• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

New Types Of Lightning: Sprites, Jets, Elves, etc.

Sprites in the Jovian atmosphere.

Jupiter may be the first planet besides Earth known to host atmospheric light shows called “sprites” or “elves.”

Sprites (SN: 6/14/02) and elves (SN: 12/23/95) are two kinds of atmospheric glows that form when lightning alters the electromagnetic environment in the atmosphere above a storm. On Earth, these electromagnetic upsets cause nitrogen molecules in the upper atmosphere to emit a brief, reddish glow. Sprites can brighten a region of the sky tens of kilometers across, while elves can span hundreds of kilometers (SN: 12/21/96).

Scientists suspected these atmospheric phenomena might appear on other planets that crackle with lightning (SN: 6/19/18). But until now, no one had seen hints of sprites or elves on another world.

From 2016 to 2020, the ultraviolet spectrograph on NASA’s Juno spacecraft, in orbit around Jupiter, caught 11 superfast flashes of light across the giant planet. Those flares, reported online October 27 in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, lasted an average 1.4 milliseconds, which is about as fleeting as sprites and elves on Earth. The ultraviolet light was at wavelengths emitted by molecular hydrogen — the type of glow expected of sprites or elves on Jupiter, whose atmosphere is made mostly of hydrogen, rather than nitrogen. ...

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/jupiter-atmospheric-lights-sprites-elves-earth
 
What about Steve? Does Steve exist on other planets?
 
Absolutely. We haven't seen it yet, but auroras are commonplace, so STEVE should occur as well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_(atmospheric_phenomenon)
160px-Optical_Steve.jpg

I'd be interested to see what auroras look like on some of the exoplanets out there; neon and sodium, for instance, are cosmically abundant, so should be present in the atmospheres of some or many planets. Red neon aurorae would be intriguing, and so would yellow aurorae on worlds with sodium-rich atmospheres.
 
There are some photos out there of aurora on Jupiter. It looks like a halo.
 
Comfortably Numb said:
There are various potential threads...

If previously unseen, I wondered if this might be of interest.

It features some remarkable footage.

Click to expand...
Viewing through this video clip, I believe I've stumbled on a UFO in the midst of this 'sprite' storm sequence.
So, I've sequenced clips of the journey of this 'UFO/Object' at each significant change of it's form and path...

*Capture A ~ the beginning of it's flight path.
A.jpg

*Capture B ~ object splits into two lights
B.jpg

*Capture C ~ object changes angle of climb
C.jpg

*Capture D ~ changes form and flight path - now
shows up as being one object
D.jpg

*Capture E ~ object diminishes in size and stops...
E.jpg

*Capture F ~ object changes course after making an
instant 90 degree turn, then vanishes completely!
F.jpg
 
Sid said:
Viewing through this video clip, I believe I've stumbled on a UFO in the midst of this 'sprite' storm sequence.
Click to expand...
Tremendous work and that is really interesting...!

Thank you and if I had a spare Blue Peter badge to hand... :D
 
Sid said:
Viewing through this video clip, I believe I've stumbled on a UFO in the midst of this 'sprite' storm sequence.
So, I've sequenced clips of the journey of this 'UFO/Object' at each significant change of it's form and path...

*Capture A ~ the beginning of it's flight path.
View attachment 32335
*Capture B ~ object splits into two lights
View attachment 32336
*Capture C ~ object changes angle of climb
View attachment 32339
*Capture D ~ changes form and flight path - now
shows up as being one object
View attachment 32340
*Capture E ~ object diminishes in size and stops...
View attachment 32341
*Capture F ~ object changes course after making an
instant 90 degree turn, then vanishes completely!
View attachment 32342
Click to expand...
Why is this not a plane?
 
Sharon Hill said:
Why is this not a plane?
Click to expand...
Hi 'Sharon:' Well, it just strikes me as being more than just 'a bit odd' that if it is a plane as you suggest, would it take off and fly around and into an electrical storm like that one. Also the fact that it appears to quickly change it's flight path, form and angle several times before it reaches the apex of it's flight path, then make a sudden fast and short (as it appears to be) 90 degree turn and then to vanish altogether. I think those are good enough reasons to suggest the question of "what exactly is captured in this video?"
 
