![]() ![]() ![]() The first video recording of a TLE was captured accidentally on Jwhen researcher R.C Franz left a camera running overnight to view the night sky. TLEs generally last anywhere from less than a millisecond to more than 2 seconds. TLEs are secondary phenomena that occur in the upper atmosphere in association with underlying thunderstorm lightning. The acronym ELVES (“ Emission of Light and Very Low Frequency perturbations due to Electromagnetic Pulse Sources”) refers to a singular event which is commonly thought of as being plural. Other types of TLEs include sprite halos, ghosts, blue jets, gigantic jets, pixies, gnomes, trolls, blue starters, and ELVESs. ![]() C-sprites exhibiting tendrils are sometimes called “carrot sprites”. C-sprites (short for “columniform sprites”) is the name given to vertical columns of red light. Sprites are flashes of bright red light that occur above storm systems. There are several types of TLEs, the most common being sprites. Transient luminous events have also been observed in far-ultraviolet images of Jupiter's upper atmosphere, high above the altitude of lightning-producing water clouds. 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. Upper-atmospheric lightning is believed to be electrically induced forms of luminous plasma. 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 and storm clouds. ![]() The colors are also produced through gas excitations of the gas molecules in the atmosphere, particularly nitrogen.Discovery image of a TLE on Jupiter by the NASA Juno probe. Seen from above, lightning storms also produce less well-known emissions of blue or red light above the clouds, known as jets and sprites. The distinctive blue-white color of lightning is caused by light emitted as the electrons drop back to their original energy states. Nitrogen, the dominant gas in the atmosphere, is excited by this strong flow of energy, its electrons moving to higher energy states. Lightning is visible as a flash of light because of both incandescence (due to its high temperature it glows blue-white) and luminescence (excitation of nitrogen gas in the atmosphere). The flash reaches temperatures of about 30,000 K. In successive discharges, surrounding pockets of charge in the cloud follow this path to earth. Once the first of these leaders reaches the ground, the electrostatic forces are free to flow to earth in a brief and high-voltage discharge. In a chain reaction, "leaders" form tracks spreading like branches through the air below the cloud, breaking down the air molecules into charged particles. For a time, the air insulates them from each other, but then the electrostatic difference reaches a point where the electric flash begins to form. Pockets of positive and negative charge develop within the cloud, and eventually reach a size big enough to induce an opposite charge at a point on the ground below. Electrical excitation is at play in both the lightning and the bridge, which is lit with vapor lamps.įorked lightning is a huge discharge of electricity between heavy cumulonimbus clouds and the ground. Above right, lightning dances across the charged skies over Sydney Harbour and the Harbour Bridge. ![]()
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