Ball Lightning: Weather's Biggest Mystery | Answers With Joe

When I was little I though that ball lightning, quicksand and the Bermuda Triangle would be huge sources of problems during a person's life

"Ice particles build up a positive charge... because reasons..." Good enough for me sips coffee

About twenty years ago (I was about 36 at that time) I was laying in my bed taking a nap during the day, recovering from a painful back injury. A bad thunderstorm raged outside as I slept and I was stunned awake by the sound of a lightning bolt striking just outside my window. As I sat up, frightened by the loudest sound I've ever heard (even to this day), to my astonishment, I watched as a crystal-ball-sized sphere slowly passed through the bedroom window and very slowly crossed my room, about six feet off the ground. It looked like it was made of a brownish haze within the sphere, and tiny arcs of electricity were all about it. It was silent... not a crackle, not a peep. It crossed my 12' x 12' bedroom in about 10-15 seconds before disappearing into the wall as if it had never been. Some hear this story and assume I dreamt it, but I was wide awake and naturally told everyone about it. Truly incredible to behold.

What I find so strange about these ball lightning stories, is that almost everyone says they've seen one when they were young. That totally doesn't make sense

“If it hits you, you explode and die...” Best line ever.

Pretty sure that a “hallucination” can’t burn your carpet as it passes through.

I actually saw what had to have been ball lightening, just a couple of months ago. A big blue white ball, so big I mistook it for the moon at first glance. It moved fast just above the tree line of the path I was on. Never saw anything like it before, and I was so glad that my husband was with me and saw it too. Weather is def weird.

My father retired after 20 years as a USAF pilot. He said that he saw ball lightning on occasion and seemed to allude to the fact that it was not uncommon among pilots. That would lend credence to the vortex theory as he told of it wandering & dancing on the wings (which of course work by creating great pressure differences and occasional vortexes). It did come inside the cockpit once but just traveled through. Great video. Thanks

Having the UFO get struck by lightning while taking off would have been an excellent touch.

Joe: Ball lightning is very rare, only a few people have experienced it. The entire comment section: I was x years old when I saw ball lightning come into my house

I've definitely heard of ball of light sightings just prior to a major earthquake or during a volcanic eruption. It's pretty likely that these phenomenons are related to similar conditions that could cause ball lightning (extremely high energy events). I've never witnessed ball lightning myself but I remember my mom telling me a story of her witnessing a ball of light during a thunderstorm in the 1960s. The ball of light came through a window, moved across the house and went out through another window. Really interesting stuff, I hope to witness one one day.

1:18 the way this man just said "voila potatoes" gets me laughing every time

"Keep your plannet" lol, this is what I needed today

My theory: Wizard duels. They turn invisible and throw fireballs at each other.

My aunt & uncle got hit by lightning recently. Said there was a metallic taste right before. It wasn't even that stormy (like, not raining at all) so they weren't expecting it. There was something like this that came through our TV when I was a kid. Like a fireball. We ran tf out of that room so fast.

Joe Scott! Your channel is flying; about 2.5% more subscribers in one day! Your content is golden, right down to the intro drum - tap & the chair swivel. Bleeping dig your humor. More!

"Keep your planet"...I laughed my socks off. Might actually be our best chance to survive an alien invasion...

Joe: they actually caught the ball lightning on camera Me: sits through the rest of the video expecting to see it

My uncle saw ball lightning once, it floated through a window and into his guest room - he'd never even heard of it before. The entire fuse for the room ended up permanently fried so he just used it for storage from then on. I think it's because there's too much positive charge in the clouds and no negatively changed spot on the ground for it to jump to. Maybe because the ground has been hit with too much lightning already in a small time period and is positively charged itself.

I've seen it once, right before a relatively tame thunder storm started. A little purple/white ball of electricity shooting through the air, a few hundred feet up. It didn't look very big, maybe two feet at the most, and it fizzled out in just a few seconds without any noise. I'd say it was moving maybe 60km-80km. It wasn't raining at the time, but it was cloudy and there was the occasional flicker of sheet lightning. I happened to be looking up at a very open area at my in-law's old place, on their balcony. It took me a long time to figure out what it could've been because it clearly wasn't a meteor and only lasted several seconds. The weirdest part was that when it fizzled out, the light that was being emitted by the outer shell of electricity looked like it got sucked into the middle of the ball. Almost like a little electric event horizon being swallowed by a tiny black hole that became unstable and then destroyed itself. I tried to contact a couple local universities to ask them, but nobody returned any emails. :(