
Thunderstorms Observed Triggering Nuclear Reactions in the Sky - davesailer
https://www.sciencealert.com/thunderstorms-observed-triggering-nuclear-reactions-in-the-sky-lightning-gamma
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sengork
This seems to be reversable, nuclear reactions causing lightings.

[http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2012/11/15/how-to-make-an-
ato...](http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2012/11/15/how-to-make-an-atomic-
thunderstorm/)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-
altitude_nuclear_explosio...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-
altitude_nuclear_explosion)

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tuxxy
I'm not very keen on these things, but I do understand some of nuclear physics
and the reactions thereof.

Maybe I'm in over my head, but how come satellites made for detecting
radiation or nuclear explosions didn't pick up on any of this before?

If not, is it possible that satellites could detect this and produce more data
for everyone on these lightning gamma ray flashes?

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lfowles
I seem to remember from the Las Vegas Atomic Museum that lightning would
indeed trigger false positives in early gamma ray detecting satellites.

Edit: The article does note that it was picked up by satellites before but
there's conclusive evidence now.

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lostlogin
So were those false positives in fact real signal? It wouldn’t be the first
time that ‘noise’ turned out to be signal.

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lfowles
Yes, but the intent was to monitor Russian nuclear testing, not just measure
gamma radiation in general.

