Facts about the city of Thunders | Venezuela

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Many people get scared by even a single lightning strike. Friends, can you imagine a place where each day, for 9 hours, there’s continuous lightning strike every couple of seconds?

No need to imagine, because such a place does actually exist in Venezuela. It’s seen on the riverside of the Catatumbo River. The phenomenon is so severe that it persists for 150 days in a year. As in, you can witness it for almost 5 months. This phenomenon is known as the Catatumbo Lightning. This area sees 250 lightning flashes per SQ KM per year, Translating to 1.6 million lightning bolts each year. Often there’s so much continuous lightning those nights don’t seem like nights, they’re bright as a day.

Facts about the city of Thunders | Venezuela

Phenomenon Name: Known as the Catatumbo Lightning (Relámpago del Catatumbo in Spanish).

Location: Occurs at the mouth of the Catatumbo River where it empties into Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela.

Frequency: Happens approximately 140 to 160 nights a year.

Duration: Each lightning storm can last up to 9-10 hours per night.

Intensity: During a storm, there can be up to 280 lightning strikes per hour.

Visibility: The lightning can be seen from over 400 kilometres away.

Nature: It's a natural phenomenon where lightning bolts illuminate the sky without producing much thunder.

Cause: Believed to be caused by the unique topography and climate of the region, where warm and moist air from the Caribbean Sea meets cold air from the Andes mountains.

Impact: Known as one of the largest generators of tropospheric ozone on Earth.

Cultural Significance: The Catatumbo Lightning is an important symbol in Venezuelan culture and has been depicted in art and literature.

Why does this happen?

We don’t know the exact sure-short reason but research papers revealed that one of the reasons could be the large amount of oil deposits here. One claimed that the large quantity of Uranium here can be another reason. And geographically the reason is pinned as the area having a hot water lake surrounded by hills on three sides. At night, when the warms water vapor evaporates and collides with cool air, this causes the lightning strike here. The indigenous people living here named it Ploi, means curiosity. They believe it to be a symbol for respecting nature.

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