This is the moment a huge lightning strike hits just a few centimetres away from a car on a Russian motorway.

The lightning, which almost hit the car, scared the people on the Chelyabinsk-Troitsk motorway in the Chelyabinsk region of the Southern Urals in southern Russia as they travelled in heavy rain.

The dashcam footage was filmed on the busy, slow-moving motorway during bad weather, with the driver of the car filming swearing as the bolt of lightning hits the ground in front of him and almost burns a car nearby.

A storm warning had been issued in the Chelyabinsk region at the time, with the footage showing it raining heavily at the time, with the driver’s wipers going back and forth across the windscreen.

According to weather forecasts, rain, showers, hail and squally gusts of wind were expected in a number of areas.

Due to weather conditions, locals were advised to refrain from long-distance travel.

Chelyabinsk is the administrative centre and largest city of Chelyabinsk Oblast in Russia.

It is the seventh-largest city in Russia, with a population of over 1.1 million people.