7,000 lightning strikes in Hanoi in three hours

Hoang Duc Cuong, deputy head of the Vietnam Meteorological and Hydrological Administration, said that at around 6-7 a.m., over 3,500 lightning bolts formed over the sky of Hanoi, with 2,300 connecting with the ground. The following hour, 2,900 struck the ground, and at 8-9 a.m., around 1,800 hit the ground.

On average, 470 lightning bolts connected with the ground every 10 minutes during the downpours in Hanoi Wednesday morning. The lightning bolts struck most frequently during the 7:40-8:50 a.m. time frame, especially in areas over Thuong Tin, Phu Xuyen, Thanh Oai and Ung Hoa.

"Not all lightning affects the ground; depending on their intensity, the bolts can affect infrastructure, the power grid, or living things differently," Cuong said.

In the morning, a 30-year-old woman in Thanh Tri District was struck by lightning while harvesting vegetables out in the field. She was taken to a hospital in critical condition.

Compared to recent thunderstorms in northern Vietnam, the number of lightning bolts in the Wednesday morning downpour was not unusual, said Nguyen Duc Phuong, head of the weather radar department under the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Network.

Most recently on May 19, over 107,000 lightning bolts were seen over the skies of northern Vietnam plains between 3-6 p.m., with 40,000 of them striking the ground.

Cuong said Vietnam is within an Asian region with frequent lightning activities, and the country receives around 2 million lightning strikes every year. Lightning strikes more frequently in mountainous regions, the midlands in the north and the plains in the south.

Northern Vietnam is expected to see more rain until Thursday, before lessening from Friday.