Recently I wondered why the Niagara waterfall ruined my photo on my iPhone and what caused the strong noise in the video. I had two theories: the obvious one (sunlight and reflections) and static electricity from the falling/flying droplets.
The first theory is straightforward and not very intriguing. As for the static electricity… I’ve discovered something relevant that brought me closer to the truth 🙂
http://glossary.ametsoc.org/wiki/Breaking-drop_theory
“The fact that an exceptionally large amount of anions (negative ions) are found under waterfalls and at the seaside was established by the German physicist Philipp Eduard Anton von Lenard (Lénárd Fülöp in Hungarian, June 7, 1862 – May 20, 1947), who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1905 for his research on cathode rays and the discovery of many of their properties.
Lenard Effect: The separation of electric charges that occurs during the aerodynamic breakup of water drops, initially studied systematically by the German physicist P. Lenard. Experiments have shown that the degree of charge separation in spray processes depends on the drop temperature, presence of dissolved impurities, speed of the impinging air blast, and contact with foreign surfaces. It is observed that the largest fragments of the broken drops carry positive charges (cations), while the fine spray of drops carried off in the air current carries net negative charges (anions).”
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 