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Re: Ball Lightning (was Hi All)

From: "Steve Young" <youngs-at-konnections-dot-com>

As many of you know, Robert K. Golka has probably invested more time and
money to generate ball lightning than any other person.  His huge tesla
coil in an airplane hanger at Wendover Air Force Base allegedly did succeed
in producing ball lightning.  Quoting from an old newspaper article Golka
generated "bead lightning inside a lightning discharge channel opening off
his large Tesla coil at Wendover.  At that time, a moving film showed the
beads, which lasted only a tenth of a second."  Then he had rental problems
with the Air Force and had to abandon the effort.  See also the June 1976
edition of Radio-Electronics magazine for another writeup and pictures.

The next attempt by Golka is really amazing, and may relate to the
Discoverer channel show.  I will quote excerpts from the newpaper article
again.  "'I was working on a high-current plasma experiment, using a diesel
locomotive from the Boston-Maine Railroad.'  The railroad let him borrow
two locomotives, a string of boxcars and a mile and a half of track.  He
used one locomotive as a giant moving generator and created ball lightning
in the cab when he threw a circuit breaker.  'From one engine I was able to
develop over a million watts of power', he said.  Golka also borrowed two
circuit breakers from a naval yard which came off a World War II submarine.
 One was mounted on the floor of the locomotive cab.  'I did form a
fireball once.'  For a second and a half, the fireball glowed before him. 
'It goes off quickly enough that it's almost like an explosion.  It was
white.  It was very bright.  It was about 10 inches across.  The circuit
breaker was on the floor of the cab of the engine, and it came up about
three feet.  It kind of spattered apart; it blew apart.  The locomotive was
reacting to this, kind of violently jumping around or moving around...the
wheels would kind of stop momentarily.'  He was able to take a picture of
the ball lightning.  His photo shows the ball lightning about to blow
apart.  Plasma is shooting out of the bottom, but the top is still
spherical and stable."

Wow!  Golka must have been one gutsy guy to throw a short across a megawatt
generator, holding onto a camera to take a picture while also being careful
to not run the train off the end of the track!  Has anyone heard of any
further experiments by Golka?

As a side note (Chip, please have patience), I work at Hill Air Force Base
which has a giant Radiographic (X-ray) facility for X-raying ICBM rocket
engines.  Quoting EDN magazine, April 20 1976, "The accidental formation of
ball lightning has been observed about once per year for the past decade
inside.  The volleyball-size fireballs drop out of the space adjacent to
the high voltage supply of the 25 Mev linear accelerator.  The ball of blue
fire floats down to the floor, rolls around randomly and then rises again
to the power-supply area where it dissipates without detectable damage. 
Despite troubleshooting, no explanation can be found for this occurrence." 
(I haven't been inside the building yet--hope to someday.)   

We have a lot to learn about such interesting phenomena.  Bring on the dual
TCs!

--Steve Young

> >
> >I saw an old gent on the "Discover" channel who was doing it by shorting
> >out a bank of submarine batteries.  Not too much voltage, but
unspeakable
> >current.  It made coin-size glowing orbs that the old timer claimed was
> >ball lightning.  Not nearly as interesting as the dual Tesla coil idea
> >though.
> >
> >Greg