Frideswide said:
when it stops, isn't it just moving directly towards or away from us?
Click to expand...
Light is constant - doesn't appear to blink in the turn?
Also, If it was moving forward, towards the camera it would not disappear so quickly as it does, I would suggest.
 
Some things to bear in mind about the video ...

(1) Sprites occur far above thunderclouds / thunderstorms - at a minimum altitude of circa 50 km / 30 miles. In the video the tops of the thunderclouds are receding (moving farther away in the distance) and low near the horizon. The aircraft isn't anywhere near the thunderstorm in terms of horizontal position, and it's even farther away from the sprites in terms of vertical distance.

(2) The apparent speed of the aircraft is a result of the time lapse recording. If you watch the transient movement in the scene (essentially limited to the reflections on the water surface) it's apparent the sequence is 'in fast forward' as a result of the time lapse setting on the camera.

Frideswide said:
when it stops, isn't it just moving directly towards or away from us?
Click to expand...

It could be either one, because interpreting orientation and direction depends on multiple factors - e.g., whether the aircraft lighting includes taxi / landing lights that are extinguished upon reaching altitude and (if moving toward the viewer) if the aircraft simply moves out of frame or attains an orientation where a marker light isn't visible from ground level.
 
I say it's a normal aircraft turning. I also saw another one in another part of the video that flies more directly. Aircraft can operate in storms, especially when they are not in the immediate area. This is the far simpler explanation than UFO.
 
Sharon Hill said:
I say it's a normal aircraft turning. I also saw another one in another part of the video that flies more directly. Aircraft can operate in storms, especially when they are not in the immediate area. This is the far simpler explanation than UFO.
Click to expand...
You're assumption is probably the simpler (easiest) explanation ~ as it does look like there could be an airport in the immediate area (seeing as the second plane takes a more direct line of take-off). It's just that the one in question seems to take on a different guise as it makes it's more erratic climb and final sudden turn.
 
Last edited:
Not so much new as rare (seems most suitable thread?).

The following video captures effects of 'anvil crawler lighting', or 'spider lighting', during an, "extremely unique" storm and I thought it might be of interest.

See the video description notes for further background information.

 
Sharon Hill said:
I say it's a normal aircraft turning. I also saw another one in another part of the video that flies more directly. Aircraft can operate in storms, especially when they are not in the immediate area. This is the far simpler explanation than UFO.
Click to expand...
Does anyone have an Idea what this capture might be, which occurs a little later in the video?
It isn't a shooting star, or a plane as it's lit full length is constant for the time it is in view, if it's a physical object then it must be extremely large, and it leaves a visual contrail?
*See: 'Comfortably Numb' #36 above for video.
*
Whats this.jpg
 
Last edited:
Sid said:
Does anyone have an Idea what this capture might be?
*See video above... 'Comfortably Numb' #36
Click to expand...
After watching this object come into view, then move towards it's final disappearance, it seems that it's a meteorite - approaching - then falling through Earths atmosphere - and finally - burning up!
 
Last edited:
Recently analyzed data and images captured from orbit have provided clues for better understanding what blue jets represent ...
Mysterious, Upside-Down Lightning May Not Be a Freak Phenomenon After All

One kind of lightning is so strange and rare, in fact, that we didn't even have concrete evidence it existed until 1990, when researchers identified its signature 'rocket-like' motion in video shot from NASA's Space Shuttle the previous year.

Later dubbed 'blue jets', the streaks are now recognised as brilliant flashes of light that last just a few hundred milliseconds, as lightning streaks upwards from the clouds and into the stratosphere. ...

We can't easily see this phenomenon beneath a curtain of clouds - but that doesn't mean scientists can't observe it from above them. Some 400 kilometres (250 miles) above the planet orbits the International Space Station, and for some time, instruments aboard have been watching for these mysterious flashes of upside-down lightning.

Now, after being installed in 2018, a European Space Station observatory equipped with optical sensors, photometers, and detectors for gamma and X-radiation has recorded five blue flashes from the top of a storm cloud, one of which ended with a blue jet streaking high into the stratosphere.

These rare glimpses provide some valuable insight into the onset of the mysterious discharges ...

