A bolt of lightning that stretched nearly 500 miles across three states is the new record holder for longest flash. The World Meteorological Organization on Monday announced that a single bolt in 2020 stretched for 477 miles across Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. A few months later, a lightning megaflash in Uruguay and Argentina lasted 17 seconds, beating the old record for longest time. Both flashes were cloud-to-cloud so no one was in danger. They were spotted by satellite. Normally, lightning flashes last less than a second and don’t stretch more than 10 miles.
Longest lightning bolt record: 477 miles over 3 states
