If lightning hits beach sand will it make glass?

Question

just wondering - can this happen like in the movie Sweet Home Alabama?

Answer 1

It can make glass to a certain extent.  It won't be the type of glass that's usable in glasses, jars, and windows, but it will be a form of it.

Answer 2

Yes it does happen. It's pretty cool.

Answer 3

No.  but it will burn those beach apes.

Answer 4

sure can u just gotta dig it up

Answer 5

no it can not becouse in order for it to smelt into glass it need to  be compressed, and the heat that comes down from a lightning bolt is not absorbed by the sand it is really spread out through the whole beach, and the heat needs to be consitent at a foucle point

Answer 6

Yes it does cause it crystalizes the sand and is very beautiful.

I say this cause i have a few you just have to dig after it cools for a while.

Answer 7

I don't think so but i never saw that movie before?

Answer 8

ya it does it is a proven fact it happens whent the sand gets superheated

your welcome

Answer 9

http://www.amnh.org/learn/musings/SP01/h...

Answer 10

Well that's how they make glass, so yes, it can happen.  Obviously they don't make it with lightning but by heating it up to high temperatures, and that's what a lightning strike would do.

Answer 11

You need a sustained heat, otherwise the energy will disperse too quickly. You also need some other ingrediants. Sand wont turn to glass under heat, you need some other stuff as well.

Answer 12

It can.  It makes a special type called Fulgurites.  Some are very interesting.  In fact, there are artists who cause lightning to hit certain materials to make custom fulgurites.  To make the lightning hit where they want they use model rockets with trailing wires.

You can even buy them on Ebay.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Lightning-Glass-rod-...

Answer 13

Surprisingly, yes.  Sand and glass are both made of the same chemical: silicon dioxide.  In sand, the silicon and oxygen atoms have a very neat, orderly arrangement.  When silicon dioxide has this neat arrangement, it is called quartz.  Sand is simply ground-up bits of quartz.

When quartz is melted, its silicon and oxygen atoms get out of their orderly arrangement.  If you cool the resulting liquid fast enough, the atoms don't have time to snap back into place before the material solidifies.  The result is glass.  Glass is also make of silicon and oxygen atoms, but unlike quartz, it lacks the regular atomic arrangement.

When lightning strikes the sand, it quickly melts the silica.  If it cools quickly enough, it forms amorphous glass rather than crystalline quartz.  I hope that helps.  Good luck!

Natural glass is different from commercial glass, however.  In addition to disorderered silica, commercial glass contains a host of intentionally-added impurities to give it strength or color.  It is carefully made under controlled conditions because glassmakers are interested in uniformity.

Answer 14

It can, but I don't know that it happens every time.

But yeah, it's a real phenomenon.