![Jovian Transient Luminous Event](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Jovian_Transient_Luminous_Event.png)
Upper-atmospheric lightning and ionospheric lightning are terms sometimes used by researchers to refer to a family of short-lived electrical-breakdown phenomena that occur well above the altitudes of normal
lightning
Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electric charge, electrically charged regions, both in the atmosphere or with one on the land, ground, temporarily neutralize themselves, causing the instantaneous ...
and storm clouds. Upper-atmospheric lightning is believed to be electrically induced forms of luminous
plasma
Plasma or plasm may refer to:
Science
* Plasma (physics), one of the four fundamental states of matter
* Plasma (mineral), a green translucent silica mineral
* Quark–gluon plasma, a state of matter in quantum chromodynamics
Biology
* Blood pla ...
. The preferred usage is transient luminous event (TLE), because the various types of electrical-discharge phenomena in the upper atmosphere lack several characteristics of the more familiar tropospheric lightning.
Transient luminous events have also been observed in
far-ultraviolet
Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nanometer, nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 Hertz, PHz) to 400 nm (750 Hertz, THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than ...
images of
Jupiter's upper atmosphere, high above the
altitude
Altitude or height (also sometimes known as depth) is a distance measurement, usually in the vertical or "up" direction, between a reference datum and a point or object. The exact definition and reference datum varies according to the context ...
of lightning-producing water clouds.
Characteristics
There are several types of TLEs, the most common being
sprites. Sprites are flashes of bright red light that occur above
storm
A storm is any disturbed state of the natural environment or the atmosphere
An atmosphere () is a layer of gas or layers of gases that envelop a planet, and is held in place by the gravity of the planetary body. A planet retains an atmos ...
systems. C-sprites (short for “columniform sprites”) is the name given to vertical columns of red light. C-sprites exhibiting tendrils are sometimes called “carrot sprites”. Other types of TLEs include sprite halos, ghosts, blue jets, gigantic jets, pixies, gnomes, trolls, blue starters, and ELVESs. The acronym ELVES (“
Emission of Light and
Very Low Frequency
Very low frequency or VLF is the ITU designation for radio frequencies (RF) in the range of 3–30 kHz, corresponding to wavelengths from 100 to 10 km, respectively. The band is also known as the myriameter band or myriameter wave a ...
perturbations due to
Electromagnetic Pulse
An electromagnetic pulse (EMP), also a transient electromagnetic disturbance (TED), is a brief burst of electromagnetic energy. Depending upon the source, the origin of an EMP can be natural or artificial, and can occur as an electromagnetic fie ...
Sources”) refers to a singular event which is commonly thought of as being plural. TLEs are secondary phenomena that occur in the upper atmosphere in association with underlying
thunderstorm
A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorms are someti ...
lightning
Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electric charge, electrically charged regions, both in the atmosphere or with one on the land, ground, temporarily neutralize themselves, causing the instantaneous ...
.
TLEs generally last anywhere from less than a
millisecond
A millisecond (from '' milli-'' and second; symbol: ms) is a unit of time in the International System of Units (SI) equal to one thousandth (0.001 or 10−3 or 1/1000) of a second and to 1000 microseconds.
A unit of 10 milliseconds may be called ...
to more than 2 seconds. The first video recording of a TLE was captured accidentally on July 6, 1989 when researcher R.C Franz left a camera running overnight to view the night sky. When reviewing the video taken, two finger-like vertical images appeared in two frames of the film. The next known video recordings of a TLE were taken in 1989, when the Shuttle Mission STS-34 was conducting the Mesoscale Lightning Observation Experiment. On October 21, 1989 TLEs were recorded during orbits 44 and 45.
TLEs have been captured by a variety of
optical recording The history of optical recording can be divided into a few number of distinct major contributions. The pioneers of optical recording worked mostly independently, and their solutions to the
many technical challenges have very distinctive features, su ...
systems, with the total number of recent recorded events (early 2009) estimated at many tens-of-thousands. The global rate of TLE occurrence has been estimated from satellite (
FORMOSAT-2) observations to be several million events per year.
