Ball Lightning in Ireland???

HellFireClub

Just wondering have there ever been any recorded incidents of ball lightening in Ireland???

It's a phenomena that has often caused me to wonder, it's extremely rare and I've never heard of any reported sightings of this in Ireland...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ioN-3UWYrY

hoody

I remember years ago - as in back in the nineties - there was something similar to this seen by the crowd during the Galway races. Haven't found any online reference so far but I remember people talking about it.

gbee

Generally speaking, we get every weather phenomenon going and we have had devastating tSunami and earthquake activity too [no volcanic in many thousands of years].

In history incidents have been misreported and Ireland is still a sparsely populated country and our pastimes, despite our outdoor lifestyles, were spent indoors.

Our culture also suppressed reporting incidents for fear of drawing the little people or the bannshee down on our heads.

Weather phenomenon such as ball lightening were interpreted as visions or demonic [depending on your parish priest] so there have been many myths making their way into the Irish weather folklore whereas in fact we do get all the weather going, just not as often and usually not as severe.

redsteveireland

hoody wrote: »

I remember years ago - as in back in the nineties - there was something similar to this seen by the crowd during the Galway races. Haven't found any online reference so far but I remember people talking about it.

I remember that too, my dad was at the races that day may have been '98 or '99.

Iancar29

WOuld love to witness this! , would love to no the conditions that make it more favourable so to be able to watch out for it..

COndition 1 - Thunderstorm ... :rolleyes:

Danno

Indeed, during the famous July 85 storm there was ball lightning, Johnstown in North Kilkenny was affected.

hotwhiskey

Danno wrote: »

Indeed, during the famous July 85 storm there was ball lightning, Johnstown in North Kilkenny was affected.

Yes i saw ball lightning during that famous storm of '85, it happened right over our home it was a sight to behold that i will never forget and properly never see again.

maquiladora

I haven't read this page yet, but a quick google search turned up....

One of the most energetic ball lightning events ever reported occurred on August 6, 1868, in County Donegal, Ireland, and was witnessed by Michael Fitzgerald, who dutifully reported it to the Royal Society in London....

http://www.zseltvay.com/first_installment_extreme_ball_lightning.htm

redsteveireland

maquiladora wrote: »

I haven't read this page yet, but a quick google search turned up....


H
http://www.zseltvay.com/first_installment_extreme_ball_lightning.htm

That report sounds crazy!

Chicken1

I rember as a young fella watching a thunderstorm over Galway Bay with my Dad when a flash of lightning hit the water and bounced along the water it was a round shape lasted for a few seconds. That was a long time ago :D, I do remember the one when the Galway races was on I never saw so much forked lightning in my life during that storm, it set poles at the course on fire and RTE showed it as they were live at the time.

alanajane

Was trying to remember exact year but Danno got there first, 1985, I was on holidays at the time but when I got home I heard the stories of the ferocious storm, including ball lightening. A relative of mine apparently got his kids up in middle of night to watch it, cause it was such a rare sight. (I personally would have left them asleep!)

traecy1

redsteveireland wrote: »

I remember that too, my dad was at the races that day may have been '98 or '99.

Early August 1995. That summer was the warmest on record in many places.

darrenh

I remember the one in Galway. No one had a clue what was going on!

hoody

I've attached a pdf of the front page of the Advertiser with the story about the fireball from August 1995... worth looking at for the price of the mobile phone alone!

Iancar29

hoody wrote: »

I've attached a pdf of the front page of the Advertiser with the story about the fireball from August 1995... worth looking at for the price of the mobile phone alone!

FAIR PLAY!... how did u hav that???

SO they thought it was St.Elmo's fire?... interesting

I know a some1 that seen that while flying through a storm.

hoody

Found it on the Galway Advertiser archive, they have every page of every issue for the past 40 years on there, some resource

loup

hotwhiskey wrote: »

Yes i saw ball lightning during that famous storm of '85, it happened right over our home it was a sight to behold that i will never forget and properly never see again.

Ball lightning also hit our family house in Dundrum that same year, our neighbour across the road reported it rolling across our roof. It hit our tv aerial and blew everything electrical in the house!

charlemont

Danno wrote: »

Indeed, during the famous July 85 storm there was ball lightning, Johnstown in North Kilkenny was affected.

That was the best storm yet and I was only seven, Awesome storm, Once those hailstones started, We knew it was going to be good.

Iancar29

I think we need to get in on this so!

http://www.nasa.gov/connect/chat/lightning_chat.html

Totofan99

Hey guys,

I know this thread is kinda old but I just came across it now and I had to contribute!

I remember ball lightning (well, I presume it was....) actually coming into our house in county Galway during a thunderstorm. This would have been in the late 90's I think.... It was very strange.... It was this yellow/orange glowing ball that gave off a hissing sound. It traveled down the hall in a perfectly straight line at the same height as the ceiling. It came into the kitchen, bounced off the gable wall, traveled back down the hall and then disappeared. Haven't seen anything like it since...

Helix

saw what i can only think was ball lightening about 10-12 years ago in balrothery

seemed to snake along a telephone/electrical wire for about 3 seconds before disappearing

opinion guy

Somebody posted a thread on AH about a 2 weeks ago describing what sounded like ball lightning.

Let me see if I can find it......

