Amazingly enough, a friend and I were talking about very odd weather in our areas just last week. He lives in Reno and I am about three or four hours north of him, in Oregon. Back in the summer of 2003, I had seen four mid-air plasma balls during a huge thunderstorm. I had even spoken to a meteorologist friend who worked for ABC Medford (Oregon) after the storm passed by, who told me I had seen a very rare event. I only wish I had video.
What had happened was a bunch of thunderstorms had merged in to a super-cell and according to radar, was moving north and would pass through the valley I live in. As I was home anyway, decided to go upstairs to view the approaching storm. My home sits up a bit higher than the rest of town so I get a good view of storms coming up the valley.
As the storm arrived, the late afternoon light went to pitch black night. Lightning, thunder, lots of rain, wind, typical thunderstorm. But then I saw a ball appear in mid-air, maybe eight blocks south of me. It floated there for I have no idea how long, seconds. I did see colors on it of white, yellow, blue. Then it exploded with a huge noise. It sounded like a bomb, not a lightning crack, and it shook the house.
I have seen a lot of goofy storms over the years but never a ball of lightning in mid-air that exploded. Over the next few hours, saw three more balls, though much farther south, all of which exploded. After the storm was over, I called the friend who worked for ABC News and found out just what I had seen.