rate at which it increased its intensity. As the
light was fading I saw a white light beam sweep the sky about 60 further
north and apparently much further away.

This was most probably the lights of a tractor driven by Mr Whittles son,
Paul, who was ploughing about 7 km north by northeast of our position.
Paul Whittle also observed a pink-orange light that night south of his
position at the same time as our sighting. The intersection of the two
independent lines of sight confirm the location of the light source as
being on Ranchall and not more than three km east of our position.

[The most probable position was around 300 m from us, with the light at or
close to ground level. With this interpretation, the central emission zone
was about 20 m diameter, and no less than 50 m at its brightest.]

After I took my photograph we drove towards the fading light. By the time
we reached the top of the ridge the light was gone. There was no evidence
of the source or its location. There was no fire or embers to indicate a
lightning strike, although this was no surprise as the behaviour and
intensity of the light was inconsistent with a bush fire.

The night revealed nothing but blackness illuminated occasionally by
lightning. There was no sound associated with the sighting and the
spectacular light show was over in not more than seven minutes. [An
internal property wire fence ran approximately 50 m to the west of us, so
that we were between the fence and the light.

The nearest point of another fence to the estimated position of the event
was more than 200 m away. I did not see any lightning strike the ground,
but lightning frequently showed in the cloud overhead.]

A subsequent inspection of the area on horseback and by motorcycle did not
reveal any evidence of the sighting (nor of any metal objects such as
wire). The slope of the area where the sighting was made is approximately
1 in 30. Average slope of the property is approximately 1 in 130 (a
photograph of the area by day from the same position at the same scale is
shown in figure 1b).

[There are no submerged water pipes within several km, and the owner
believes it unlikely that there are any buried metal objects.]

The photograph of the sighting was taken in the last 90 s or fading phase
of the light, with Fujicolour 100 ASA slide film in a Nikon FE2 camera
through a Tamron 28­135-macro zoom lens and a Hoya 67 mm Skylight lB
filter. It was set on automatic wide-angle f.4. Exposure time was about 15
seconds.

J.A. has more detailed reports, discounting other people in the area, and
discount ing the possibility of it being a refraction phenomenon.


Figure 1. Photograph of large (100 m) luminous object seen at night on
Australian farmland, described in § 1 q. The reflection off low cloud can
be seen in the sky. (b)  Photograph of the same scene by day (but 11 years
later), showing the same trees on the skyline.  (Photographs courtesy of
Brett Porter, Queensland, Australia.)

(r ) Ball within an electronic circuit, stable, negligible lifetime after
power off

Eddie Sines (Electronic Technician, Navy Research Laboratories,
Washington, DC, USA). Email 2001.

I was designing a high frequency high voltage power supply used to drive
TWT's (travelling wave tube amplifier, amplifying high frequency radio
waves). I designed a dummy load which is a group of resistors which mimic
the TWT load, so I could test the power supply under real load conditions
without risking a TWT. I recall that I was working on the voltage
regulation control loop and setting the output voltages and doing a
thermal power survey at the time. The resistor dummy load was made up of
many resistors of different values and wattage ratings placed on a
Plexiglas base.

The TWT I was designing required a number of high voltages outputs, which
needed to be highly regulated. I recall that I had placed a small clip
lead to a multi-meter to monitor the current in one part of the circuit.
Like most tests, you are thinking ahead of the results you expect to see,
and this one was no different. The supply was working great and all of the
outputs were in the correct range. So I extended the test to see how it
would handle the thermal issues.

My focus was on the supply at this time and not the dummy load. I had
failed to notice the clip lead that I had disconnected from the meter had
coiled back and was touching one of the load resistors, which was quite
hot. The insulation on the clip lead must have started to melt and the
smoke started to rise up on to the dummy load resistor bank. By the way,
my output power was about 375 watts of high voltage into the dummy load at
this time.

I was using an IR thermal probe and looking at a different section of the
switching regulating power supply and taking notes as to the operating
temperatures of the various circuits, when all of a sudden I heard a loud
clapping sound. It is not unusual for new power supplies to fail like
this. I quickly looked up to scan the meters and then looked at the supply
and every thing seemed just fine. Then I heard a small hissing noise and
thought it was leaking high voltage to ground somewhere.

I scanned around till I found the source and was shocked to see a small
golf-ball-sized free-standing plasma ball floating next to the bottom half
of the dummy resistor load stand.

