Thunderstruck: what does the future hold for lightning?

Humans have always been awed by the power and beauty of lightning. How does the experience and understanding of it change in a warming world? In a rock shelter in Kakadu national park in the north of Australia is an image of a being the Bininj people call Namarrkon. His flesh bleached away to reveal the bones beneath, he wears stone axes on his head, elbows and knees, and wields a great band of lightning that runs from his ankles up, over his head. Namarrkon’s journey from the Arafura Sea to the Arnhem Land escarpment helped shape the landscape, according to the dreamtime stories of the Bininj. And in the great storms that arc and rumble across the landscape during the buildup and the wet season, it is Namarrkon who splits the clouds with his stone axes to create the thunder and lightning and release the life-giving rain. Continue reading...