Red Sprite Lightning over the Andes
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What are those red filaments in the Night Sky? They are a rarely seen form of lightning confirmed only about 30 years ago: Red Sprites.
Recent research has shown that following a powerful positive cloud-to-ground lightning strike, Red Sprites may start as 100-meter balls of ionized air that shoot down from about 80-km high at 10 percent the speed of light. They are quickly followed by a group of upward streaking ionized balls.
The featured image was taken earlier this year from Las Campanas Observatory in Chile over the Andes Mountains in Argentina. Red Sprites take only a fraction of a second to occur and are best seen when powerful Thunderstorms are visible from the side.
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