The plasma ball was rotating as if it had poles. The colour was red to
orange and dark enough [opaque enough] not to be able to see through. It
seemed to rotate in both directions, starting at the top and then changing
direction at the bottom. I scanned the supply and the power meters and all
seemed well, everything was stable, with no change in the load. I assumed
that some of the power was being used to drive the plasma ball and was not
going through the load resistors.

This went on for some 2 to 3 minutes, at which time I shut the system
down, and removed the lead which had started the fireball in the first
place. The power supply was not damaged and continued to work afterwards.
I never tried to do this again, but often thought that this could be done
given the same set-up conditions.

The plasma ball went out the instant I switched off the supply. With a
little effort this could be done again.

[The plasma ball was made of high DC voltage only, which was negative when
referenced to ground.]

J. A.: The photograph supplied showed a bank of vertically oriented
resistors mounted parallel to each other on a horizontal insulation board.
The ball was appar ently close to one of these resistors.

(s) Plasma inside building, before lightning strike

Dr John S. Derr (Chief Global Seismograph Network, US Geological Survey,
Albuquerque, USA). Emails 2000, 2001.

As one who has studied earthquake lights (EQL) for many years, I read your
Nature letter with great interest. My first thought was that your theory
does not apply to my own, personal experience.

Twice, my sons and I have seen plasmas form on an ungrounded FM antenna
(88­108 MHz) about one second before a very close strike. This happened
inside a building, immediately above our heads. We're still alive and
uninjured, so there was absolutely no direct strike on this antenna, even
after the stroke. I'm sure we could repeat the experiment by removing the
new ground wire, although I think that would be tempting fate and I do not
volunteer to try.

[The cabin is single storey, open stud construction with no interior
lining, in a forest of mixed hard and soft wood trees growing to heights
much higher than the chimney. There are copper pipes in the walls and a
telephone line, connected by a cable just underground, but no utility
power connection of any kind. The phone was not damaged.]

[Your question of distinguishing between corona and ball lightning is an
interesting one, and I'm not sure that I could make a case for either one.
However, the ball of light I saw did not envelop the entire antenna, nor
did it assume its shape. It was spherical and limited to one portion of
the antenna.]

(t ) Lightning strike near nose of aircraft

Jim Mills (commercial airline pilot, Alaska Airlines, USA). Email 2000.

At the time of the incident, I was employed as a pilot for Horizon Air, a
northwest regional airline owned by Alaska Airlines. During a daytime trip
in a Fairchild Metro liner III, I observed, along with a number of
passengers on board, a ball lightning phenomenon.

We were flying at 16 000 ft near McCall, Idaho, USA, when our aircraft was
struck by a bolt of lightning near the nose area. After the strike, a
bright glowing object slowly drifted down the aisle of the aircraft in
clear view of the passengers, floated to the rear and disappeared with an
audible `pop'. We could think of no other explanation other than that the
object was ball lightning. Some minor damage was found on the aircraft as
a result of the strike.

[The aircraft appeared to be struck on the right front nose baggage access
door, as well as on the stall avoidance system (SAS) vane, also on the
right side of the plane. The strike welded the SAS vane in place,
rendering the system inoperative.

It also damaged the internal components of the system. The strike may have
indeed vaporized some small amount of aluminium, as two or three pinholes
were present on the nose baggage door, but this does not explain how the
ball lightning could enter the pressure vessel of the aircraft. This
aircraft is pressurized and the ball lightning would have to pass through
a sealed pressure bulkhead to enter the cabin area.  No loss of pressure
was experienced.]

2. Observations from the collection of the Russian Ball Lightning
Committee

(a) Form, gel-type structure, penetration through holes and high energy
content

S. I. Kirichenko (female), film director's assistant, 37 years old at the
moment of observation. Observation of 15 August 1980, 14:00 h. Interview
1998. 5­6 observers.

Reaction--interest. Outdoors, 90 km from the city Krasnodar in the direction of
city Sochi, Russia.

It was 20 minutes after a thunderstorm. It was sunny, no wind, rather
hot--about 30 C. During the film shooting, I and other people unexpectedly
noticed at 20 m from us, 3 m over the land, a luminescent circle that
resembled the sunray reflection.

It moved towards us. We could not understand what it was. Approaching us
it began to resemble a rugby ball in size, and a comet in appearance. It
moved and vibrated, up and down; it was light in weight, but little
heavier than a gas balloon. And it was swaying as a gel, a balloon of a
gel. Its colour was yellow, slightly blue, and slightly brown with orange
or rainbow shade. It was rather bright, like an incandescent lamp of 100
W. Such a coloured gel, or it resembled a soap bubble, was not a
transparent one but of a thick mass.