History
In the 1920s, the Scottish physicist
C.T.R. Wilson predicted that electrical breakdown should occur in the atmosphere high above large thunderstorms.
[C. T. R. Wilson (1924) "The electric field of a thundercloud and some of its effects," ''Proceedings of the Physical Society of London'', 37 (1) : 32D-37D. Available on-line at]
University of São Paulo
.[Earle R. Williams (November 2001) "Sprites, elves, and glow discharge tubes," ''Physics Today'', 54 (11) : 41–47. Available on-line at]
''Physics Today''
. In ensuing decades, high altitude electrical discharges were reported by aircraft pilots and discounted by
meteorologist
A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists in research, while t ...
s until the first direct visual evidence was documented in 1989. 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. The terms ''red sprites'' and ''blue jets'' gained popularity after a video clip was circulated following an aircraft research campaign to study sprites in 1994.
Sprites
![StarStaX 00017 f23990-00017 f24033 eclaircirV5](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/StarStaX_00017_f23990-00017_f24033_eclaircirV5.jpg)
Sprites are large-scale
electrical discharge
An electric discharge is the release and transmission of electricity in an applied electric field through a medium such as a gas (ie., an outgoing flow of electric current through a non-metal medium).American Geophysical Union, National Research C ...
s which occur high above a
thunderstorm
A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorms are someti ...
cloud, or
cumulonimbus
Cumulonimbus (from Latin ''cumulus'', "heaped" and ''nimbus'', "rainstorm") is a dense, towering vertical cloud, typically forming from water vapor condensing in the lower troposphere that builds upward carried by powerful Buoyancy, buoyant air ...
, giving rise to a quite varied range of visual shapes. They are triggered by the discharges of
positive lightning between the thundercloud and the ground.
The phenomena were named after the mischievous
sprite, e.g., Shakespeare's
Ariel
Ariel may refer to:
Film and television
*Ariel Award, a Mexican Academy of Film award
* ''Ariel'' (film), a 1988 Finnish film by Aki Kaurismäki
* ''ARIEL Visual'' and ''ARIEL Deluxe'', 1989 and 1991 anime video series based on the novel series ...
or
Puck,
[Fro]
page 128
of: John Friedman, ''Out of the Blue: A History of Lightning'' (New York, New York: Random House, Inc., 2008):
"Dr. Davis Sentman of the University of Alaska, one of the few scientists studying these luminous, ghostlike phenomena .e., sprites named the eerie flashes of colored lights after Shakespeare's mischievous spirits of the air — Ariel in ''The Tempest'' and Puck in "A Midsummer Night's Dream." and is also a
bacronym
A backronym is an acronym formed from an already existing word by expanding its letters into the words of a phrase. Backronyms may be invented with either serious or humorous intent, or they may be a type of false etymology or folk etymology. The ...
for Stratospheric/mesospheric Perturbations Resulting from Intense Thunderstorm Electrification.
They normally are colored reddish-orange or greenish-blue, with hanging tendrils below and arcing branches above. They can also be preceded by a reddish halo, known as a sprite halo. They often occur in clusters, reaching to above the
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...
's surface. Sprites have been witnessed thousands of times.
[Walter A. Lyons and Michey D. Schmidt (2003)]
P1.39 The Discovery of Red Sprites as an Opportunity For Informal Science Education.
American Meteorological Society
The American Meteorological Society (AMS) is the premier scientific and professional organization in the United States promoting and disseminating information about the Atmospheric sciences, atmospheric, Oceanography, oceanic, and Hydrology, hydr ...
. Retrieved on February 18, 2009. Sprites have been held responsible for otherwise unexplained accidents involving high altitude vehicular operations above thunderstorms.
