ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen (who happens to the first astronaut from Denmark) was tasked during his mission on the International Space Station (ISS) with documenting red sprites and blue jets in order to understand more about them. Blue jets happen in cone shapes above thunderstorm clouds, and are not related to lightning. Elves, Sprites & Blue Jets: Earth's Weirdest Lightning Elves - Like sprites, elves are reddish, ultra-fast bursts of electricity bright enough to see during the daytime high in the Earth's atmosphere. share: alienaddicted. Blue jets are cones of blue light brighter than sprites that spray upward from the tops of thunderclouds up to an altitude of about 25 miles (40 kilometers) at speeds of about 22,370 mph (36,000 km/h). Red sprites and blue jets. Watch this short presentation by Mogenson about his experience photographing electrical storms: Profuse activity of blue electrical discharges at the tops of thunderstorms. One of the blue jets observed reached 25 miles (40 km) above sea level. Transient Luminous Event (TLE) are flashes and glows that appear above storms that are results of activity occurring in and below those storms. Red sprites and blue jets Access the video. Spent 7. Blue Jets . Chasing Red Sprites and Blue Jets: Photos Jason Ahrns, a graduate student at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, goes sprite-chasing at night during electrical storms. The ISS offers an optimal observation point with its low orbit available at around 400 km altitude. Read more about this image . The bizarre discharges have been called red sprites, blue jets, pixies and even elves. Citing Literature . NASA is investigating cloud top lightning phenomena, which includes red sprites, blue elves, and gamma ray bursts, with sensors on the International Space Station. sprite.gi.alaska.edu. Related displays of atmospheric electricity -- 'red sprites' and 'blue jets' -- inspire awe too. In views from the International Space Station, a mysterious set of electrical discharges shine above a roiling thunderstorm in Earth's upper atmosphere. Several years later, the optical signatures of these events were named 'sprites' by researchers to avoid inadvertently implying physical properties that were, at the time, still unknown. Iconography, science and lightning figures At a meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco last week, researchers unveiled theories to explain the phenomena, dubbed red sprites and blue jets. Andreas Mogensen, a European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut who flew … Red sprites, Blue jets and Elves are three principal types of upper atmospheric optical phenomena which are collectively known by atmospheric physicists as Transient Luminous Events (TLEs). Lightning phenomena: sprites, elves and blue jets There are different types of lightning (or electrical discharges) that occur well above the realm of the thunderstorms that we experience in the troposphere (the lowest layer of earth’s atmosphere as it runs as high as about 17 km above earth’s surface). In the 1920s, the Scottish physicist C.T.R. Atmospheres: Atmospheric Phenomena : Red Sprite : High-altitude flashes excited by lightning which occur between the tops of some thunder clouds and the ionosphere, first reported by Franz et al. Here, in Marin, weather(all types) is a wonderful addition to my world after growing up in LA. Related displays of atmospheric electricity -- 'red sprites' and 'blue jets' -- inspire awe too. Also, blue light doesn't travel through the air as well as red, and high-speed cameras are less sensitive to blue. The image shows lightning strikes illuminating clouds over Western Australia during a thunderstorm. Related displays of atmospheric electricity -- 'red sprites' and 'blue jets' -- inspire awe too. These optical emissions, known as red sprites and blue jets, occur between the tops of some thunderstorms and the ionosphere. This large red sprite was observed over a thunderstorm in the Midwest; the top of the sprite is higher than 280,000 feet (85 km); the tendrils beneath the sprite are as low as 195,000 feet (60 km). Red sprites are interpreted as the downward streamers of varying cross sections launched from plasma patches in the lower ionosphere, which are caused by the electric field generated by the lightning discharge. Previously unrecorded form of optical activity above thunderstorms blue jet is a album., natural phenomena Support: $ 396,882 Source: NASA Period: 6/1/97-5/31/2000 Abstract Looking for red sprites, jets. Entwined this is a wonderful addition to my world after growing up in LA awe.! 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