Firstly the ball was moving over us and then it began descending towards
the land and entered the base of a big lighting device (DIG). It moved
quickly and covered the total distance of about 20 m in 30 s. The DIG was
very hot, and several rows of holes 3­5 cm in diameter were in its base.
The BL struck it like a pancake and then penetrated through the holes into
the DIG. There was a great bang, as if a grenade had exploded. The 100 kg
DIG construction fell to the ground. Pieces of metal flew from it as if a
missile had got into it. A hot piece got into a shoe of a worker.

(b) Swaying soap bubble that was broken into uneven pieces

V. N. Nezamaikin (male) a student engineer. 20 years old, the end of June
1972. Interview 1992. Settlement Kopos, Ukraine.

In the morning I went hunting to a shore of the Dnieper river. The sky was
clean, with no thunderstorm or precipitation. I came to an open place on
the high shore of the Dnieper and noticed a luminescent object 7 m from me
in the reeds. It was a ball of 100 mm diameter, of a bright blue colour.

It radiated light like an incandescent lamp of 100­200 W. Its matter,
dense in appearance, was swaying, also resembling a soap bubble. The ball
stayed motionless in the air, 600­700 mm above the grass.

Not thinking for long, I made a shot into it with my shotgun. The bullet
consisted of lead pellets. The ball's size increased by 1.5 times, and
after that it decayed with a bang. It broke into uneven pieces. They
dissipated and then disappeared near the surface of the water. The whole
event lasted for 1­1.5 min.

(c) Appearance in the place of a bulb, evaporation of metallic filament in
a bulb, crinkles of burnt linoleum

V. V. Demchenko (male) a student mathematician. 20 years old, August 1972.
Interview 1992. Moscow, Russia.

In the evening, 15 minutes after a strong thunderstorm, I came into the
kitchen of my apartment on the third floor of a many-storied house. On
entering I felt the existence of an electric field in the room, strong
enough to make the hair stand up on my head.

I switched on lights. At this moment a sphere of bright-white colour
appeared in the place of the bulb of the incandescent lamp on the ceiling,
2 m from me. Its diameter was 250­300 mm. It radiated light like an
incandescent lamp of 100­200 W. It had a core of 150­200 mm size. Then the
sphere slowly descended to the linoleum floor, where it spilled into small
glowing points and crinkles of burnt linoleum appeared on the floor. The
whole process took 10­15 s.

I examined the bulb, finding that the metallic filament had been
evaporated, and the metal had been condensed on the inner surface of the
bulb.

(d ) Penetration through a windowpane, penetration into electric outlet

M. I. Oleneva (female) a pensioner. Observation 1955, a letter with
description 1990. Reaction--fear. City, Kstovo near Nizhnii Novgorod,
Russia.

It was gloomy before raining, but with no thunderstorm. My son, my mother
and I were sitting by the table. The table was covered with an oilcloth. A
small windowpane was opened by 100 mm. A fireball rolled through this
space. It was very slightly yellow. We were all scared and did not move. A
white electric outlet made of china was 0.5 m from us. The ball began to
crawl inside this through one of the two holes. It almost all entered into
the outlet, but the tail, the last part of the ball, was drawn into the
other hole.

Then a strong explosion was heard. A fire and a lot of soot appeared. The
electric outlet was broken into pieces and its parts became black.

(e) Form, vibrating surface, burning of an electric motor, armature
melting on edges

I. V. Alexandrov (male), professor of chemistry. 29 years old, summer of
1976. Interview 1991. A settlement 3 km from the city Monino near Moscow,
Russia.

After dinner (usually 13:00­15:00 h in Russia) there was a dry
thunderstorm, and lightning was observed without rain. Being under a cover
of the open kitchen, out doors, I suddenly noticed that at a distance of 7
m from me a fireball was moving, jumping over the reinforced concrete
slabs. Its form was elongated and resembled a long lemon with a thin end,
or a pear, 150­160 mm in size. Its colour was blue yellow, slightly dirty.
The surface seemed to be smeared and vibrating. It resembled a bulb of an
incandescent lamp of 20­40 W that was jumping in arcs over the road.

