Ball Lightning

Approaching St. Luis, heading west, I was caught in the worst storm I

had ever experienced while driving. Rain buffeted from every side and the

small minivan I drove shuddered and jumped with the wind. Visibility was

intermittent and lightning pounded into the ground, lighting up the sky with

disturbing regularity.

Nearer the city, the rain started to lessen and the worst seemed to be

past, but I was still driving slowly just to be safe. Then, as if an after thought of the storm spirits, a
lightning bolt struck a large tree, to the left of the highway.

The poor tree cracked and embers jumped from the smoldering wood. But in

the center of the twisted limbs, a ball of energy formed. The Ball Lightning

floated free of the timber, burning branches as it went. It was difficult to tell

how big the ball was, because the light was brighter than any local

phenomenon of the town.

I almost knew what was going to happen next, like deja- vu you can't

quite shake. The ball sped up, flying faster in the air and heading toward a

dark structure. Sparks began to shoot off the floating energy and jump to

wires. The structure was an electrical substation, with transformers the size of my van.

The ball hit one of the transformers and disappeared inside. All was

dark for a moment but for the street lights and the headlights of a few cars.

Then a glow came from the transformer and a lightning bolt shot out of the

top and launched itself skyward. The transformer blew up (Okay, maybe just
the top blew off) with metal or sparks flying, even out into the road. At that moment, the neighborhood
was plunged into darkness. Quite shaken, I drove

on into the night, and did not stop until the far side of St Luis.

Ball Lightning, by many accounts, appears to be intelligent at times. For

me and our work in the fields of Aether, all energy is intelligent to some

extent or another, lightning being no different. The difference would be, as

with most things, on a continuum. A continuum with high level

consciousness at one end and instinctual consciousness at the other.

Perhaps another story in is order.

A couple of years back an experiment was tried combining Tesla

technology and the power of the sun with the desired outcome of Alchemy.

And this is the stuff that dreams and nightmares are made of, yes?

Using a 32 foot parabolic satellite receiver dish, the goal was to

concentrate the light of the sun into a focused beam. Well, beam is a

misnomer. The light would be less a beam and more akin to a super heated

ball, suspended in the air. The wave guide and support struts were removed

and the entire concave surface of the dish was covered with reflective foil.

(Classified material accidentally supplied by 3M, but that's another story.)

Once the surface was covered with the foil, the dish was aimed at the

sun. Using a long rod, with a piece of cardboard attached to the end, the

perimeter of the focal point was established to be about a foot in diameter.

Using a steel rod, the most intense point of the heat was found to be about a

sphere of two or three inches in diameter. A 1 inch metal rod was moved

through the focal point and it melted like a stick of butter. Imagine that: a

three inch super heated sphere that reaches beyond 3000 degrees. And that is just from the sun, so its
free energy, in the extreme.

On that note: It has been shown that if 187 square miles of the Arizona

desert were converted to harness the light of the sun, using solar heat

collectors rather than photovoltaics, the energy could be stored in thermal

batteries rather than as electricity. By day and night, the energy would be

converted to low pressure steam and generate transmittable energy as AC

electricity. For the cost of36 billion dollars, and 6 years worth of work, the

US could be completely energy independent for the next 50 years and never

have to run a nuclear power plant or burn another piece of coal. Just food for

thought.

Back to the solar alchemy experiment.

An apparatus like a conveyer was set up to drop copper ore through the

focal point, through the 3000+ degree heat zone. The melted ore would then

be collected in a large crucible. This alone was a pretty ingenious way to melt

ore without the need for external fuel or electricity.

The Tesla technology added to this process came in the form of a giant

Tesla coil. Perhaps giant is too grandiose, but is was large. The primary was 7

feet in diameter and shaped from one inch copper tubing, so water could be

pumped through, for cooling. The secondary was about 4 feet across and 8

feet tall, made from 20 gauge wire. And the tertiary peaked out at nearly 12

feet tall with 30 gauge wire. The primary was driven by a 440 volt gen-set

and the tertiary produced huge sparks. Those sparks are channeled to carbon
electrodes two inches in diameter, which were placed outside the large heat

bubble. When the whole apparatus was activated, the Tesla coil discharge

sparked through the solar focal point and right through the stream of ore.

On experiment day, the sun shone brightly and not a cloud graced the

sky. The process_ started up as planned. The ore was melted instantly and

collected in the cn1cible as planned and the arc looked like a sparkler display as

it ignited the stream. That is when the strangeness began.

The light, both reflected sunlight from the ore and the light from the

arc, intensified suddenly. Brighter and brighter. There was a sound,

somewhere between a pop and a snap. The arc, looking vaguely like a

lightning bolt, seemed to coalesce into a glowing sphere. A ball oflightning.

The ball jumped out of the stream of ore and the focal point of light,

taking on a life of its own. Hovering in the air above the assembly, the ball

wavered then seemed to draw more light from the still running arc. If you

blinked you would have missed it; the ball shot from its origination above the

dish and punched right through the concrete wall of the chemical laboratory.

Someone had the presence of mind to shut off the system and rotate the dish

away from the sun.

Inside the lab, we could hear the crashing and glass breaking, But no

one was crazy enough to go inside. Looking through the window, you could

see the ball lightning zipping around the room, destroying glass wear and then

jumping to the other side to do the same again. After a short time that seemed

like forever, the ball oflight stopped in nearly the center of the room and

wavered again, before finally fading from existence. Upon entering the small
building, it was readily apparent that every piece of glass in the entire lab had

been destroyed. Thousands of dollars worth oflab-ware was now in pieces no

bigger than a 50 cent coin.

Fast forward a few weeks and the project was ready to go again. After

all, ball lightning is a freak occurrence, right?

The process started up as expected, with ore falling through the arc and

the focal point of sun and molten globs of metal collecting in the crucible.

The sparkler show started and the expected alchemical transformation was

under way. And just as before, the light began to intensify and then the Pop.

The energy ball jumped out of the stream and hovered for a moment.

Someone shut off the Tesla coil and the ore conveyer but as the last few

discharges sparked across the gap, the ball of lightning seemed to gather them

into itself With a slight waver in the air, the ball began to move in a slow

circle and then shot towards the still running generator. Through the housing

and into windings. Sparks flew and it ran faster, then slower as the metal

began to heat and smoke. As quickly as it started, the gen-set seized and more

sparks shot out as the windings melted into the stator and the frame. We

thought it was over.

The ball lightning, which we thought was gone for good, rose out of

the generator and hovered for a moment. Everyone held their breath. The

ball of energy shot through the air and hit a round power transformer hanging

on a power pole. The transformer popped and sparks ejected from the top. A

stream of energy flowed from the gray frame, spreading to the power lines,

seeming to draw energy from the grid itself Another pop and the energy
flashed. For a quarter mile in each direction, shiny copper gleamed on the

power lines.