File:RedSprite.jpg
File:Sprites-Argentina-2014-02-02.png
File:Red sprite lightning seen from ISS (ISS031-E-010712).jpg, A red sprite as seen from the ISS
File:Red sprite in Hungary.jpg
Jets
Although jets are considered to be a type of upper-atmospheric lightning, it has been found that they are components of tropospheric lightning and a type of cloud-to-air discharge that initiates within a thunderstorm and travels upwards. In contrast, other types of TLEs are not electrically connected with tropospheric lightning—despite being triggered by it. The two main types of jets are ''blue jets'' and ''gigantic jets''. ''Blue starters'' are considered to be a weaker form of blue jets.
Blue jets
![Gigantic jet NOIRLab](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6a/Gigantic_jet_NOIRLab.jpg)
Blue jets are believed to be initiated as "normal" lightning discharges between the upper positive charge region in a thundercloud and a negative "screening layer" present above this charge region. The positive end of the
leader
Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets vi ...
network fills the negative charge region before the negative end fills the positive charge region, and the positive leader subsequently exits the cloud and propagates upward. It was previously believed that blue jets were not directly related to lightning flashes, and that the presence of
hail
Hail is a form of solid precipitation. It is distinct from ice pellets (American English "sleet"), though the two are often confused. It consists of balls or irregular lumps of ice, each of which is called a hailstone. Ice pellets generally fal ...
somehow led to their occurrence.
[Fractal Models of Blue Jets, Blue Starters Show Similarity, Differences to Red Sprites](_blank)
/ref> They are also brighter than sprites and, as implied by their name, are blue in color. The color is believed to be due to a set of blue and near-ultraviolet
Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nanometer, nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 Hertz, PHz) to 400 nm (750 Hertz, THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than ...
emission lines from neutral and ionized molecular nitrogen
Nitrogen is the chemical element with the symbol N and atomic number 7. Nitrogen is a nonmetal and the lightest member of group 15 of the periodic table, often called the pnictogens. It is a common element in the universe, estimated at se ...
. They were first recorded on October 21, 1989, on a monochrome
A monochrome or monochromatic image, object or palette is composed of one color (or values of one color). Images using only shades of grey are called grayscale (typically digital) or black-and-white (typically analog). In physics, monochrom ...
video of a thunderstorm on the horizon taken from the Space Shuttle
The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program na ...
as it passed over Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
. Blue jets occur much less frequently than sprites. By 2007, fewer than a hundred images had been obtained. The majority of these images, which include the first color imagery, are associated with a single thunderstorm. These were taken in a series of 1994 aircraft flights to study sprites.['Red Sprites & Blue Jets – the vide]
'Blue Jets & Blue Starters – the vide
More recently, the source and formation of blue jets has been observed from the International Space Station
The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ...
.
Blue starters
Blue starters were discovered on video from a night time research flight around thunderstorms[Examples may be seen in the clip 'Blue Jets & Blue Starters – the video]
and appear to be "an upward moving luminous phenomenon closely related to blue jets." They appear to be shorter and brighter than blue jets, reaching altitudes of only up to 20 km.[Blue jets](_blank)
"Blue starters appear to be blue jets that never quite make it," according to Dr. Victor P. Pasko, associate professor of electrical engineering.
/ref>
Gigantic jets
Where blue jets are believed to initiate between the upper positive charge region and a negative screening layer directly above this region, gigantic jets appear to initiate as an intracloud flash between the middle negative and upper positive charge regions in the thundercloud. The negatively charged leader then escapes upward from the cloud toward the ionosphere before it can discharge within the cloud. Gigantic jets reach higher altitudes than blue jets, terminating at 90km. While they may appear to be visually similar to carrot-type sprites, gigantic jets differ in that they are not associated with cloud to ground lightning and propagate upward from the cloud at a slower rate.
