Apparent ball lighting Rich Valley Alberta Canada

[jarlrmai]

I saw this video recently


Source: https://youtu.be/mmOfwFHBu_o?si=5LT6A3J-PdicUN5M


https://globalnews.ca/news/11272805/alberta-storm-lightning-ball-video-july/

An Alberta couple captured something on camera Wednesday evening that they can't explain. But they believe it could be a rare weather phenomenon called ball lightning.

"After a rather vicious lightning strike, we saw a ball of fire kind of … about 20 feet above the ground," Ed Pardy recalled. "And it kind of stayed there in a big round ball."

Global News showed the video to Frank Florian, senior manager of planetarium and space sciences at the TELUS World of Science in Edmonton.

He described it as "an incredible video" of something "very strange associated with severe weather conditions."

He said he believes it is possible the Pardys saw ball lightning.

"It could be ball lightning or it could be something that's more of an artifact of a lightning strike itself," he explained, adding that some scientists are researching the phenomenon of ball lightning and trying to recreate such events in laboratory settings.

 

[John J.]

Thanks @jarlrmai, I think that's really interesting.

Must admit, before finding Metabunk I thought ball lightning was a rare but "accepted" phenomenon; it's only after reading posts here that I realised the evidence is not conclusive.

There's a thread here, When Ball Lightning Isn't Ball Lightning.

I guess the leading non-ball lightning explanation might be a brilliant artificial lightsource, e.g. a searchlight(s) or similar mounted on a truck. (I'm hoping someone's checked that there isn't a sports ground with floodlights out there ).

I think the light moves a little from left to right, roughly horizontally- Mr Pardy said it moved horizontally- but I'm not sure.

The single roughly round* light seems to become irregular in shape and then become 3 smaller lightsources before vanishing.
Screen snips from approx. 0 mins 32 seconds into the video:

I'm a bit surprised there's no mention of anyone investigating the ground along the estimated path of the light, or at least the place where it vanished. If it was ball lightning, any physical evidence left on the landscape would be cool.

* I first put "spherical" but of course we don't know that.

 

[jarlrmai]

I noticed the way it becomes 3 lights as it fades as well my thoughts were possible farm equipment or electrical infrastructure.

I tried to geolocate it but have not been successful yet, there's no address I can find for the observers and the location in the video lacks any significant features that might help. We do have more skilled geolocaters than me here though that might get something.

But yes I would also assume someone would try to visit or follow up on the site it was seen, especially the science group that was contacted.

 

[Edward Current]

This seems to not be consistent with descriptions of ball lightning (Wikipedia):

• Their diameters range from 1–100 cm (0.4–40 inches), most commonly 10–20 cm (4–8 inches)
• Their brightness corresponds to roughly that of a domestic lamp, so they can be seen clearly in daylight
• A wide range of colors has been observed, with red, orange, and yellow being the most common

This thing appears to be on the order of 20 meters or more in diameter (if it's 1km away as described), much much brighter than a "domestic lamp" (illuminating a large area of the ground), and white.

If I had to guess, I'd say electrical infrastructure. It has the brightness and color of high-power arcing, even though it's not flashing like a typical transformer malfunction. Maybe something like the lightning bolt struck high-voltage power lines causing them to short in an unusual and long-lasting manner.

Note the similarity to this one from the other thread, which more clearly starts with a transfromer getting blown:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hvajvgj16dg

 

[anonymoose65]

I think this was filmed at 53.849934, -114.348409

Boat and other objects lined up parallel to the fence and what looks like it could be a hot tub in the back as well

Street view on the highway shows us a similar patch of trees, notably the few taller ones in the middle and then the tapering out towards the end with a break that we also see in the video

Looks like it was probably just in the field over there

 

[jarlrmai]

I am getting nowhere with geolocation, I think the town is Barrhead AB Canada based on web searches but finding something that featureless is hard.

 

[Ann K]

I guess the leading non-ball lightning explanation might be a brilliant artificial lightsource, e.g. a searchlight(s) or similar mounted on a truck.

I have seen burning or exploding transformers during severe thunderstorms which emitted a brilliant light. That doesn't explain close-up moving balls of light, of course, but power line transformers were my first thought when I looked at the video in the OP.

