For the sake of this question, it doesn’t have to do with the terrain.
In: Physics
> it doesn’t have to do with the terrain.
It has everything to do with the terrain.
Terrain is what causes thunder to roll. The rolling is the thunderclap echoing off of the terrain around you so that instead of the mighty snap you get a long rumble.
When the lightning is close to you, you hear the thunderclap immediately, unfiltered by the terrain so it’s loud, sharp, and short. When the lightning is farther away, you hear the echoes. Keep in mind that lightning has three dimensions to move through. It can be directly over your head and still be far away from you just by being very high up, and the sound gets muffled by clouds before echoing off of the terrain.
My mention of the terrain was only me thinking that there would be more rumbling and echoing in mountainous terrain than in a flatter area, such as where we live. Last night we listened to thunder claps both very short and very long over the course of just a few minutes. Made us wonder about the reason.
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