Observations
On September 14, 2001, scientists at the Arecibo Observatory
The Arecibo Observatory, also known as the National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center (NAIC) and formerly known as the Arecibo Ionosphere Observatory, is an observatory in Barrio Esperanza, Arecibo, Puerto Rico owned by the US National Science F ...
photographed a gigantic jet—double the height of those previously observed—reaching around into the atmosphere. The jet was located above a thunderstorm over an ocean, and lasted under a second. The jet was initially observed to be traveling up at around at a speed similar to typical lightning, increased to , but then split in two and sped upward with speeds of at least to the ionosphere
The ionosphere () is the ionized part of the upper atmosphere of Earth, from about to above sea level, a region that includes the thermosphere and parts of the mesosphere and exosphere. The ionosphere is ionized by solar radiation. It plays an ...
where it then spread out in a bright burst of light.
On July 22, 2002, five gigantic jets between in length were observed over the South China Sea
The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by the shores of South China (hence the name), in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan and northwestern Phil ...
from Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
, reported in ''Nature''. The jets lasted under a second, with shapes likened by the researchers to giant trees and carrots.
On November 10, 2012, the Chinese Science Bulletin reported a gigantic jet event observed over a thunderstorm in mainland China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
on August 12, 2010. "GJ event that was clearly recorded in eastern China (storm center located at 35.6°N,119.8°E, near the Huanghai Sea
The Yellow Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean located between mainland China and the Korean Peninsula, and can be considered the northwestern part of the East China Sea. It is one of four seas named after common colour terms ...
)".
On February 2, 2014, the Oro Verde Observatory of Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
reported ten or more gigantic jet events observed over a thunderstorm in Entre Ríos south. The storm center was located at 33°S, 60°W, near the city of Rosario
Rosario () is the largest city in the central provinces of Argentina, Argentine province of Santa Fe Province, Santa Fe. The city is located northwest of Buenos Aires, on the west bank of the Paraná River. Rosario is the third-most populous ci ...
.
On August 13, 2016, photographer Phebe Pan caught a clear wide-angle photo of a gigantic jet on a wide-angle lens while shooting Perseid meteors
The Perseids are a prolific meteor shower associated with the comet Swift–Tuttle. The meteors are called the Perseids because the point from which they appear to hail (called the radiant) lies in the constellation Perseus.
Etymology
The name ...
atop Shi Keng Kong peak in Guangdong province
Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...
and Li Hualong captured the same jet from a more distant location in Jiahe, Hunan, China.
On March 28, 2017, Photographer Jeff Miles captured four gigantic jets over Australia.
On July 24, 2017, the Gemini Cloudcam at the Mauna Kea Observatory
The Mauna Kea Observatories (MKO) are a group of independent astronomical research facilities and large telescope observatories that are located at the summit of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, United States. The facilities are located ...
in Hawaii captured several gigantic jets as well as ionosphere-height gravity waves
In fluid dynamics, gravity waves are waves generated in a fluid medium or at the interface between two media when the force of gravity or buoyancy tries to restore equilibrium. An example of such an interface is that between the atmosphere ...
during one thunderstorm.
On October 16, 2019, pilot Chris Holmes captured a high-resolution video of a gigantic jet from 35,000 feet (10.6 km) above the Gulf of Mexico near the Yucatán Peninsula.[Phillips, T. (October 25, 2019). Close encounter with a gigantic jet. Retrieved from https://spaceweatherarchive.com/2019/10/25/close-encounter-with-a-gigantic-jet/] From 35 miles (56 km), Holmes's video shows a blue streamer reach up from the top of a thunderstorm to the ionosphere, becoming red at the top. Only then does a brilliant white lightning leader crawl slowly from the top of the cloud, reaching about 10% of the height of the gigantic jet before fading.
On September 20, 2021, at 10:41 pm (02:41 UTC) facing NE from Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, photographer Frankie Lucena recorded a video of a gigantic jet plasma event which occurred over a thunderstorm in the area.
On June 13, 2022, northern Kansas, U.S.A, photographe
Paul M Smith
captured several gigantic jet events over a thunderstorm. The farthest north they have been recorded.
