Satellite lightning detectors show that over the entire Earth lightning strikes about 45 times each second, or 1.5 billion strikes each year. In the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa every year each square mile, on average, has some 200 lightning strikes. A section of Florida known as “lightning alley” is a 60-mile wide hot-spot of lightning activity in the United States. On average there are 50 lightning strikes in each square mile per year.