--- title: Weather, lightning and storms — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Weather, lightning and storms», a lesson of the myths course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Thunder cracks over the house and Grandad pats your hand: "Don't worry, lightning never strikes the same place twice!" It's a cosy thing to sa --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Myths](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/) / Weather, lightning and storms # Weather, lightning and storms Lesson 15 of the myths course of Mova's primary school: 17 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/0/) — Thunder cracks over the house and Grandad pats your hand: "Don't worry, lightning never strikes the same place twice!" It's a cosy thing to say in a storm, and it's wrong: tall buildings like the Empire State Building are struck again and again every year. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/1/) — Weather sayings are old and many sound wise: too cold to snow, red sky at night, a wet September means a hard winter. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/2/) — Some hold a bit of truth, some none, and you can test them with a diary and old records. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/3/) — Lightning myths are the ones that matter most, because a wrong idea can put you in danger: a tree feels like shelter from rain, but trees attract lightning; lying flat feels safe, but it isn't. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/4/) — The real safety rule is simple: when thunder roars, go indoors, or into a car with a metal roof, where the electricity flows round the metal shell to the ground; the rubber tyres have nothing to do with it. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/5/) — For the fun myths, look closely: raindrops aren't teardrop-shaped, "heat lightning" is just faraway lightning, and storms are named from a list, not after people who caused them. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/6/) — Lightning often strikes the same place, especially tall things; the Empire State Building is hit about 20 to 25 times a year. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/7/) — A car with a metal roof protects you from lightning because the electricity flows around the outside metal shell to the ground; the tyres are too thin to matter. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/8/) — Lying flat on the ground in a thunderstorm makes you more exposed to current through the ground; the safest places are indoors or in a metal-roofed car. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/9/) — Sheltering under a tree in a thunderstorm is dangerous, because tall trees attract lightning. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/10/) — It can snow at very low temperatures; very cold air holds little moisture, so heavy snow is less likely, but it still snows in Antarctica at minus 40. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/11/) — "Heat lightning" is ordinary lightning too far away for its thunder to reach you; sound travels about one kilometre every three seconds. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/12/) — "Red sky at night, shepherd's delight" is partly true in places like Britain, where weather usually comes from the west, but it isn't reliable everywhere. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/13/) — Small raindrops are round, and bigger ones are flattened at the bottom like a burger bun as they fall; none is shaped like a teardrop. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/14/) — Big, complicated snowflakes are almost certainly all different, but very simple tiny crystals can look identical, and a scientist made matching ones in a lab. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/15/) — Hurricanes get names from lists made in advance by the World Meteorological Organization, to make warnings clear; the Met Office names UK storms too. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/15-weather-lightning-and-storms/17/) — A comforting saying is not a safety rule; for lightning, follow official advice such as the Met Office's. - ← previous: [The Moon, the planets and the stars](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/14-the-moon-the-planets-and-the-stars/) - next →: [Water, deserts and the shape of the land](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/16-water-deserts-and-the-shape-of-the-land/) - ↑ back to [Myths](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/myths/)