It made 2­3 soundless jumps and went into the box of an electric motor of
a well, a 5 m long metallic pipe going into the ground. The fireball
disappeared with a flick. A thunderstorm with rain broke out 20 minutes
later. Later it was discovered that everything was burnt out inside the
box of the electric motor. The outlets of the metallic armature on the
edges of the reinforced concrete slabs were melted.

(f ) Woollen-type structure, burnt grass

M. V. Lozovsky (male) a student. 8 years old, summer 1983­1984. Interview
1994. Settlement Voronovo 40 km from Moscow, Russia.

It was at 17:00­17:30 h, and a strong thunderstorm broke out with a rain
shower. There was a strong wind with air temperature 22­23 C. My
grandmother and I were returning from the forest. Suddenly we noticed a
ball 200­220 mm in diameter in a round clearing 15 m from us. It was
rolling with a spiral trajectory. The ball was rotating, touched the
ground and made a movement for 50 mm. It resembled a tangle of woollen
threads, as if blue threads covered a warp of red threads.

The intensity of its radiation could be compared with an incandescent lamp
of 120 W. We were scared and quickly went away. The next day we saw that
the surface of the clearing was burnt out, so that its colour became
brown-black.

(g) Ascendance of several BL synchronously with the motion of a storm
cloud

Yu. L. Serov (male), PhD in physics. 13 years old, July 1958. Interview
1990.  Near St Petersburg, Russia.

A thunderstorm was approaching, with low storm clouds. The first drops of
rain began to fall. Air temperature was 20­23 C. At a distance from me
smaller than 1 km, a ball appeared in the grass. Approximately for 0.5 s
it flew up by several tens of metres and exploded. The sound of its
explosion was 2­3 times weaker than that of the usual linear lightning.
Then I observed about 5 analogous events. The period between events was
3­5 s. Balls flew up and exploded. The places where the balls appeared
moved synchronously with the movement of the storm cloud.

(h) Several objects, appearance from nowhere, separation of one object
into 6­7, decay into three shell-type pieces and several small pomegranate
grain-like pieces

A. S. Timoshuk (male), associate professor in chemistry. 6 years old,
April 1946. Interview 1990. City, Belaya Tserkov near Kiev, Ukraine.

It was 10:00­11:00 h in the morning at the end of April. It was the
beginning of a thunderstorm: a thunderstorm cloud was approaching very
quickly, and thunder broke out. A branching linear lightning shorted
wires, going from a wooden telegraph pole to the other side of the street
and over a broken branch of an old poplar. The distance between the
objects and me was about 25 m.

At the moment of the shorting of the wires a yellow-green flash appeared
near the upper insulator on the telegraph pole, resembling the intensity
of a flash of electric welding. Inside of it grew a white ball about 150
mm in diameter. It slowly rolled over the inclined wire, increasing its
velocity, changed to the colour of melted red metal, and during rotation
provided many sparks.

The ball was perceived as light in weight but not a hollow formation. At
the lowest point of the wire it jumped to a lower wire 5 m from the pole.
At the lowest point of this wire it fell down to the poplar branch,
covering the distance of 0.5­0.8 m between them. At the moment of touching
a strong crack sound was heard. The branch was broken and inclined. 

The ball decreased in size, but 6­7 balls of 40­60 mm diameter appeared,
running over the branches. Then they expired simultaneously. Approximately
3 s later a new ball of 120 mm diameter appeared from `nowhere'. The place
of its origin was 1 m to the right of the place of formation of the first
ball. It moved over the inclined thick branch, accelerating, smoothly and
elastically jumping over any unevenness. It decreased to 90­100 mm,
spreading many sparks.

Then it jumped onto the roadway, where it jumped in a similar fashion to a
gas balloon. The heights of its jumps were 200, 120 and 50 mm; in so doing
the amplitudes decreased, but the frequency of jumps increased. Then the
ball decayed into three big pieces of a shell shape and several further
smaller pieces. The collection resembled a broken pomegranate with red
grains on the ground. The destruction of the ball was viscous, similar to
snow rolled-up into a snowball, whose structure is laminated. Parts
disappeared non-simultaneously. Total duration of the event was 18­20 s.

(i ) Appearance from lightning strike on soil

I. E. Gortunov (male), programmer, engineer. 14 years old, July 1952.
Interview 1997. Daytime. Village, Enishevo of Smolenskaya oblast, Russia.

Boys and I were fishing. A black cloud approached and a thunderstorm
began. We hid in the wooden building of a mill, in the pole basement. A
bright flash broke out during strong rain and the broken trajectory of a
linear lightning suddenly appeared.

