Sprites captured

[Stu]

Amazing pictures. I knew these existed but don't think I had seen genuine images of them before?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-39728714

[Davey-T]

Seem to remember some images of them taken from the ISS.

Dave

[Pompey Monkey]

Good link.

Shame the Beeb can't tell the difference between the Magenellic Clouds and aurora though.

[Stu]

15 minutes ago, Pompey Monkey said:

Good link.

Shame the Beeb can't tell the difference between the Magenellic Clouds and aurora though.

Is the Aurora not the coloured light down towards the horizon?

[laudropb]

Good post. Never heard of them Stu. Time to go on google.

[Stu]

42 minutes ago, Davey-T said:

Seem to remember some images of them taken from the ISS.

Dave

Now you mention it Dave, that does ring a bell....

https://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view.php?id=78487

[Pompey Monkey]

1 hour ago, Stu said:

Is the Aurora not the coloured light down towards the horizon?

Could be. I thought it was light pollution. Just goes to show what I "expect" to see in images of the night sky  

[Stu]

4 minutes ago, Pompey Monkey said:

Could be. I thought it was light pollution. Just goes to show what I "expect" to see in images of the night sky  

I'm not totally sure, but I assume that to capture sprites you must have to be far away from light domes like that, so it must be the aurora...

[Ravenous]

Quite a few decent sprite photos have been taken in recent years.  Some examples:

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150204.html

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap151220.html

http://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1505b/

(Hope the links work for you.)

[Stu]

Thanks Ravenous, they worked although I could not immediately see one in the last image?

The first one I found surprising because it seems to be unconnected to a cloud/lightning event?

[Ravenous]

@Stu in the last image, the sprite is very distant, on the horizon, at the left of the image.  Right on top of the hill to the left of the smallest dome.  You have to go to the bottom of the page to "Image formats" and download one of the large-ish images to see it in detail.

I just realised there's another page that shows a bit more detail of the same image:

http://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1505a/

In these cases, it seems the thunderstorm that causes them is so far away it's over the horizon. We're getting a glimpse of the sprites that are sitting above the main thundercloud, I think...