Question

Lightning strikes only on high rise buildings. Explain it.

Answer 1

Hint:Lightning strikes the high rise building due to the shorter distance between clouds and the high rising building. The lightning rods present at the top of the high buildings are very good conductors and conduct the lightning through heavy wiring to the ground without damaging the building.

Complete step by step answer:
Lightning strikes the high rising building due to the short distance between positively charged top of the building and the negatively charged layer of cloud. Also the lightning rod installed at the top of high buildings is made up of metal and is a very good conductor. This causes lightning to preferentially hit the lightning rod over the other structures which are made up of wood or concrete which are generally bad conductors. These buildings are heavily wired so as to conduct the lightning to the ground directly without damaging the building.

Additional information:
We may define lightning as naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electrically charged regions in the atmosphere or ground temporarily equalize themselves, causing the instantaneous release of as much as one gigajoule of energy. A single stroke of lightning can heat the air around it to 30,000°C (54,000°F). Due to opposite charge interaction the negative layer at the lower part of the cloud gets interacted towards the positively charged earth surface causing lighting.

Note:The surrounding buildings are not likely immune to lightning. However it is the good conductivity of the lightning rod that attracts the lightning towards itself and thus protecting the building from damage.