Ball lightning is one of the most mysterious phenomena in nature. Now scientists from the University of Tel Aviv in Israel have created a laboratory version of the eerie floating orbs using technology taken from a common microwave oven.

The work could help scientists figure out how the lightning forms in nature and lead to practical applications that harness its power.

Read more... (MSNBC)

This is too bad ***! Now it's only a matter of time before the good ol' US of A develops this into some really awesome weapons technology. And on marches the legacy of N. Tesla.

It was already revealed many decades ago
that a ball lightning is stabilized by
circular magnetic fields in the three
axes.

Previous attempts failed to create large
ball lightnings because of instability
or even lack of the fields in all axes.

It should be possible to create really
large ones by using tri-axial microwaves.

Weaponization, however, is impossible:
It literally gets blown-away by winds,
which is why poison gas used in World War
I was not very effective in kill ratio,
although it served as a psychological
weapon.

Once the protective fields destabilize,
it can explode with a bang.

If some way to stabilize it can be found,
then it'll make an interesting power
storage system that weighs almost nothing,
which is just the car to replace the
hybrid electric and the hydrogen battery
car.

Not that I know of any footage, I have read many accounts of ball lightning occurring naturally. The are reports of balls entering aeroplanes through the side of the fuselage hovering around a bit and then floating off. This would suggest that there is little interaction with ungrounded items however near earth this could be dangerous.
Have we ever had a discussion about positive leaders? My nutty friend reckons it's a proton beam.

You wanna make ball lightning with a microwave? take a tea light candle take the wick and the metal piece off the bottom and replace the wick with a toothpick light the toothpick and then stick the still burning candle into the microwave on full power for about 45 seconds and you'll see plenty of ball lightning.

yeah, this is old news...there was some internet discussion years ago, I'm sure it's still archived, of a guy who created plamoids, as he called them, in his microwave. I looked into it and university labs have been doing the same thing. How is this news?

This isn't news.

This guy has been doing it for quite some time:

http://jlnlabs.online.fr/plasma/gmr/

It's easy.