Edit - My apologies to @Edward Current : I posted this before I had read down to his excellent post.

 

[Matt33]

When you drive North a little bit from that house via Street View you have a clear view. There are some distinct landscape features that help to locate the light. In the Street View photo there are very faint electricity poles in that direction. The building on the corner is a water truck fill station. I guess it's the pole at that station that lit up. The three lights may have something to do with three wires and/or insulators on the poles.

 

[Matt33]

There might have been such a distribution transformator for the water fill station. Street View photo from that road.

 

[jarlrmai]

Annoyingly there is no street view but I setup google earth with some polygons for the poles along Township Road 564 and they seem to match for the location of the lights.

I also emailed the journalist

https://globalnews.ca/author/phil-heidenreich/

To see if there can be a follow-up with the electrical firm or even a visit to the road to check for transformers.

 

[owntheissue]

The three lights may have something to do with three wires and/or insulators on the poles.

Very likely.

As per other comments- I find the distinct lack of mainstream scientific research in this area weird.
My knowledge of Ball Lightning was almost solely based on the UK's Condign Report for years.

Given Condigns allusion to existing and future "novel millitary applications" relating to such phenomena - I do wonder if adjacent (classified) activities might be where all the knowledge is silo'd?

 

[JMartJr]

As per other comments- I find the distinct lack of mainstream scientific research in this area weird.

Yes, but the study of transient, rare phenomena is not easy.

I guess the leading non-ball lightning explanation might be a brilliant artificial lightsource, e.g. a searchlight(s) or similar mounted on a truck.

Farm equipment that works at night will have very bright headlights/worklights. This video is, of course, not at night, but the ecxstence of farm equipment out in a field which is equipped with very bright lights would be normal:


Source: https://youtu.be/Uiu7dEfouXw?t=121



Source: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/7v6bal140uQ?feature=share



Source: https://youtu.be/HGED_EszhPI?t=9

 

[Matt33]

In the video there is a part at 00:26 where they zoomed in on the light. You can see some lights flying around. Maybe those are internal reflections in combination with the built in image stabilization of the smartphone? The dots appear to be two, or three, might be doubled reflections in the camera lens. Or could it be the big light, which gets overexposed, but is in fact two (or three) sparks? Just a vague guess.

 

[Ann K]

I find the distinct lack of mainstream scientific research in this area weird.

A search of "Ball lightning research" gives me page after page of articles. But, as it's a phenomenon both extremely rare and transient, it's difficult to understand how natural ball lightning could be studied directly, so creating similar phenomena in the lab would seem to be their only probable course. There's plenty of public research available, so an unknown number of possible studies held by governments should not be inferred out of ignorance. Please, don't invent conspiracy theories out of something that is completely unknown.

 

[jarlrmai]

In the video there is a part at 00:26 where they zoomed in on the light. You can see some lights flying around. Maybe those are internal reflections in combination with the built in image stabilization of the smartphone? The dots appear to be two, or three, might be doubled reflections in the camera lens. Or could it be the big light, which gets overexposed, but is in fact two (or three) sparks? Just a vague guess.
View attachment 82221

They look like destabilised internal reflections to me, the phone stabilization works for the scene, but in doing so it has the opposite effect on the reflections, it could also be taken though a window, with a similar effect.

 

[Mick West]

They look like destabilised internal reflections to me, the phone stabilization works for the scene, but in doing so it has the opposite effect on the reflections, it could also be taken though a window, with a similar effect.

You would not get destabilization through a window. I'm pretty sure this is a sensor reflection.

 

[Mick West]

This is a better report, with a better quality video

https://www.ctvnews.ca/video/2025/0...of-a-rare-phenomenon-taken-by-alberta-couple/

At 1:28, George Kourounis points at the reflection while suggesting it's a traveling arc on a power line. I think he is correct.

 

[jarlrmai]

This is a better report, with a better quality video

View attachment 82222
https://www.ctvnews.ca/video/2025/0...of-a-rare-phenomenon-taken-by-alberta-couple/

At 1:28, George Kourounis points at the reflection while suggesting it's a traveling arc on a power line. I think he is correct.

