Lightning Photography 2006
BY MARTIN KUCERA & FLORIDALIGHTNING.COM THE 2005 LIGHTNING CHASES WERE QUITE SLOW. A LOT OF HURRICANES AND GENERALLY COLD WEATHER
DID NOT HELP ANYTHING. THIS SEASON I AM GOING TO CONCENTRATE ON PERFECTING THE ART OF
CAPTURING POSITIVELY CHARGED LIGHTNING STRIKES, EXACTLY AS I DID IN 2005. PLEASE MARK THIS PAGE
IN YOUR FAVORITES AND STOP BY TO SEE THE LATEST UPDATES AND IMAGES OF THE SEASON. THE FIRST
PHOTOS OF 2006 ARE AT THE TOP OF THE PAGE, PROGRESSING TOWARD THE BOTTOM AS THE YEAR GOES ON.
| Same night but photo taken overlooking the ocean. Positively charged lightning strike here often signifies a dissipating stage of the storm. |
| The same thunderstorm a couple minutes later. Another positive strike. This is the back side of the departing squall line associated with the cold front. |
| A huge positively charged lightning strike over a near shore waters of Florida Bay. |
| April 22nd - One of the last cold fronts moved through last night bringing small hail and frequent lightning not only over Florida Bay. |
| These ten photographs were taken during the annual Midwest trip. The storm activity was quite slow during this year so I will have to make it up back here in Florida during the rest of the summer. The very first photo shows a supercell thunderstorm producing a single cloud to ground lightning bolt. You can easily see the rounded shape of the storm which clearly shows the cell is rotating. The second photo is from the same storm. The next seven photos are from another storm. A line of severe thunderstorms rolled through south east Texas panhandle and produced an incredible lightning show during the dusk hours. The last photo is of a single storm cell somewhere in South Dakota that was very interesting to watch. It was severe warned at the time this photograph was taken. |
| June 26 - a minute later after adjusting the exposure. This was the last double strike that happened with this storm moving through the area. |
| June 27 - A historic Indian Key in the center of the photo again. The cluster of storms is about 60 miles distant. Alligator reef light can be seen of the bottom left. |
| June 26 - An upper low brought squalls over the Keys. Shot using 24mm lens the picture quite does not show how close these blinding strikes actually were. Sadly enough it came out overexposed a bit. |
| A quite picturesque positive strike (CG+) exits the upper regions of a mature thunderstorm over the Atlantic ocean south of the Florida Keys. |
| Still June 27th - the thunderstorm departing the area to my north east. Unfortunately the cell was too weak now to light up the area for a more detailed photo. The storm is rapidly falling apart now. |
| A lightning channel is exiting the mid region of the storm toward the upper portion of the cell while producing a cloud to ground lightning at the same time. |
| July 7th - First really nice longer lasting thunderstorm with vivid positive lightning strikes occurring on several occasions. Both of these photos show positive bolts coming from the top parts of thunderstorm. Shot on a wide angle lens these photos really do not show how close the strikes actually were. |
| July 10th - Lower Keys early morning lightning strike - crawler on a dissipating thunderstorm. The second image taken shortly after on a new developing thunderstorm quite far away in the waters of Gulf of Mexico |
| July 10th - A positive lightning strike over the waters of the Florida Bay taken in Islamorada, FL |
| July 6th - Another crawler lightning - these are actually not seen very often in the Florida Keys lately. |
| July 6th - Crawler lightning shoot from the balcony of my apartment. I usually hate the electricity poles and wires but somehow I like them in this photograph as they add another dimension |
| July 10th - Vivid cloud to water lightning strike from the Lower Florida Keys. This storm was very charged an lasted quite a while. Wish I had a time to get closer to this one. |
| July 21st - An amazing experience while capturing this weak looking lightning strike. Went to the beach during a pretty intense thunderstorm. This bolt originated on the Atlantic ocean horizon as seen in this photo. Then the bolt went on over me and the islands and finished somewhere over on the other side over the Florida Everglades. The discharge was so strong it blinded me for several seconds. The thunder followed the lightning channel - the intense rumble went over my position and multiplied toward the Everglades, lasting forever. Best lightning related experience of the year 2006 so far. |
| July 26 - just after midnight - A great display of lightning storms over the waters of the Atlantic ocean and Florida Bay. I first noticed a great looking cluster of thunderstorms over the ocean just before sunset. As soon as it got dark enough the real lightning show started and went on non-stop till 5am as I am writing this and there are still new cells going up right now. For about a week now we really get the good lightning that I have been waiting for the whole year. Persistent flashes lasting sometimes up to one hour with a storm and in case of cluster even longer. |
| August 4th - Minutes before dawn. The most magic time of the day for lightning photography. It is not light outside yet but you can already make out the cloud formations on the horizon. The blues come up just incredible in the pictures. Add some lightning and it simply does not get any better. These towers were "blinking" which is something I prize way more than seeing regular cloud to surface lightning strikes. The window of opportunity is quite small though - you've got about 10-15 minutes to catch the best light before it gets too light outside. Notice where the lightning starts on the top in the photo on the right. |
| August 7th - A small after-sunset thunderstorm surprised with close CG lightning strikes. The beginning of August has been quite slow for thunderstorms or tropical system activity so far. Couple more months to go. |
