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 ERROR 405; SLOGAN FOUND, but... well, it wasn't that good. |
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Ball lightning is a very mysterious, insanely cool, face-meltingly-good natural phenomenon, and, as would be expected of any unexplained, face-melting force, the Internet is home to a slew of information. The following are some of the (numerous) websites that were most useful in the investigations of the Tangmonkey Group. Enjoy.
| Ball Lightning Page | Likely the Web's best source of Ball Lightning information, this page houses an archive of links to other BL websites, as well as information on related printed publications. Highly recommended. |
| Ball Lightning at Earth Lights | An examination of the science of ball lightning, and the way it relates to other luminous natural phenomena (earth lights). |
| Ball Lightning Reports | Dozens of personal testimonials about BL sightings, from all over the globe. Highly interesting reading. |
| Spectres in the Storm | An article about the evidence for ball lighting, by Adrian Ashford, first published in AA&ES Magazine. |
| All Fired Up | A fairly recent article from New Scientist magazine, explaining a theory for the formation of ball lightning. A much longer, more recent article is available here, but it is only available if you have access to the New Scientist archives. |
Ball lightning is really really dangerous. It can do all sorts of nasty things, including the melting of faces. What's funnest about ball lightning, however, is that you can make it in your own kitchen!
But you shouldn't.
All over the Internet, there exist web-pages that outline experiments which simulate the appearance of ball lightning, most of which use your microwave. Despite the ubiquity of this information, however, these experiments are intensely dangerous, as evidenced by the warning in this screen capture from a legitimate ball lightning website.
With that formality out of the way, however, if you want to melt your face off - feel free. The following sites are recommended.
| The Microwave Phenomenon page |
A step by step description of various microwave/ball lightning experiments, wtih movies (.avi) to download. |
| My Science Project | An amateur's account of a microwave experiment (proving how our youth are endangered by the looming ball lightning threat!) |
| Ball Lightning and Fireball | The abstract of an academically-oriented experiment by Masashi Kamogawa, Hideho Ofuruton, Norihisa Kondo and Yoshi-Hiko Ohtsuki, which includes colour photos. |
| Microwave induced plasma balls | Another academic experiment conducted by István Csabai and András Czirok; includes many, many pictures and their scientific results. |
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