---
title: "Researcher's  ‘Mixed-Reality’ Game Teaches Lightning Safety to Kids"
date: 2025-04-08T05:30:00-04:00
author: University of Maryland
canonical_url: "https://today.umd.edu/game-keeps-players-virtually-safe-from-lightning"
section: Articles
---
# Researcher's  ‘Mixed-Reality’ Game Teaches Lightning Safety to Kids

*April 8, 2025* — by [Cazzy Medley](/author/cazzy-medley)


> VR Headset Provides Immersive Learning Experience About the Dangers, Wonders of Thunderstorms

*Faraday Lightning Safety 1920x1080 1 1 — A car protects a cartoon owl from a lightning strike in a mixed-reality game designed to teach lightning safety that was designed by a UMD researcher and created with help from a student team.*

Generally, University of Maryland atmospheric scientist Guangyang Fang would advise you not to walk out into a violent thunderstorm. These days, though, he’s encouraging people to go look for that lightning strike—but only in virtual reality.

Fang recently released Faraday Lightning Safety, a mixed-reality game available for free at the Meta Store that might represent the future of geoscience education. The brief game demonstrates how the “Faraday cage effect”—a phenomenon where an enclosed conductive structure shields its interior from external electric fields by redistributing charges and blocking electromagnetic waves—can protect people from lightning during a thunderstorm.

“Instead of just looking at a diagram or reading an explanation, virtual reality and mixed reality let you step inside a concept,” said Fang, a visiting assistant research scientist at UMD’s Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center currently researching lightning detection and physics. “You can walk around a thunderstorm, see lightning strikes in real time, view everything from a top-down omniscient perspective, and immediately understand how protection works, which is tough to achieve with traditional methods.”


*video game setting with rain falling and lightning striking a small wooden house with owl inside*



**Sidebar note:**

“Faraday Lightning Safety” is available for[ free download on the Meta Quest store](https://www.meta.com/experiences/8916168031765951/), and is compatible with Meta Quest 2, Quest Pro, Quest 3 and Quest 3S headsets. A video demo of Faraday Lightning Safety can be found[ at the website](https://sites.google.com/view/xr-cisess/virtual-proving-ground-lab#h.7ngv7lmbkhcd). The game will be demonstrated at the ESSIC booth on Maryland Day, the University of Maryland open house event on April 26.





**Topics:** [Research](https://today.umd.edu/tags/research)


**Tags:** [Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality](https://today.umd.edu/topic/augmented-reality-virtual-reality), [Research Impact](https://today.umd.edu/topic/research-impact), [Research](https://today.umd.edu/topic/research)


**Units:** [College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences](https://today.umd.edu/topic/college-computer-mathematical-and-natural-sciences), [Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center](https://today.umd.edu/topic/earth-system-science-interdisciplinary-center)