© P. Horálek/ESORed sprites (right) captured from ESO’s VLT platform by Petr Horálek.
At the ESO's observatories located high in the Atacama Desert of Chile, amazing images of distant objects in the Universe are captured on a regular basis. But in
January 2015, ESO photo ambassador Petr Horálek captured some amazing photos of much closer phenomena:
red sprites flashing in the atmosphere high above distant thunderstorms.
The photo above was captured from ESO's Paranal Observatory.
A few days earlier during the early morning hours of Jan. 20 Petr captured
another series of sprites from the La Silla site,
generated by a storm over Argentina over 310 miles (500 km) away.
Sprites spotted from ESO’s La Silla observatory by Petr Horálek (left horizon)
So-named because of their
elusive nature, sprites appear as clusters of red tendrils above a lighting flash, often extending as high as 55 miles (90 km) into the atmosphere. The brightest region of a sprite is typically seen at altitudes of over 40-45 miles (65-75 km).
Because they occur high above large storms, only last for fractions of a second and emit light in the portion of the spectrum to which our eyes are the least sensitive, observing sprites is notoriously difficult.
Comment: There have been reports of flooding all over the world in the past month. Is California next? See the map below for flooding reported in the month of January of this year.