An astronomer recently captured one of the most detailed snapshots ever of a rare type of upward-shooting red lightning, known as a sprite, which briefly levitated through the air like a giant jellyfish during a thunderstorm over central Europe.
Stanislav Kanyansky, an astronomer at the Banska Bystrica Observatory in Slovakia, caught the sprite near his home in Latky, Slovakia, in August. 14, Spaceweather.com mentioned. The luminous, squiggly structure was more than 31 miles (50 kilometers) long and lasted for only a few milliseconds before disappearing.
Spurts, or stratospheric disturbances caused by the electrification of severe thunderstorms, are created when electrical discharges from lightning shoot upwards, often in addition to their normal downward path. These discharges create long strands of plasmaor ionized gas, in the ionosphere – the ionized part of Earth’s atmosphere that begins about 50 miles (80 km) above the Earth’s surface, according to NASA.
Sprites are very difficult to photograph because they are fleeting and often obscured by thick clouds. But Kaniansky’s orientation enabled him to take a closer look at the phenomenon. “The thunderstorm was about 320 kilometers (200 miles) away, which gave me a good view of the atmosphere just above the cloud tops,” he told Spaceweather.com.
The image is “one of the most detailed images of an object ever made,” according to Spaceweather.com.
Related: This stunning time-lapse image captures 100 lightning bolts blazing in the sky over Türkiye
Orcs were It was officially discovered in the early 1990s When NASA space shuttles took the first clear pictures of this phenomenon. But studying red lightning has proven difficult because it is short-lived.
Scientists now believe that orcs may be Partly caused by disturbances in the atmospheric plasma It’s caused by little things like meteorsBut the exact mechanism behind this phenomenon is still not clear.
And on August 20, the goblins were too Photographed over lightning strikes from Hurricane Franklin Puerto Rico also passed.
Sprites are part of a group of phenomena known as transient luminous events (TLE) that are all associated with lightning. Other TLEs include blue jets, which are more powerful and energetic versions of orcs and elves, or light emission and extremely low frequency perturbations due to electromagnetic pulse sources, which are transient rings of red light created when electromagnetic pulses (EMPs) released from lightning striking the ionosphere.
Other TLEs are also very rare but have become easier to image thanks to advances in technology. And in 2019, instruments aboard the International Space Station took pictures Pictures of a giant blue plane from space. This phenomenon was also seen along with the 2018 lightning strike in Oklahoma. It is suspected to be the strongest of its kind ever recorded. And in April of this year, a photographer in Italy took a strange picture of a ring-shaped dwarf, which It seems to be hanging over town like a UFO.