On 26 February 2019, the Atmosphere-Space Interactions Monitor (ASIM) observatory recorded five blue flashes, around 10 microseconds long each, in the top of a stormcloud, not far from the island of Nauru in the Pacific Ocean.

One of these flashes produced a blue jet, reaching as far as the stratopause - the interface between the stratosphere and the ionosphere, at an altitude of about 50 to 55 kilometres (around 30 to 34 miles).

In addition, the observatory recorded atmospheric phenomena called ELVES (short for Emission of Light and Very Low Frequency perturbations due to Electromagnetic Pulse Sources). These are expanding rings of optical and ultraviolet emission in the ionosphere that appear above storm clouds, lasting just a millisecond or so ...

Red emission from the leader, however, was faint and very limited. This, the research team said, suggests that the leader itself is very short and localised, compared to fully developed lightning leaders between the ground and clouds.

This also suggests that the flashes and the blue jet itself are a type of discharge streamers: branched, writhing sparks striking out of high voltage sources, like Tesla coils, on a chain-reaction of ionising air particles.

"We propose then, that the UV pulses are elves that are generated by the streamer flash currents, rather than by lightning currents," the researchers write in their paper.

The flashes, they believe, are similar to narrow bipolar events. These are high-power radio-frequency discharges that occur inside clouds during thunderstorms, which are known to trigger lightning within the cloud. The blue flashes in the cloud tops, the team said, are likely the optical equivalent of this phenomenon, and can develop into blue jets. ...
Click to expand...

FULL STORY:
https://www.sciencealert.com/rare-a...wn-blue-jet-lightning-might-not-be-so-unusual

PUBLISHED REPORT (Bibliographic Details & Abstract Only):
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-03122-6
 
I know meteorologists started to study in the 90's because there was these puffs shot up into space from top of clouds as lightning was coming out the bottom of the clouds. It was viewed on a satellite. It looks similar to Enolas post above!
 
Last edited:
Here's an even more recent photo of red sprites, captured at the European Southern Observatory in Chile.

RedSprites-Chile-2208.jpg
Rarely Seen 'Red Sprites' Have Been Glimpsed in The Sky Above Chile

This new image, taken of the skies above Chile's Atacama Desert near the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) La Silla Observatory, shows bright red streaks in the sky known as red sprites.

Red sprites are large-scale electrical discharges that occur high above thunderstorm clouds, usually triggered by the discharges of positive lightning between an underlying thundercloud and the ground.

However, the red sprites appear high in Earth's atmosphere, sometimes 50-90 kilometers (31 to 55 miles) in altitude.

People have been telling folktales for centuries about mysterious red lights in the sky, which were usually dismissed by experts. ...

According to the Farmer's Almanac, even when respectable pilots or scientists (including CTR Wilson, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist) described them, the scientific community ignored the events. ...

However, in 1989, scientists from the University of Minnesota actually captured pictures of red sprites, and the attitude about them has since changed. ...

The red sprites appear low on the horizon, only due to the perspective of the camera, located on the platform of ESO's 3.6-meter (12-foot) telescope at La Silla. The background of the photograph shows a green hue, known as airglow. ...
Click to expand...
FULL STORY: https://www.sciencealert.com/rarely-seen-red-sprites-have-been-glimpsed-in-the-sky-above-chile
 
Red Sprite captured on camera by ESA astronaut

Astronaut Andreas Mogensen snapped the photos using a very powerful camera as part of the Thor-Davis experiment at Danish Technical University (DTU).

Scientists estimate the size of the red sprite in the image taken by the ESA astronaut is roughly 14 by 26km (8.7 by 16.2 miles) in size.

A red sprite is an example of a remarkable weather event known as a Transient Luminous Event (TLE).

It's also sometimes referred to as red lightning, and takes place above thunderclouds that are between 40 and 80 kilometres (25 - 50 miles) above ground.

A red sprite happens incredibly quickly - in about a millisecond - which can make it tricky for scientists to capture and observe them.

Also, as the red sprites form above thunder clouds, they are not easily studied from Earth and are mostly seen from space.
However, learning more about them can provide valuable information about things going on in the upper-atmosphere.
Click to expand...

There’s also a short video of a ‘blue jet’, another TLE

1701962095898.png
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top