Why the photographer behind this image called it 'Lucky strike'

'After years of trying I finally got my lightning and rainbow picture”

McCown named his image Lucky Strike (Greg McCown/ Facebook)

A storm chaser from Arizona has watched one of his photographs go viral after taking a rare shot of a lightning bolt striking through the middle of a rainbow completely by chance.

Greg McCown, 42, who works as a real estate agent but has been storm chasing since 2004 after taking up photography as a hobby, took the once-in-a-lifetime shot by accident while driving down a highway in Marana.

Sharing the picture on Facebook McCown wrote: “Finally! After years of trying I finally got my lightning and rainbow picture. What an awesome evening.”

“Found it just in time as this was the last bolt to strike before the storm dissipated into nothing”.

Finally! After years of trying I finally got my lightning and rainbow picture. What an awesome evening. I headed out...

Posted by Greg McCown on Saturday, 8 August 2015

In honour of the serendipitous nature of the image, McCown named his image "Lucky Strike", telling the Weather Channel that the combination of the rainbow, powerful lightning bolt and the saguaro cactus was something he had never seen before.

“I've only seen the potential for lightning mixed with a rainbow on four or five occasions," he said, "And I've only been able to try and photograph it three of those times, taking thousands and thousands of pictures, but no luck.”

The picture is being called “The shot of the year” by other photographers and storm chasers, and so far the picture has received nearly a quarter of a million likes on Facebook and been shared 118,000 times.