Shot from the abandoned Salton Sea Naval Station / Test Base on Thursday October 3, 2018 from 7:27 PM through 8:45 PM.

When I arrived, the thunderstorms were in Calipatria / Slab City and then they gradually worked their way north and east to somewhere Desert Center, Joshua Tree, and then Twentynine Palms. This the best lightning I've seen this year - and it's even past monsoon season.

Lighting is so very rare in San Diego County where I live, so I'm always eager to shoot it. I grew up in northern Illinois where epic thunderstorms were very frequent events in the summertime, but moved to San Diego County in the late 1980's.

Prior to these storms beginning, they weren't hyped up by the news or weather forecasters. I had been keeping my eyes on the radar all afternoon and knew something was likely to happen by early evening. Being that I had to drive a ways down a dirt/sand/clay wash, I had to be ready to leave quickly should there be any substantial rainfall and resulting flash floods. While I was here, there wasn't a single drop of rain.

I shot three sequences totaling 755 frames each shot at 3 sec f/2.8 ISO 2000 with a Canon 6D and Canon "Nifty Fifty" 50mm lens.

The structures seen in the foreground are what remains of the decommissioned Salton Sea Naval Station / Test Base.