Decades later, this is still one of my all-time personal favorites, mainly because of the variety of lightning on display: a split-channel CG strike, along with a mixture of connected and disconnected “anvil crawlers.” These natural pyrotechnics blazed through a region of light rain trailing a mesoscale convective system (MCS), which was moving SSE away from the scene. There is no place better than the central U.S. Plains for photographing “anvil crawlers“, because of the frequency of MCSs, and the lack of visibility obstruction by haze, low clouds, trees and terrain. No photograph can possibly capture the spectacular majesty of lightning filaments branching across the sky in every direction, but this Ektachrome slide came close.
Norman OK (1 Sep 89) Looking S
35.2074, -97.4387