Chapter 2 Global lightning flash rate = 100 S-1 estimated by Brooks(1925).

1925). Flash Density = Number of flashes per unit area per unit time. Ground Flash Density (Ng)= Number of Ground flashes per unit area per unit time. (Per km2 per year) Entire earth surface = 5.1 x 108km2 Typical thunderstorm lifetime = 1hour. The number of strokes per flash and the polarity of the charge lowered to the ground depends on : o season o location o storm type Thunder storm Days = TD Thunder storm Hours = TH TD , TH and Ng vary on space (location) and Time. So when considering the correlation among these factors, always select either the spatial or the temporal category of them first. Average flash rate during the lifetime of a thunderstorm cell is 3 min-1 (Cianos and Pierce 1972) About 70% of all lightning occurred during the "active storm period" which represented only about 30% of the whole storm duration. Severe storms are said to provide atleast one of the following according to US Weather Service: o large hail (diameter >= 1.9cm) o damaging winds (speed >= 26ms-1) o tornadoes Convection is the concerted, collective movement of groups or aggregates of molecules within fluids (e.g., liquids, gases) and rheids. Anisotropy is the property of being directionally dependent, as opposed to isotropy, which implies identical properties in all directions. Mesoscale meteorology is the study of weather systems smaller than synoptic scale systems but larger thanmicroscale and storm-scale cumulus systems. Horizontal dimensions generally range from around 5 kilometers to several hundred kilometers. Examples of mesoscale weather systems are sea breezes, squall lines, and mesoscale convective complexes (MCC 250-2500km).