700-km Brazil 'megaflash' sets lightning record

The UN's weather agency announced Thursday the longest lightning bolt on record—a single flash in Brazil on October 31, 2018 that cut the sky across more than 700 kilometers.

That is equivalent to the distance between Boston and Washington DC in the United States, or between London and Basel, Switzerland, the World Meteorological Organization said in a statement.

WMO's committee of experts on weather and climate extremes also reported a new world record for the duration of a lightning flash, with a single flash that developed continuously over northern Argentina on March 4, 2019 lasting for a full 16.73 seconds.

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The UN weather agency measures lightning using satellite imagery technology

The previous record for the longest detected distance for a single lightning flash was 321 kilometers (199 miles), measured on June 20, 2007 in the US state of Oklahoma, WMO said.

The previous duration record was 7.74 seconds, measured on August 30, 2012 in southern France, it said.

Source / Image Courtesy

This GOES-16 (GOES-East) Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM) animation from October 31, 2018, shows a record-breaking lightning flash in Brazil that traveled 440 miles.

On June 25, 2020, the World Meteorological Organization certified this flash as the longest reported distance for a single flash.

A World Meteorological Organization (WMO) committee of experts has established two new world records for the longest reported distance and the longest reported duration for a single lightning flash in, respectively, Brazil and Argentina.