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9:00 am
Thu August 2, 2012

Chasing Lightning

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Credit Photo Credit © Carsten Peter
Guided by the laptop weather map reflected in his window, Tim Samaras rushes to catch up to a dying thunderstorm. He hopes to be the first to photograph the split-second event that triggers a lightning strike
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Credit Photo Credit © Carsten Peter
As he waits for a wave of thunderstorms to form along Colorado's Front Range, Samaras readies the 1,600-pound camera he calls the Kahuna.
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Credit Photo Credit © Carsten Peter
Back on the highway with the Kahuna in tow, Samaras hunts for the elusive shot. This summer he's on the chase again, with new, nimbler equipment.
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Credit Photo Credit National Geographic

Produced with Emma Ruddock

How do you capture something on film that takes place in 200 milliseconds? Answer: Not easily. For the past six years, our guest Tim Samaras has been working to capture a lightning strike in super-slow motion using a six-foot-tall, sixteen hundred pound cold war camera he calls “the Kahuna”.  Tim is an engineer with three decades of storm research under his belt. His attempts to photograph lightning are profiled by George Johnson in the latest issue of National Geographic.

All images are from the August edition of National Geographic magazine
 

Tags: 
kahuna
tim samaras
lightning
national geographic
camera

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