According to Channel 2 Action News Chief Meteorologist Glenn Burns, Atlanta had more than 1,000 lightning strikes in a 15-minute period around 5:30 p.m. For the rest of the evening, lightning averaged between 800 and 900 strikes every 15 minutes.

"This happens every July, but this type of lightning is very, very powerful and very dangerous," Burns said. "Heat and humidity drive these storms up to 50,000 feet into the atmosphere and the hail and ice bump into each other creating a lot of static electricity."

Burns said Monday's lightning was 1,000 times more powerful than typical lightning.

"There are about one million volts in negative lightning, there are over one billion in positive lightning," he said.

"Positive lightning comes from the top of the cloud and hits the ground," Burns explained, "while negative lightning works within the cloud, or transfers cloud-to-cloud."

Burns also said Monday's powerful lightning causes more fires because it can travel "tremendous distances."

Indeed, Monday's storms had fire departments responding across the metro area. In Cobb County, there were three reported house fires due to lightning by 8 p.m. There were no injuries in those fires. Gwinnett County reported 14 house fires, two apartment fires and a business fire, where a firefighter was injured and taken to the hospital for overexertion. In Johns Creek, three residence fires were caused by lightning, with no injuries reported.

Heavy storms and lightning caused both Delta Air Lines and Airtran Airways to cancel some flights Monday night, officials said.

A spokeswoman from Delta said it had to cancel approximately 30 flights. An Airtran spokeswoman said the airline had to cancel five flights.

Nearly all flights to and from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport were delayed between 4 and 8 p.m., officials said.

Kathleen Bergen, spokeswoman for the Federal Aviation Administration Southern Region, said at 8:25 p.m. Monday, all flights headed to Atlanta were delayed by 3 hours and 18 minutes. All departing flights from Hartsfield were experiencing 2 hour and 15 minute departure delays.

The storms appeared to be mostly stationary, Burns said.

"There may be a slight eastward drift at 1 or 2 mph," Burns said, "which is why we're getting the localized street flooding."

Storms will continue through the evening, ending by midnight, he said.

But ... "they will return every day this week with more of the same."

The storms caused approximately 6,100 Georgia Power customers to be without power Monday night, a spokesman said.

Approximately 3,500 of those outages were in the metro area, Georgia Power spokesman Mark Williams said.

The most pervasive outages were in Henry and Gwinnett counties.

Whenever Georgia experiences heavy storms, Williams said power outages take place for multiple reasons.

“Tree limbs hit power lines, lightning can strike transformers, it’s just a matter of figuring out the cause before we can get it back on,” Williams said.

Metro Atlanta has seen three deaths caused by lightning this summer; all victims were teens.

On July 13, two teenage girls were struck in an Austell apartment complex. One was pronounced dead at Grady Hospital, the other died eight days later from her injuries.

On July 30, two teens were holding hands under a tree at a residence in Henry County. One teen was holding on to a tree branch and died of cardiac arrest when lightning struck the sidewalk in front of them. The other survived her injuries and only has minor burns scars on her neck and shoulders.

On June 19, a teen was struck by lightning in Acworth. The victim in that incident survived after a friend quickly summoned help by flagging down an Acworth police officer near the intersection of Lake Acworth Drive and West Lakeshore Drive.

On May 3, lightning struck the MARTA rail line between the Vine City and Ashby stations, causing crews to close the line for one day. MARTA officials said it was the worst lightning strike to affect MARTA in 30 years.

For 2007, the latest data the Georgia Department of Community Health could provide, there were three lightning-related deaths in Georgia. Since 1994, the most lightning-related deaths was five in 1999.

There were 50 Georgia emergency room visits and nine hospitalizations for 2007.

Nate Mayes, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service said there is a lot of cautionary information people should know about lightning.

"Most people are struck by lightning before the storm hits," Mayes said. "The lightning can be at the front of the storm and it doesn't seem dangerous yet."

Mayes also listed precautionary measures such as staying indoors or inside vehicles during a thunderstorm and avoiding open fields and bodies of water. He also warned that lightning can travel through metal pipes and phone lines, so it is best to not take showers or baths during a thunderstorm, or to talk on a land line phone.

"The best thing you can do is listen," Mayes said. "Lightning causes thunder. When you see lightning, start counting. Every five seconds that pass until you hear thunder is a mile in [distance]."

--Staff writer Marcus K. Garner contributed to this report.