Lightning and thunderstorms have no relation.
 Many other observational variants are recognized, including "heat lightning", which can be seen from a great distance but not heard; dry lightning, which can cause forest fires; and ball lightning, which is rarely observed scientifically
=== Lightning and climate change ===Due to the low resolution of global climate models, accurately representing lightning in these climate models is difficult, largely due to their inability to simulate the convection and cloud ice imperative which are fundamental to lightning formation