Here ya go:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=73966909

dr24444

This one may seem a little fare fetched, but my brother would recount this story anytime a good conversation about lightning would develop. He passed away some years ago, and I have found that I now carried on the story for him.
He would have be 10 years old when this happened, it was a summers day and as I recall a very hot humid day. My brother and a school pal had just come in from outside as it had began to rain, a summer shower as we would call it at the time. They had switched on the TV and were watching cartoons, the TV was a Ferguson and we had only bought it at Christmas. Suddenly there was a massive bang from the TV and loud rumbling of thunder. I was in the next room and ran in to see what had happened. My brother and his pal were in a state of shock. They sat there for a couple of second and then became animated, they told me that a white ball slightly smaller that a tennis ball had came through the celling following the coaxial aerial cable. It followed the outside of the cable slow enough that they could watch it. At one point the cable looped down toward the floor and it followed the loop and up along the cable again and into the back of the TV. It was just then they had heard the TV go bang. A eye witness said later that from were he was standing it look like the hole area around the house had lit up.

V_Moth

Some info on ball lightning:

http://www.torro.org.uk/site/ball_info.php

dr24444

Thanks for your reply, I will certainly give it a read. I also remember Sir Arthur C. Clarke covering the subject in a BBC series. I will try and find that program and post the link.

cocoshovel

Is it just me, or does ball lightening terrify anybody else?

Supercell

V_Moth wrote: »

Some info on ball lightning:

http://www.torro.org.uk/site/ball_info.php

Utterly fascinating, but in some respects I wish i never read it - If i ever see ball lightening I'm running in the opposite direction and fast!

V_Moth

Nah, I would be far too interested in documenting any sighting. Looking through YT, there is very little convincing footage. After sorting through all the OMG UFO, fakes and plasma balls, only these two are of interest:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9SrGOma5YE

This one I am not 100% sure of, could be just a plane turning in the clouds, but it seems remarkable that it appears just before two fairly strong lightning bolts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ioN-3UWYrY

And then there is also this (skip to 0:55):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qevVKCIAdwM

Also, I wonder if there is any relationship between ball lightning and some of the upper atmospheric lightning types (elves/sprites/blue jets).

ShiresV2

Supercell wrote: »

If i ever see ball lightening I'm running in the opposite direction and fast!

My now deceased aunt tried to get away from ball lightning once and it "followed" her briefly, we guess due to air currents.

I saw what I assume is ball lightning in London about 9 years ago. I was in bed reading and it entered the room as an intense, localised ball of white light, about 2 metres away from me. It persisted no more than 10 seconds. I said to the girlfriend "do you see that?" to which she replied yes and then it was gone. Surreal experience.

Wine Goddess

loup wrote: »

Ball lightning also hit our family house in Dundrum that same year, our neighbour across the road reported it rolling across our roof. It hit our tv aerial and blew everything electrical in the house!

Yes also the needle of the record player had a tiny flame on it AND it made a weird pattern on the carpet where it finally earthed itself!
"Penthouse and Pavement" by Heaven 17 was the album.......great songs on that......

Coles

An interesting report of ball lightning during a storm in Wicklow in June 1896.

stooge

I may have posted this before on here but its about the only 'surreal' thing that has happened to me so its worth mentioning again in the context of ball lightning as it seems to fit in with some of the other reports.

When: Jan/Feb 1995 around 9/10pm

Where: Minor road about .5mile from home house

Weather conditions: Calm, dry, cold, slightly cloudy. Probably 5 or 6deg if I had to guess.

What happened: We were in the car coming back from a football match. about half a mile from home there is a stretch of the road with no houses which is quite dark. There are a few trees either side of the road.

As we approach, my Dad and I almost at the same time said "what's that?". A greeny yellow ball of light was moving from right to left about 30ft in the air. Not fast, but not slow either. The ball was at a guess about half a metre wide. A couple of seconds after we said that, it stoppped, hovered and then moved left to right away from our approaching car.

We slowed down to try and get a better look at which point the thing sped up and disappeared out of view. The whole thing lasted no longer than 15-20secs and we both talk about it to this day.

mickmackey1

Hard to say obviously but could even be something as simple as the moon scudding behind some fast moving clouds as seen through branches. You'd be amazed at the number of apparently bizarre sightings which have relatively mundane explanations. Just guessing of course...

Coles

mickmackey1 wrote: »

Hard to say obviously but could even be something as simple as the moon scudding behind some fast moving clouds as seen through branches. You'd be amazed at the number of apparently bizarre sightings which have relatively mundane explanations. Just guessing of course...

Ball lightning might be uncommon, but it's certainly real. I find the above story from 1896 is remarkable because it is almost identical to an experience I was told by two Wicklow farmers following the huge electrical storm in 1995. In that case the ball appeared in the room and moved rapidly around the room until it hit a light fitting on the wall and disappeared. The light fitting was obliterated.

My father saw ball lightning a decade earlier when the ball moved down the laneway and around the side of the house. He initially though it was the headlight of a motorbike until it suddenly disappeared.

stooge

mickmackey1 wrote: »

Hard to say obviously but could even be something as simple as the moon scudding behind some fast moving clouds as seen through branches. You'd be amazed at the number of apparently bizarre sightings which have relatively mundane explanations. Just guessing of course...

I agree that bizarre things generally have mundane explanations, however in this case we were completely stumped as to what it could have been. It definitely wasnt the moon though as it was moving between the trees and not behind them. It was also changing direction from right-> left then from left -> right.

On a funnier note, a few years later, near the same part of the road I was walking home after a few drinks with friends. I'll admit I was a bit hesitant due to the earlier experience so I started to run. I had gone about 100 yard when a bloody great badger came out of the hedge in front of me! never been so frightened in my life!!:pac::o