Scientists Used Lasers To Divert Lighting Bolts In The Sky

[Judi Lynn]

If you’ve ever wanted to play Zeus hurling bolts of lightning (and who hasn’t) we may be close to the next best thing.

STEPHEN LUNTZ
Freelance Writer

Jan 16, 2023 10:00 AM



A green laser beam seen against the Säntis Mountain weather station, a frequent site of lightning strikes. Image Credit: TRUMPF/Martin Stollberg

Lasers can act as virtual lightning rods, redirecting the direction in which bolts jump – although we’re a long way from being able to call down the wrath of science on unbelievers like a creature of myth.

The Franklin lightning rod was a major scientific advance of its day, preventing millions of fires and electrocutions and demonstrating humanity’s capacity to control forces we had long feared as belonging to the gods. Nevertheless, it’s been 270 years, and it remains the basis of our lightning protection: maybe it’s time for an upgrade.

That is what Dr Aurélien Houard of ENSTA Paris and co-authors propose in a new paper, demonstrating that laser pulses can change the direction of a lightning strike.

The team previously demonstrated lasers' capacity to ionize air in laboratories can cause 2-million-volt sparks to jump along low-density channels. To take their idea to a larger stage, they placed a laser machine the size of a car near a tower on Säntis Mountain, Switzerland. The tower was chosen as, contrary to sayings about lightning never striking twice in the same place, it gets hit about 100 times a year – reportedly the most in Europe.

More:
https://www.iflscience.com/scientists-used-lasers-to-divert-lighting-bolts-in-the-sky-67089