Solar winds may influence lightning strikes on Earth

New Scientist : Provided a storm is imminent, the number of lightning strikes could increase significantly if the solar wind is blowing harder than usual. The solar wind is a stream of charged particles that flows outward from the Sun at regular intervals. Christopher Scott of the University of Reading in the UK and colleagues compared data from the Advanced Composition Explorer spacecraft, which measures the solar wind, with the number of lightning strikes measured by monitoring stations in the UK between 2000 and 2005. They found there was an average of 422 strikes in the 40-day period after a solar wind blast and just 321 strikes in the 40 days before the blast. Although no one yet knows how lightning is created, the researchers hope their findings will help meteorologists predict periods of increased risk of severe storms and lightning strikes.