4-Steps of Lightning

Step 4: With the connecting of the Stepped Leader and the Return Stroke, electrons from the cloud flow to the ground, while positive charges from the ground discharge into the cloud. The flow of currents from the cloud to the ground now becomes visible with the Return Stroke. What is not visible to the eye is that there are many discharge strikes taking place within and during each lightning stroke. These are taking place in fractions of a second - too fast for our eye to register as individual strokes.