Student Takes Rare Photos of Red Sprites

Becky Oskin’s piece in livescience explains how this stunning image of the elusive red lightning called sprites was taken:

Sprites last less than a second as they dance on the tops of thunderstorms. Many viewers say the clusters of charged particles look like jellyfish — big, red balls with tendrils that reach down into theclouds. But red sprites take many shapes, from crowns to carrots, and researchers still don’t why. Because few sprites are seen from the ground, thanks to obscuring storms, scientists are hunting them from the air.

Graduate student Jason Ahrns captured stunning images of spritesduring several flights over the Midwest this summer aboard the National Center for Atmospheric Research’s Gulfstream V research plane. Ahrns is part of a sprite-hunting team from University of Alaska, Fairbanks, the U.S. Air Force Academy and Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colo. [See Ahrns’ Stunning Images of Sprites]