Reply #4: I saw St. Elmo's Fire once

[Dr Batsen D Belfry]

when lightning hit the flagpole outside a dorm when I went to college. It just glowed blue on top for a while. It was pretty cool.

I got my appreciation for lightning a few years later though. I was an RA in college and had to respond to a fire alarm in the furthest building from the office during a thunderstorm. I ran my ass off across the 150 yards to get to that building, and just shy of 75 yards, I heard this crackling sound and all the hair on my body stood on end. I dove under the footbridge that went over the creek bed just as the lightning hit.

It looked like billions of fireflies floating around me


DBDB