View attachment 82223

That fits with the movement we see.

 

[Matt33]

The reflections fly all over the place, sometimes even over the meadow in the foreground.

 

[jarlrmai]

The reflections fly all over the place, sometimes even over the meadow in the foreground.

Indeed, we've seen it before with stabilised phone footage

https://www.metabunk.org/threads/de...ctions-squiggly-lines-and-dancing-dots.12802/

 

[Ravi]

At 1:28, George Kourounis points at the reflection while suggesting it's a traveling arc on a power line. I think he is correct.

I think so too. Similar purple-blueish colour of the arc (ionised air) in the video is seen in other videos of power lines and/or exploding transformers etc.

 

[Mauro]

This is a better report, with a better quality video

At 1:28, George Kourounis points at the reflection while suggesting it's a traveling arc on a power line. I think he is correct.

Googling for 'traveling arc on power line' finds this:

 

[Edward Current]

So, the apparent size of the "ball" is due to glare, yeah? It would be interesting to know what the witnesses saw. To the naked eye I would expect it to appear smaller (perhaps even point-source-like), and of course much brighter, whereas on camera it's just blown-out white with considerable bleed at the sensor.

 

[Mick West]

Another example, on lager wires.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yBTHrXEK4U


This one travels a long way
(Watch on YouTube only)
Source: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/97hcMifkMJg?feature=share

 

[Mick West]

Sitrec recreation. The arc here is moving about 20 mph (very rough match, might be a bit less)

https://www.metabunk.org/sitrec/?custom=https://sitrec.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/1/Ball Lightning/20250705_205230.js

 

[Matt33]

Sitrec recreation.

Trump speaking in the audio track?

 

[Mick West]

Trump speaking in the audio track?

oops, I must have had the volume down, and was recording audio.

 

[Mick West]

Removed the unfortunate audio!

 

[John J.]

My knowledge of Ball Lightning was almost solely based on the UK's Condign Report for years.

I wouldn't put too much weight on the Condign project's findings

Quick notes on Project Condign...
it concluded that black triangles and other UAP might be caused by (naturally formed) areas of "buoyant plasma". The blackness is caused by refraction of light; as with some other claims and suppositions in the report, no convincing scientific evidence for this is presented.

Due to the secret nature of the report, it was apparently not subject to peer review, and it has been suggested that the "buoyant plasma" hypothesis would not have withstood independent scrutiny

Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Condign

There are some indications that the authors- or possibly author- were not scientists familiar with atmospheric phenomena, which must seriously impact how their startling conclusions are viewed; as early as page 7 we have this awkward wording

Considerable evidence exists to support the thesis that the events are almost certainly attributable to physical , electrical and magnetic phenomena in the atmosphere, mesosphere and ionosphere.

Awkward, because the mesosphere and ionosphere are included in the term "atmosphere". We might charitably think the author(s) meant "...in the atmosphere, in the mesosphere and ionosphere" but we'd be wrong; the authors discuss the risks of aircraft collisions with buoyant plasmas, advising fighters shouldn't pull hard manoeuvres in attempts to intercept them and, though risk might be low, pilots should try to keep the UAP aft if spotted. However, the Mesosphere is far above the operating altitudes of jet fighters and airliners. There is no indication, AFAIK, that the report's air safety advice was forwarded to pilots or otherwise acted upon.

A bit like British Rail's 1973 design for a thermonuclear propelled flying saucer, my biggest takeaways from Condign are (1) even apparently staid public bodies/ government departments sometimes consider dramatically "out there" ideas, which is very different to how they're characterised by UFO enthusiasts, and (2) when they do, they might benefit from liaising more with relevant domain experts- physicists and nuclear engineers in the case of British Rail; meteorologists, physicists, pilots and aerospace engineers re. the Condign author(s).
-Maybe even sceptical followers of the UFO scene could have had a useful input in the Condign case, as the author(s) assumed that huge flying black triangles (as per the Belgian reported sightings of 1989-1990, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_UFO_wave) were an objectively real, demonstrated phenomenon.