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| Sprites, Lomonosov Moscow State University |
With more and more thunderstorms rumbling across the country it's time to mention that we have entered the season of the sprites. A sprite is a member of a family of upper atmosphere lightning phenomena called transient luminous events or TLE's. Other members of the TLE family include blue jets and elves. They are associated with thunderstorms and although observed earlier were unknown to science a little more than a generation ago. Digital photography and advanced computer technology enabled both their imaging and analysis beginning around 1995.
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| Centre Nationales D'Etudes Spatiales |
I find these atmospheric events fascinating, beautiful, and mysterious but the probability of observing them in real time is practically nil. I have yet to see one in person. For certain I won't be seeing anything from my woodland home in Georgia or the eastern U.S. for that matter. When you find yourself in a thunderstorm-rich location with unlimited visibility beyond the horizon you have found the ideal conditions for LTE observation. In other words, our readers in Oklahoma, Texas, and other wide open spaces need only step out on the porch and into a comfortable chair to enjoy the possibility of seeing a rare and still mysterious show in the distant sky.
Below is an amazing video by the quintessential storm chaser, Pecos Hank, and the world's leading TLE photographer, Bill Smith. It's ten minutes of breathtaking photography and excellent instruction in what could be a complex subject for non-science folks. I can only hope the high standards of science instruction found in this video is in every classroom in the US.
This video is one of many on Pecos Hank's You Tube channel. If you enjoy weather science and storm chasing combined with high production values Pecos Hank is your destination.
Keep looking up!
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