It struck into the body of the earthen dam. Simultaneously I felt a strong
electric shock into my bare feet. In spite of this, I detected a blinding
ball of the size of an orange fruit ascending into the air 20 m from me,
originating from the place where the linear lightning struck.

It was of red colour, like the colour of a ruby laser; and irradiated more
intensely than an incandescent lamp of 200 W. Its clear-cut surface was
well seen. The ball was hissing and slightly crackling. It got to a height
of 3­4 m by flying over an arc in length about 10 m with a speed about 1 m
s-1, descended to the ground, and exploded. Its sound was like a cannon
shot.

Totally, it lived for about 15 s. After the thunderstorm we investigated
the place of the linear lightning strike, and found a crater of about 70
mm diameter and a corkscrew dip. We could not detect the place of the ball
lightning explosion.

(j ) Shaggy tangle structure

G. V. Donskihk (male), a letter, summer of 1978, June­July. Settlement,
Blagodatnoe of Donetskaya oblast, Russia.

During a daytime thunderstorm outburst, which was accompanied by rain and
gusts of strong wind, I was sitting by a window and looking into the yard.  
Suddenly I saw a moving ball, a tangle of fire, in the vegetable garden.
It had a rather spherical form, but its contour was not sharply cut-off,
and slightly shaggy. This ball was rolling over the ground like a wheel,
contacting the surface. Its diameter was up to 500 mm.

Its dense core had a much smaller size. The large size of this object was
caused by a halo of luminescence and shaggy spiral fire strips that
surrounded the core. It seemed that a shaggy tangle was rolling over the
ground and it could not become denser. A fire train of fire strips and
sparks 800 mm long was moving after it. The colour of the ball and sparks
was yellow-red.

The velocity of its motion was higher than that of a motorcyclist moving
over a highway. The ball rolled to the vegetable garden and the house
yard, and then it rolled through the open gates and disappeared.  
Immediately afterwards, I heard a strong explosion. The duration of the
observation was 2­3 s.

(k ) Multiple appearance of fireballs

Yu. A. Pletnev (male), V. A. Pletneva (female). 53 and 54 years old.  
Observation of 1978, letter 1979. Night-time, 2 h, September, Novyi Afon,
Crimea, Ukraine.

It was during a thunderstorm without rain. Strong wind gusts came from the
Black Sea. During the gusts 40­50 fireballs appeared on a tree. They were
falling toward the ground and expiring in the air. The lifetime of the
fireballs was 2 s, and diameters 50­60 mm. The distance to the balls was
about 10 m. The distance covered by a ball was 5­10 m. Their form was
spherical, and their colour was white-blue. The intensity of radiation was
about that of a 500 W incandescent lamp.

(l ) Fluff­gel structure

A. I. Romanov (male), philologist. 47 years old, middle of September,
beginning of October 1994. Interview 1994. Local time 16:00­17:00 h. A
village near a river in Ivanovskaya oblast. Russia. Psychological
reaction--quiet. Temperature 8­10 C, a dry day, no wind.

After dinner I was working on the roof of a house. I had to put the second
layer of slate onto the first layer, which lay on metal roofing. A lot of
compressed poplar fluff and buds from the nearby poplar tree had
accumulated between the old roofing and the slate. I began to throw it
down. Suddenly from under the roofing at a distance of about 1 m from me 2
tangles of 30­35 mm diameter appeared. They resembled tangles of the
poplar fluff; and everything inside of them was interconnected.

I did not feel any heat from these balls. They began to descend, flying
and gliding like soap bubbles. The balls differed from the fluff tangles
by their ability to make a crackling sound when they collided with the
trees while falling down. The balls crackled, radiated weak lights
(sparks) similar to burnt out sparklers. The colour of the lights, or
sparks, of the two balls was white-rose.

The glow appeared only at the moment of the collision. The ball's surface
in flight was vibrating like a gel and resembled a gel-like substance.
Having covered 10 m, the balls expired with the sound of fireworks. The
total observation time was 15­20 s.

(m) Extra large object penetrated through a window

E. A. Toloknova (female), doctor of medicine. 34 years old, end of May,
beginning of June, 12:00­13:00 h, 1952. Interview 2000. M. V. Barinova
(female), professor of medicine. Weather clear, a sunny day, no
thunderstorm. Moscow, Russia.

