Weather stories

Almost immediately after hearing the combined explosions … Mrs D. saw a bizarre object enter the room directly through the (closed) south-facing window. The appearance of the ‘thing’ left Mrs D. doubting her senses, for it seemed to pass through the window glass as if this obstacle to its progress did not exist.

The phenomenon consisted of a smoky-black object, shaped like a stubby cigar, and apparently hollow, with whirling streams of smoke rising vertically from its upper surface. The object was small, about 9cm ± 1cm in length and no more than 2 cm across at its widest point. The whirling smoke streams were very long in comparison, being about 75 cm in height. The object travelled in a straight line, for south to north, at a speed of about 50 cm per second, and at a height of about one metre above the carpeted floor. Mrs D. noted that the forward end of the ‘cigar’ was slightly filled-in on one side. This weird little visitant passed form S[outh] to N[orth], which is the same direction followed by the stream of light. It is believed that the ‘cigar’ was either a by-product of the ‘stream’, or its terminal phase.

Mrs D. was far too startled by the object’s ingress and passage, to observe its manner of exit, but she did note that there was an ozone-like smell during the event. Her husband saw nothing, and the dog seemed quite undisturbed by the proximity of the ‘cigar’ and its ‘smoke’. Mrs D. was concerned that the thing may have burned the carpet, and the upholstery of the chair in which she was sitting, but on close inspection no damage was discovered.

Peter Van Doorn, ‘Complex Ball Lightning Events at Shoreham, West Sussex, United Kingdom, 24 September 2000 and 3 November 2000: Part 3’, The Journal of Meteorology, vol.28, no.276, February 2003, p.65