Massive thunderstorms occur on 140-160 nights per year with an average of 28 lightning strikes per minute lasting up to 10 hours at a time. Sometimes referred to as Venezuela’s “eternal thunderstorm,” the Catatumbo Lightning … Venezuela’s Lake Maracaibo earned a place in the Guinness Book of World Records for ‘highest concentration of lightning’ with 250 lightning flashes per square kilometre each year. For almost two decades, the satellite in the orbit of Earth has been collecting data on meteorological phenomena. The light from the thunder is used as an alternative to a lighthouse by local ships. [4] The phenomenon is characterized by almost continuous lightning, mostly within the clouds. Lake Maracaibo is surrounded by mountains on three sides, which traps warm and moist air flowing in from the equator and condenses it into clouds with enormous electrical energy. The warmer masses lower into the Maracaibo basin, colliding with the cold air of the Andes. Muñoz, Á.G., Núñez, A., Chourio, X., Díaz-Lobatón, J., Márquez, R., Moretto, P., Juárez, M., Casanova, V., Quintero, A., Zurita, D., Colmenares, V., Vargas, L., Salcedo, M.L., Padrón, R., Contreras, L., Parra, H., Vaughan, C., Smith, D., 2015: Reporte Final de la Expedición Catatumbo: Abril 2015. Lake Maracaibo tops out at an astonishing 233 lightning flashes per square kilometer per year , making it the absolute lightning … The Spectacular Lake Maracaibo. The 13 years of TRMM Lightning Imaging Sensor: from individual flash characteristics to decadal tendencies. Known as Relampo del Catatumbo , the storm is located where the Catatumbo River flows into Lake Maracaibo. [clarification needed] Other studies have indicated that this model is contradicted by the observed behaviour of the lightning, as it would predict that there would be more lightning in the dry season (January–February), and less in the wet season (April–May and September–October). And indeed, the Catatumbo region is surrounded by a wall of Andes in the shape of a letter V. The current hypothesis is that the mountains capture the enormous quantities of water evaporating off the lake each day under the equatorial sun and the warm trade winds blowing in off the Caribbean. Its Lightning Image Sensor has been tracking and recording flashes of light to produce the map of the lightning "top spots.". Do you like storms? It's so silent that the thunder from it cannot be heard. Universidad del Zulia. Humidity has been thought to have played a role, as the longest recorded pause of lightning activity, in 2010, coincided with a severe drought in Venezuela caused by an El Niño weather event. Maracaibo basin is on top of one of South America's largest oil fields. 5. Catatumbo lightning (Spanish: Relámpago del Catatumbo) is an atmospheric phenomenon which occurs over the mouth of the Catatumbo River where it empties into Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela.It originates from a mass of storm clouds at a height of more than 1 km, and occurs during 140 to 160 nights a year, 10 hours per day and up to 280 times per hour. The phenomenon gained a poetic name "Beacon of Maracaibo" for its significance for navigation, and the river is known as a "river of fire.". Prospects for the weekend at Maracaibo. With some delay, we can hear the thunder: a shock wave of sound created when the heat of the lightning compresses the surrounding air. This storm has 1 million lightning strikes a year. All maps, graphics, flags, photos and original descriptions © 2021 worldatlas.com, The Beacon of Maracaibo: The Home Of The Lightning Storms, Places In The World Where Lightning Strikes The Most, The Five Most Lightning Prone States In The United States, Worst Storms of All Time - The Ground Blizzard of 1977, The Causes And Effects Of Ocean Pollution. Live weather reports from Maracaibo weather stations and weather warnings that include risk of thunder, high UV index and forecast gales. An atmospheric event that occurs where the Catatumbo River enters the Lake Maracaibo became known as Catatumbo lightning. These air masses meet the high mountain ridges of the Andes, the Perijá Mountains (3,750 m), and Mérida's Cordillera, enclosing the plain from three sides. [2] It occurs over and around Lake Maracaibo, typically over a bog area formed where the Catatumbo River flows into the lake. [10], Catatumbo lightning usually develops between .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}8°30′N 71°0′W / 8.500°N 71.000°W / 8.500; -71.000 (Approximate outer limit) and 9°45′N 73°0′W / 9.750°N 73.000°W / 9.750; -73.000 (Approximate outer limit). [14][15], A team from the Universidad del Zulia has investigated the impact of different atmospheric variables on Catatumbo lightning's daily, seasonal and year-to-year variability, finding relationships with the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone, El Niño–Southern Oscillation, the Caribbean Low-Level Jet, and the local winds and convective available potential energy. 4. Reporte público ¿Relámpagos del Catatumbo regeneran la capa de ozono? The only apparent unique characteristic of this phemonemon is that the storms form and persist in the same place night after night. There are 250 lightning strikes per sq. The collision of temperatures is the essential recipe for a thunderstorm. The Catatumbo Lightning is the most reliable - and frequent - lightning show on earth, occurring about 300 days out of the year. Sometimes it lasts as long as 10 hours per day, with as many as 300 lightning … [4][5][6], Prussian naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt described the lightning in 1826. But some scientists suggest that another factor is increasing it: methane. The storms ease off in the dryer months of January and February and are most spectacular at … Helicopters cause lightning : temperatures, precipitation, sunshine, Clouds, Maracaibo Venezuela The temperature can be hotter than the surface of the Sun! "Catatumbo lightning" refers to continuous (high frequency) lightning from a near-daily thunderstorm complex that forms in the Lago de Maracaibo/Catatumbo River region in northern Venezuela, South America. [9], Some authors have misinterpreted a reference to a glow in the night sky in Lope de Vega's description in his epic La Dragontea of the attack against San Juan de Puerto Rico by Sir Francis Drake as an early literary allusion to the lightning (since in another verse the poet does mention Maracaibo), but it was actually a reference to the glow produced by burning ships during the battle. Surrounded by mountains in three directions, and open to the warm & unstable air that sits above the Caribbean Sea, Venezuela's Lake Maracaibo is the "Lightning Capital Of The World". The lightning is caused by closed wind circulation. That combination of the topographical and atmospheric features alone would make it the location into a "cooking pot for thunderstorms.". The heat and moisture collected across the plains create electrical charges and, as the air masses are destabilized by the mountain ridges, result in thunderstorm activity. A lot of tourists are attracted to the Beacon of Maracaibo since, in many countries, thunderstorms and lighting are exceedingly rare. This place is just above a swampy patch of Northwestern Venezuela, where the river Catatumbo meets with lake Maracaibo.Catatumbo lightning appears almost every night with average 28 lightning strikes per minute and up to 10 hours at a time. By Antonia Čirjak on January 13 2020 in Environment, Venezuela's Lake Maracaibo sits at its rightful top position as the location with the highest concentration of lightning. 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