SHELBY COUNTY, AL — A positive lightning strike impacted the area near Caldwell Mill Road in Shelby County, Alabama just after 10:20 PM Wednesday, rattling residents in the Oak Mountain area during an active overnight storm period. The strike serves as a critical reminder of one of the most dangerous and least understood weather phenomena in meteorology, as positive lightning carries dramatically higher electrical charges than common negative lightning and can strike miles away from any visible rain or storm activity with absolutely no warning.
Positive Lightning Carries Up to Ten Times the Electrical Charge of a Typical Strike
Positive lightning differs fundamentally from the frequent flickering strikes most people associate with thunderstorms. While negative lightning originates from the lower, negatively charged base of a thunderstorm and travels a relatively short path to the ground, positive lightning originates from the anvil cloud at the very top of a mature thunderstorm, tens of thousands of feet in the air. Because it travels such an enormous distance to reach the ground, positive lightning carries a dramatically larger electrical charge, up to ten times the electrical current of a typical negative bolt, with a longer flash duration, higher peak charge, and significantly lower survival rates…