Easy Way to Figure Out How Far Away Lighting Is

To find out how far away lighting is, you simply count the number of seconds that pass between the flash of lightning and the sound of thunder and then divide that number by 5. This works because light travel so fast that you see the lightning nearly exactly when it happens. Sound however travels much more slowly – about 1000 feet per second. That means it takes lightning about 5 seconds to travel 1 mile. So if you count to 5 then lightning is 1 mile away. If you count to 10 lightning is 2 miles away.