Types
Elves
ELVES ( Emission of Light and Very Low Frequency
Very low frequency or VLF is the ITU designation for radio frequencies (RF) in the range of 3–30 kHz, corresponding to wavelengths from 100 to 10 km, respectively. The band is also known as the myriameter band or myriameter wave a ...
perturbations due to Electromagnetic Pulse
An electromagnetic pulse (EMP), also a transient electromagnetic disturbance (TED), is a brief burst of electromagnetic energy. Depending upon the source, the origin of an EMP can be natural or artificial, and can occur as an electromagnetic fie ...
Sources) often appear as a dim, flattened, expanding glow around in diameter that lasts for, typically, just one millisecond
A millisecond (from '' milli-'' and second; symbol: ms) is a unit of time in the International System of Units (SI) equal to one thousandth (0.001 or 10−3 or 1/1000) of a second and to 1000 microseconds.
A unit of 10 milliseconds may be called ...
.[ELVES, a primer: Ionospheric Heating By the Electromagnetic Pulses from Lightning](_blank)
/ref> They occur in the ionosphere
The ionosphere () is the ionized part of the upper atmosphere of Earth, from about to above sea level, a region that includes the thermosphere and parts of the mesosphere and exosphere. The ionosphere is ionized by solar radiation. It plays an ...
above the ground over thunderstorm
A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorms are someti ...
s. Their color was unknown for some time, but is now believed to be red. ''ELVES'' were first recorded on another shuttle mission, this time recorded off French Guiana
French Guiana ( or ; french: link=no, Guyane ; gcr, label=French Guianese Creole, Lagwiyann ) is an overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France on the northern Atlantic ...
on October 7, 1990. That ELVES was discovered in the Shuttle Video by the Mesoscale Lightning Experiment (MLE) team at Marshall Space Flight Center
The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), located in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama (Huntsville postal address), is the U.S. government's civilian rocketry and spacecraft propulsion research center. As the largest NASA center, MSFC's first ...
, AL led by the Principal Investigator, Otha H."Skeet" Vaughan, Jr.
ELVES is a whimsical acronym
An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...
for Emissions of Light and Very Low Frequency Perturbations due to Electromagnetic Pulse Sources.[The Free Dictionary – ELVES](_blank)
/ref> This refers to the process by which the light is generated; the excitation of nitrogen
Nitrogen is the chemical element with the symbol N and atomic number 7. Nitrogen is a nonmetal and the lightest member of group 15 of the periodic table, often called the pnictogens. It is a common element in the universe, estimated at se ...
molecules due to electron
The electron ( or ) is a subatomic particle with a negative one elementary electric charge. Electrons belong to the first generation of the lepton particle family,
and are generally thought to be elementary particles because they have no kn ...
collisions (the electrons possibly having been energized by the electromagnetic
In physics, electromagnetism is an interaction that occurs between particles with electric charge. It is the second-strongest of the four fundamental interactions, after the strong force, and it is the dominant force in the interactions of a ...
pulse caused by a discharge from an underlying thunderstorm).
Trolls
TROLLs (Transient Red Optical Luminous Lineaments) occur after strong sprites, and appear as red spots with faint tails, and on higher-speed cameras, appear as a rapid series of events, starting as a red glow that forms after a sprite tendril, that later produces a red streak downward from itself. They are similar to jets.
Pixies
Pixies were first observed during the STEPS program during the summer of 2000, a multi-organizational field program investigating the electrical characteristics over thunderstorms on the High Plains High Plains refers to one of two distinct land regions:
* High Plains (United States), land region of the western Great Plains
*High Plains (Australia)
The High Plains of south-eastern Australia are a sub-region, or more strictly a string of adja ...
. A series of unusual, white luminous events atop the thunderstorm were observed over a 20-minute period, lasting for an average of 16 milliseconds each. They were later dubbed 'pixies'. They are less than 100 meters across. They are not related to lightning.