We were in a large room with a fluorograph and other electric measuring
devices on the second floor of a two-storey house. A ball entered the room
through an open window of 1.5 × 2.5 m2. Once it was in the room, it proved
to be larger (1.8 × 2 m2) than the window. Its transverse and longitudinal
sizes were equal.

The impression was that an object resembling a sun had entered the room.
It was golden orange, and the colour inside the 700 mm diameter core was
more intense. Near the boundary the colour was less bright. On the
boundary a lot of objects resembling small snowflakes were observed. The
colour did not change during the observation. The boundary of the ball was
indistinct. The glow was bright, more than 100 W in comparison with an
incandescent lamp.

As the ball approached, we were scared that we would be burnt and stopped
our observation for several moments. The ball passed by us at a distance
of 3­4 m. We did not feel any heat from it.

The ball moved slowly and smoothly in a straight line from the window,
through an open door to a corridor. In the corridor it broke into
yellow-orange snowflakes with a loud sound, about 5­5.5 m from us. The
sound was as strong as thunder. Over 1.5­2 minutes it covered about 12 m.
It left no traces. The ball lightning did not affect the working of
devices in the room.

(n) Fluff­cotton-wool structure, high energy

V. A. Rantsev-Kartinov (male) PhD in physics. 5 years old, summer,
13:00­14:00 h, 1944. Interview 2000. Two observers. Settlement, Kupino
near Novosibirsk, Russia.

A strong thunderstorm was coming to an end, and the rain had stopped, but
there was a strong wind. I was in a room with a Russian stove in a village
house. An iron sheet covered a small windowpane. A small ball appeared
after a linear lightning strike into a birch tree in the yard. First, a
glowing point appeared, then it transformed into a ball of 70­90 mm
diameter, and after this the size of the object did not change. As the
ball was growing bigger it was shaking, and the impression was that it was
moving; its centre was vibrating. Its boundary was indistinct and diffuse.
It resembled a cotton wool ball with fluffed-up boundaries or a coloured 
woollen ball.

The ball flew to the stove at a height of 1.5 m, and then it turned 90 and
flew to the entrance hall. It moved smoothly and horizontally. First, it
moved slowly, but later it began to move more quickly. I heard the
explosion from the entrance hall.

The corner of the hall was destroyed but without traces of charring. The
doors in the house were not close to the walls. Even though there was a
draft, the ball flew to the corner. The total ball lightning lifetime was
7­9 s. Its time of growth was 2­3 s. Its flight time in the room was 3 s
and in the entrance hall 1.5­3 s. I observed the object from a distance of
7­10 m. The shortest distance to the ball during its motion was 0.5 m. The
ball covered 6 m in 3­4 s.

The glow of the ball was bright white-rose with a white-blue periphery.
The lumi nescence could not be compared with an incandescent lamp, since
it was possible to look at it. The luminescence could be compared with a
daylight lamp of 40 W. The glow did not make the corners of the room
lighter. The colour of the ball did not change.

(o) Cotton-wool structure, unfortunate case

V. A. Rantsev-Kartinov (male) PhD in physics. 5 years old, autumn, 20:00
h, 1944. Interview 2000. Number of observers: 8. Settlement, Kupino near
Novosibirsk, Russia.

A rain ended. There was no thunderstorm. It was quiet with no wind, and
hot and stuffy. I observed this event outdoors at a distance of 30 m from
the object. A woman went out from the house to fan a flatiron. I noticed a
glowing ball at a distance of 2­3 m from her. It resembled a cotton-wool
ball of fist-size, 70­90 mm. When the woman put her hand with the flatiron
behind her neck, the ball flew into the iron.

Before this, the ball was moving after the iron. The observation time was
1­2 s. The woman fell on the ground. People took her and buried her (head
out) in the ground (the traditional treatment for lightning strike
victims). After 0.5 h her face turned blue and she died.

(p) Appearance from nowhere, penetration through a hole

E. A. Megera (female), programmer, engineer. 5 years old, July, 16:00 h,
1948. Interview 1992. Observer reaction--fear. Settlement, Rozhdestvenno
near Moscow, Russia.

During a hot day at the beginning of a thunderstorm, with strong winds, my
par ents and I (3 people) were sitting by a table in a room of an old
wooden house. Suddenly, a spherical glow appeared in the right corner
(with respect to me)  about 0.5 m above the floor. The ball lightning was
spherical with its surface indistinct. Its diameter was 200­250 mm. Its
white-blue colour did not change during the observa tion. Its radiant
power could be compared with an incandescent lamp of 40­50 W.

