Weather: record 110,000 lightning bolts strike during 'superstorms'

The Met Office said more than 110,000 lightning bolts were recorded across the UK, with more than 200 strikes recorded every minute at the peak of activity.

Experts said this was 40 times higher than an average lightning storm and was the equivalent of four months’ worth of strikes in one day.

Government forecasters said most of Thursday’s strikes, which came as rare “super cell” thunderstorms battered the Midlands and northern regions, were fork lightning and hit the ground.

In one dramatic video, footage showed a spectacular bolt striking the lighting storm over a field in Suffolk, UK Bridge, linking Newcastle and Gateshead, which captured the intensity of the fierce storms that swept across the North.
[link to www.telegraph.co.uk]