samba

Yes, now I think of it, the smell is too strong to be created by lightning or other random events in the cloud itself. I suppose then that the smell created by spores and organic matter as you describe would be too complex to put down to a mix of one or two chemicals. Would it be an assumption to say it was the nitrogenous ones that were the stinkiest?

Hi guys, I was wondering what is that smell before a thunderstorm comes after dry weather. Its very distinctive here in Australia in the summer. I remember hearing someone say it was actually ozone from the lightning; i'm not very familiar with the smell of ozone. However it could be that as I've smelt it from storms that aren't actually raining much, or are only raining far away, and furthermore the smell seems to lessen once the storm has passed or it begins to rain heavily, which seems to suggest it is produced inside the cloud itself. At it's strongest it is a smell that's reminiscent of urine(!) which is why I had originally thought it could be water+organics in soil (urea, ammonia?). I was just reading the very interesting thread ongood and bad chemical smells and would have added to it with this question, but thought it was a bit off topic. thanks! samba