The ball rose to the ceiling, a height of 2.5­3 m, then it moved to the
centre of the room to an electric lamp, which was hanging on an electric
cord. It left a black thread-like trace along the entire length of the
white cotton-fabric covered cord. Then the ball returned to the wall where
it first appeared. Then it left the room through a hole in the window. It
became flat and elongated. The ball lightning flattened into a flat stream
and flowed through the hole in the window. Then it disappeared through the
hole. While in the room the ball moved smoothly with a velocity of about
0.5 m s-1. It covered a maximum distance of 10 m, the minimum distance
from me being 3.5­4 m. I did not feel any heat.

(q) Poplar-fluff structure, large size, and two cases of penetration

I. A. Zemnukhova (female), teacher of mathematics. 7­8 years old, 20
August, 19:00­20:00 h, 1964­1967. Interview 1993 and 1998. Five observers.
Tambovskaya oblast, Zherdevsky district, Russia.

At first I observed this event through a window of a village house. A
strong wind was outside. Branches of trees, buckets and bowls left in the
yard were flying in the wind. Straw rooves were torn off different
buildings. It was dark because a big storm cloud had approached. Suddenly,
everything calmed down, the dust sank and I could see a large ball with a
diameter greater than 1 m. It was smoothly rolling and swiftly jumping in
the field. It approached our village. The ball resembled a fire tangle.
Its colour was a mixture of yellow, orange, and brown. There was a halo
around it.

The halo consisted of vortices of dust with a dusty grey-yellow colour.
Sometimes it stopped. Then it smoothly turned toward our house. Telegraph
poles stood on the sides of the street. Inclined supports were fastened to
poles.  Such a support was standing in the way of the ball, but the ball
penetrated through the support. I did not understand how, but it continued
its motion. Then it ascended over the ground, over a house, and over
trees. It seemed that it was flying to the sky.

All these events happened very quickly. Then the ball descended near our
window, and through the windowpane it got into our room. The windowpane
was closed, but without locks (maybe the ball itself opened the pane,
maybe it was the wind that opened it). Now the ball did not have a halo.
It seemed to mix colours, density, and brightness with the halo while
getting around the pane. Getting through the pane, the ball was elongated
like a rubber ball, taking an ellipsoidal form. After this it regained its
spherical form.

The distance between the ball and the floor was about 200 mm. People
pinned themselves to walls. There was no heat from the ball. My
grandmother opened a door to a long corridor and the ball drifted, by a
draft, to the street. When it was moving in the corridor, it was elongated
and resembled a big melon. The ball covered 15 m from the house to the
vegetable garden; there it met a cherry tree. Without exploding, it
decayed into fire shreds of 150­200 mm size. They were hanging for a short
time on branches and glowing, after that the tree caught fire. Soon after
this, lightning struck and rain began, but the tree was still on fire.

In density, the ball resembled orange-coloured smoke clouds, different in
density, brighter and more yellow in the centre. The ball also resembled a
balloon filled with smoke. It also resembled tangles of poplar fluff but
different in density and not poplar coloured. It seemed that rays were
emanating from the dust covering the ball.

Big particles entered the ball and moved up and down inside it. The ball
boundary was indistinct. The radiant intensity was analogous to that of a
campfire, in the centre yellow-orange, more than 200 W in comparison with
an incandescent lamp.

[Note that `passing through a windowpane' does not necessarily mean in
Russia/Ukraine `penetrating a glass sheet'. In none of the observations
given here from these areas do the observers indicate through a glass
sheet. Rather they indicate that the ball passed through a gap or space to
the side of the glass, covered with gauze in the case of §2r below.]

The shortest distance to the ball was 1.5­2 m. The distance covered by the
ball was about 300 m. The time of observation inside the house was 30­40
s, and outside about 3 minutes.

(r ) Penetration through gauze

E. R. Il'in (male), PhD in engineering. 20 years old, 15­30 August 1958.  
Interview 1993. Three observers. Reaction--fear. Moscow, Russia.

It was in a house, in a room on the fourth floor. The weather was sunny,
warm and dry without a thunderstorm. A ball of 60­80 mm diameter flew into
a win dow gap closed by gauze. We did not notice how it penetrated through
the gauze. The ball boundary was indistinct. The glow of the ball could be
compared with an incandescent lamp of 10­15 W. Its colour was white-yellow
and dull.