| August 15th - Not a whole lot has been happening lately. Tonight was the first opportunity in more than a week to catch some lightning bolts. Everything happened around Marathon, Fl tonight. I went south at 3am and stayed until after sunrise. The first photo is a dream scene where you've got the flashing tower and nothing else but clear deep blue sky with bright stars. This tower is distant about 30 miles to my south-west. The second photo shows an intense thunderstorm just south of the Seven Mile Bridge producing numerous frequent CG lightning strikes during dawn hours. The bolts are no farther than five miles as the photo was taken on ultra wide lens. The thunder was unbelievable with these close bolts. |
| August 15th - Single cell lone thunderstorm is trying to survive the loss of heat during the sunset hours. Looking north-west over calm waters of Florida Bay this thunderstorm is located over the Everglades National Park. With the heating of the day lost and nearly calm winds the storm's life cycle is just about to end. |
| August 22nd - Single cell thunderstorm formed over the waters near Middle Keys at about 4am. The lightning was quite infrequent yet some of the bolts were great. The above photo shows a single lightning discharge. Closer examination reveals multiple simultaneous (most probably) positive lightning bolts. |
| August 20th - Incredible lightning show happened tonight and I'd certainly say it was the one of the best as far back as I can remember. For more detailed account - click on the image above. |
| August 22nd - Same thunderstorm as the one above right just several minutes later. A single positively charged lightning bolt exists upper regions of the updraft tower delivering an enormous discharge to the surface, very likely the ocean. |
| August 24th - These towers developed on northern coast Cuba tonight. The visibility was so great I was able to zoom in on these with a telephoto lens. The thunderstorms were over a hundred miles away yet the camera was able to capture these positive lightning bolts quite nicely. It is almost the end of August yet I am still waiting for a lot more lightning activity during next couple of months. For the end of the year and the upcoming season I might be able to actually start travelling much greater distances to chase storms and especially to photograph lightning in many interesting and lightning favorable locations around the world. |
| August 25th - Strong storms developed on a outflow boundary that moved to the Keys from Florida mainland. Unfortunately I had to be at work... |
August 31st - This thunderstorm formed over the ocean well before sunset on a left over boundary after
one of tropical storm Ernesto's outer bands moved through the region. Mosquitoes were just incredible.
one of tropical storm Ernesto's outer bands moved through the region. Mosquitoes were just incredible.
| September 1st - A great variety of stormy situations tonight. Intense and widespread thunderstorms started well before sunset so I shot HD video. Once it got darker the lightning never stopped till about midnight. It was one of those nights where you want to grab several cameras and point them in several different directions. Lots and lots of flashes but majority were intra-cloud strikes. Overall the event was not so easy for lightning photography. The very left photo in the first row above is quite interesting - the thunderstorm is lit up thanks to the street lights of distant island of Key Largo. The city lights created the orange glow that made for an interesting lightning shot. The very last photo quite puzzles me - the bolts were attracted to something on the horizon out of camera view - something that caused this strange lightning behavior. |
| All Images and Text (c) 2006 Martin Kucera & FloridaLightning.com |
| September 16th - Unreal lightning experience again tonight over the Atlantic ocean just south of the upper Florida Keys. Click for more photos. |
| September 29th - A great lightning show lasted for hours, mainly south of the Florida Keys island chain. Added the houses just for comparison. |
| November 8th - Departing front lit up horizon for an hour or so. The storms became active in the Straits of Florida late at night, too far and too late for any reasonable action on my part here in the islands. |
| October 5th - A magic night again. The moon was so bright you could see everything just like during daylight. The moon light also added a moving like motion to the clouds. A lot of unwanted small clouds were present tonight though, obstructing the view of more distant thunderstorms. |
| October 4th - Plenty of debris clouds in the area greatly limited my opportunity to get nice lightning photos. This one was a pure magic, though. Wow. |
| September 29th - These strong thunderstorms literally grew before your eyes. Upper right image - yet another great example of a positively charged lightning bolt originating in upper portions of the thunderstorm. Unfortunately, by this time of the year, lightning frequency seems to be coming to an end. |
| September 29th - Spent hours shooting lightning photographs tonight. Not a single cell on the Bay side of the Florida Keys but the ocean was on fire. A non stop lightning show lasted till early morning hours. I was able to observe numerous positive lightning strikes, again. A lot of electricity was out there tonight. |
| November 15th - A cold front was on the move through the south Florida and the Keys. Numerous thunderstorms occurred in unstable environment tonight. This is a first good looking positive strike. |
| November 15th - The four lightning shots above show a series of several positively charged lightning bolts that happened within several short minutes and signified a painful end of this thunderstorm. Blinding intensity of these lightning strikes was unprecedented. The thunder carried for especially long periods of time. This thunderstorm was very much electrified - you can notice in the two middle photos - there is actually several bolts occurring with each strike. It seems to me that a storm always somehow fully discharges itself while this type of strikes is occurring - I hardly ever witness any more lightning following these powerful bolts.... |