Characteristics of upward bipolar lightning flashes observed at the Gaisberg Tower

• We analyze current records for 21 upward initiated bipolar lightning flashes observed at the Gaisberg Tower (GBT) in Austria from 2000 to 2009. A bipolar lightning flash occurrence of 3% (21/652) is found during the 10-year observation period. Thirteen (62% or 13/21) of them occurred in nonconvective season (September-March). On the basis of the classification suggested by Rakov and Uman (2003), 13 (62%) of the 21 bipolar flashes belong to Type 1 associated with a polarity reversal during the initial stage (IS) current, five belong to Type 2 associated with different polarities of the IS current and the following return strokes, one belongs to Type 3 associated with return strokes of opposite polarity following the IS, and two of them are not assigned. We also find that the initial polarity reversal from negative to positive occurs more often (76% or 16/21) than that from positive to negative within a bipolar flash, in agreement with observations in other studies. The geometric mean (GM) and arithmetic mean (AM) of the total absolute charge transfer are 99.5 C and 125 C, with the GM and AM total flash duration of 320 ms and 396 ms, respectively. From simultaneous current and high-speed video measurements of one bipolar flash, within the field of view, the positive charge was transferred along one branch initially, followed by the negative charge transfer after cessation of the luminosity for 142 ms, while the other two branches connected to the main channel always contributed to the negative charge transfer during the whole process.

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TEKNIK OCH TEKNOLOGIER  -- Elektroteknik och elektronik (hsv//swe)

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY  -- Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering (hsv//eng)

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Electrical engineering, electronics and photonics

Elektroteknik, elektronik och fotonik

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