The ball flew smoothly at a height of 2­2.5 m over the floor. Its
trajectory was horizontal. It went from the room to the corridor, from
where we heard a crackling sound. I did not find any traces there, but it
smelt burnt and sulphurous. The maximum distance covered by the ball was
6­7 m. The closest distance to the object was 0.5 m. I did not feel any
heat from the ball. The observation time was 1­2 s.

(s) Vibration, penetration through a hole

A. V. Elinek (male), PhD in chemistry. 20 years old, 20 March 1994, time
16:00­17:00 h. Interview 22 March 1994. Reaction--interest, no fear.
Moscow, Russia.

A thunderstorm with strong wind gusts and snow took place that day, and it
was partly cloudy. But at the moment of the ball's appearance, it was
clear. I was under my car in the garage and noticed an unusual glow. I got
up from under the car and saw a ball of indistinct size that was floating
at a height of 1.5 m over the floor. Its size was 150­200 cm in diameter,
coloured yellow-green. It illuminated like a non-intense daylight lamp,
comparable with an incandescent lamp of 40 W.

At its boundary the intensity was lower than in the centre. The ball had a
half transparent halo. The ball lightning was floating and vibrating in
the air.  When I went to it, it began to move away from me. When I
stopped, it stopped also. The nearest distance to me was 2.5­3 m. Then a
thunderstorm started outside.

Smoothly floating, it got to a hole between the door and the wall, 30­50
mm wide. The ball penetrated through the hole by quickly decreasing in
size in a few tenths of a second.

When I went out, the blue sky was filled with white clouds, I heard
thunder, and saw lightning discharges. I could not find the ball. During
the observation, the ball moved horizontally, swaying, and covered about 2
m. The starter of my Zhiguly VAZ-21-011 (which worked well before the
event) was out of order for about 2­3 hours. After this, it worked well
again. No sound or heat effects were observed. The ball colour did not
change.

(t ) Appearance from nowhere, large size, soft bubble, interaction with
observers

T. S. Sychevskaya (female) a teacher of pre-school. 17 years old, 20:00 h,
June 1971. Interview 1998. 5 observers. City, Zapadnaya Dvina, Russia.

In the evening my friends and I went to a dance. It was rather cool after
a thunder storm, but with no wind. We crossed the Moscow­Riga railway. We
just had crossed the rails and suddenly noticed a spherical ball lightning
over our heads. It was of 700­800 mm diameter. It appeared as if from
nowhere. We got frightened, squatted, and connected our hands, creating a
circle. The ball suddenly began to move over us in a circle, and it also
moved up and down. It was at a height of 0.5 m above the ground. Then it
`chose' my head and began to jump on it, up and down, like a ball.

It made more than 20 jumps. It was as soft as a bubble and I did not even
feel its weight. I felt cold from it. The ball resembled a gel of
white-grey colour. Its bound ary was like a soap bubble. Its glow could be
compared with that of an incandescent lamp of 200 W. Inside the ball (at
1/3 of its diameter) the glow was more intense than outside. Then it
ascended and disappeared unexpectedly. After this contact we were throwing
up.

(u) Woollen tangle structure, penetration through a hole

L. G. Romanova (female) biologist. 14 years old, 20:00 h, 8 August 1954.  
Interview 2000. 2 observers. Settlement, Taezhnyi near the Enisei River,
80 km from Krasnoyarsk, Russia.

It was the middle of the day, before a very strong thunderstorm. My mother
and I were looking through a window. Suddenly the windowpane began to
glow. A tangle, like a tennis ball, 70­80 mm in size, penetrated into the
room. Later we found out that the edge of the glass in the windowpane was
broken. The ball resembled a soft woollen tangle. It was white, bright
like an incandescent lamp of 100 W to look at. It was difficult to look at
it. A door into the corridor was unexpectedly opened and the ball was
dragged into it and went out of sight. The ball covered about 18 m in the
room. It moved non-smoothly. The closest distance to us was 2 m, and
observation time about 20 s.

A.V.B. and V.L.B. express their deep gratitude to Mrs Jerri Lynn for her
help in the translation of these observations. The Editorial board of the
Russian journal Nauka I Zhizn (Science and Life) allowed us to publish
letters related to this survey through the journal in 1992­1993. Also we
thank all those who provided accounts of their experience with ball
lightning.

References

Abrahamson, J. & Dinniss, J. 2000 Ball lightning caused by oxidation of 
nanoparticle networks
from normal lightning strikes on soil. Nature 403, 519­521.
Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. A (2002)
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