[HN Gopher] First Successful Lightning Triggering and Guiding Us...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       First Successful Lightning Triggering and Guiding Using a Drone
        
       Author : gnabgib
       Score  : 48 points
       Date   : 2025-04-23 19:24 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (group.ntt)
 (TXT) w3m dump (group.ntt)
        
       | dolphin0 wrote:
       | Next step, use the energy?
        
         | ahahahahah wrote:
         | Yes, thanks for repeating the content from the article.
         | 
         | "In addition, we aim to not only trigger and control lightning,
         | but also to harness its energy. Future efforts will focus on
         | developing technologies for capturing and storing lightning
         | energy for potential use (Figure 7)."
        
           | dinkblam wrote:
           | isn't conventional wisdom that this is "impossible" because
           | you cannot charge batteries that fast?
        
             | fudged71 wrote:
             | Like most things, you'd probably end up heating water
             | somehow and using that energy.
        
       | dhagberg wrote:
       | Wow, getting a drone to survive the massive electromagnetic
       | fields (and plasma!) around lightning strikes is quite an
       | accomplishment. Prior art in the area used rockets trailing a
       | similar light wire to trigger lightning - used by Dr Uman's team
       | at University of Florida (https://ufdc.ufl.edu/UFE0047331/00001).
        
       | dole wrote:
       | This [1] article claims that the electricity from 115 strikes
       | could power the entire US grid for a year, but it's surely napkin
       | math. Awesome tech, though!
       | 
       | [1] https://www.treehugger.com/how-much-energy-is-in-
       | lightning-8...
        
         | xnx wrote:
         | That article seems very very wrong. I think they missed the
         | difference between GW and GWh.
         | 
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fs28lEq9smw
        
           | npunt wrote:
           | Hah quite the oversight! To put a spin on an old saying, _a
           | little math is a dangerous thing_.
        
         | janalsncm wrote:
         | Apparently a single lightning strike contains the equivalent of
         | about 40 gallons of gasoline. It's very powerful but not that
         | significant on the scale of a whole city.
         | 
         | In fact a quick back of the napkin math suggests it would only
         | power a city of a million people for half a second.
         | 
         | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvesting_lightning_energy
        
       | FlyingSnake wrote:
       | I wonder if we managed to harness and store this electricity from
       | the lightning into some kind of large battery. If a drone can
       | successfully fly and connect with the lighting, this seems like a
       | possibility.
       | 
       | Edit: I read past the line where they mentioned this was in the
       | plans.
        
       | iugtmkbdfil834 wrote:
       | So.. how long do we have before situational personal lightning
       | bolt is a thing?
        
         | Noumenon72 wrote:
         | Apparently they already have the ability to create lightning
         | bolts in the lab for testing. Maybe they can license that.
         | 
         | > we conducted artificial lightning tests on drones equipped
         | with the lightning protection cage. The results showed that the
         | system withstood artificial strikes of up to 150 kA--five times
         | greater than the average natural lightning strike--without any
         | malfunction or damage, covering over 98% of naturally occurring
         | lightning conditions.
        
       | walrus01 wrote:
       | That's a freefly Alta X in the photos which is a $20k drone
       | commonly used in cinematography.
        
       | _benj wrote:
       | That is impressive, specially the drone surviving! I expect
       | something along the lines of disposable drones, which would like
       | still be cost effective at saving 100-200b yen a year! It'll be
       | fascinating seeing this deployed!
        
       | rkagerer wrote:
       | This is really cool, but I'm super skeptical of their proposed
       | use case for protecting cities.
       | 
       | Aren't lightning conditions often preceded by strong winds and
       | poor weather conditions? Not a great time to be flying drones.
       | And the approach seems more complicated than simply installing
       | lightning rods.
       | 
       | I'd sooner envision people using the technique to get a kick out
       | of throwing lightning around like they're Zeus.
        
         | bestouff wrote:
         | AFAIK the electric buildup starts even before the
         | meteorological shenanigans.
        
       | anonymousiam wrote:
       | The lightning "strike" mentioned in the article was probably not
       | a direct hit. Nothing can really survive >30kA of current. I
       | recall concerns from Boeing engineers when they switched to
       | carbon fiber fuselages, that a strike would be far more serious
       | than before, with Aluminum.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2025-04-23 23:00 UTC)