Ghosts
Ghosts (Green emissions from excited Oxygen in Sprite Tops) are faint, green glows that appear within the footprint of a red sprite, remaining after the red has dissipated, and fading away in milliseconds. Though possible examples of Ghosts can be seen in historical images, Ghosts were first noted as an exclusive phenomenon by storm chasers Hank Schyma
Hank Schyma, also known as Pecos Hank, is a musician, songwriter, filmmaker and professional Storm chasing, storm chaser based in Houston, Texas. He has fronted the rock group Southern Backtones for over fifteen years. During the same period, he ...
an
Paul M Smith
in 2019.
No scientific journal papers have been published on these phenomena. Their green glow has been speculated by observers to come from excited oxygen atoms, much as how auroras appear green.
Other
There is a type of lightning that is a small, brief spike of light that points upward from a thunderstorm cloud's anvil top, caused as strong updrafts push moist air above the anvil. It lasts for only a few microseconds. It is about 200 meters wide, and is a maximum of 1 kilometer in height. Its color is unknown as it has only been observed in black-and-white footage.
See also
* Aurora
An aurora (plural: auroras or aurorae), also commonly known as the polar lights, is a natural light display in Earth's sky, predominantly seen in high-latitude regions (around the Arctic and Antarctic). Auroras display dynamic patterns of bri ...
* Heat lightning
Heat lightning, also known as silent lightning, summer lightning, or dry lightning (not to be confused with dry thunderstorms, which are also often called dry lightning), is a misnomer used for the faint flashes of lightning on the horizon or o ...
* Schumann resonances
The Schumann resonances (SR) are a set of spectrum peaks in the extremely low frequency (ELF) portion of the Earth's electromagnetic field spectrum. Schumann resonances are global electromagnetic resonances, generated and excited by lightning ...
* Sprite (lightning)
Sprites or red sprites are large-scale electric discharges that occur high above thunderstorm clouds, or cumulonimbus, giving rise to a varied range of visual shapes flickering in the night sky. They are usually triggered by the discharges of ...
* St. Elmo's fire
St. Elmo's fire — also called Witchfire or Witch's Fire — is a weather phenomenon in which luminous plasma is created by a corona discharge from a rod-like object such as a mast, spire, chimney, or animal hornHeidorn, K., Weather Element ...
* Steve (atmospheric phenomenon)
''yes'Steve is a masculine given name, usually a short form (hypocorism) of Steven or Stephen
Notable people with the name include:
steve jops
* Steve Abbott (disambiguation), several people
* Steve Adams (disambiguation), several people
* Steve ...
References
External links
Homepage of the Eurosprite campaign, itself part of the CAL (Coupled Atmospheric Layers) research group
Quote: "...Red sprites and blue jets are brief but powerful lightning-like flashes that appear at altitudes of 40–100 km (25–60 miles) above thunderstorms..."
*
* Barrington-Leigh, C. P., "
ELVES
: Ionospheric Heating By the Electromagnetic Pulses from Lightning (A primer)''". Space Science Lab, Berkeley.
* "
'". Space Physics Group, University of Otago.
* Gibbs, W. Wayt, "
Sprites and ELVES : Lightning's strange cousins flicker faster than light itself
'". San Francisco. ScientificAmerican.com.
* Barrington-Leigh, Christopher, "
VLF Research at Palmer Station
'".
Sprites, jets and TLE pictures and articles
High speed video (10,000 frame/s) taken by Hans Stenbaek-Nielsen, University of Alaska
Livescience article, 2007.
*
Video evidence
* Pictures and video of two separate gigantic jets above Oklahoma
Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...
Gigantic jets between a thundercloud and the ionosphere.
* http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20020914103454/http://elf.gi.alaska.edu/
The Endless, Short film inspired by Sprite
Cloud Flashes , ZT Research
{{DEFAULTSORT:Upper-Atmospheric Lightning
Electrical phenomena
Lightning
Space plasmas
Weather hazards
Light sources