Re: what is the radio frequency emission specta for lightning

Lightning bolts are powerful sources of radio waves. These electromagnetic signals, which are like short bursts or impulses, are called Sferics.

Lightning's radio waves are spread throughout the electromagnetic spectrum--from the very lowest of radio frequencies up to the microwave frequency ranges and into the visible light part of the spectrum.

However, most of the electromagnetic energy from lightning is in the very lowest part of the radio spectrum, from 0.1 to 10 kHz. The peak of the spectrum generally seems to be between 1 and 10 KHz.

Above 10KHz, the energy spectrum tails off, but has the nature of random noise - there are random peaks occurring with short durations.

In researching this, I found out several interesting things:

* NASA has an educationally-motivated effort to study sferics; you can find out more about this at this site.

* In 1989, new upper atmospheric optical phenomena associated with thunderstorms were discovered. Called Red Sprites and Blue Jets, they are beautiful and give off interesting electromagnetic spectra and sounds.