Astronauts Reveal The Shocking Beauty of Lightning From Space
If you live on this planet Earth, odds are good that you've experienced a lightning storm in your life: a wild, crashing affair, with forks of light that split the sky, accompanied by the bone-rattling roar of thunder.
Although lightning is common here on Earth, there is still a lot we don't know about this extreme phenomenon. Scientists have set up all sorts of apparatus to find out, and have made great strides in teasing out some of the split-second processes that go into a bolt of lightning.
Sometimes, however, a new perspective can be helpful – and this is where astronauts aboard the International Space Station can help. Using techniques developed by legendary NASA astronaut Don Pettit, they photograph powerful lightning storms as they soar 400 kilometers (250 miles) above the planet's surface.
That's the subject of recent images posted to social media by NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, currently serving stints aboard the space station as crew members of Expedition 73.
Each image is captured at speeds of 120 frames per second; the brilliant violet glow that seems to light up the clouds from within appears for just a fraction of that time.
Observations of lightning from above the clouds can reveal details about the phenomenon that we cannot see from here on the surface. We didn't know about the upside-down lightning phenomenon of blue jets, for instance, until it was spotted from a rocket; space-based observations were crucial to understanding how it worked.
Satellite data can also be used to study the frequency and distribution of storms, and has revealed the propagation of 'killer' electrons that fly out into space when lightning flashes in the atmosphere. The interaction between lightning and the upper atmosphere is poorly understood; orbital observations can help scientists study it.
Sometimes, however, it's nice to do a thing just because you can. Not everyone gets the cachet of being able to manually photograph one of Earth's most spectacular, untamed phenomena from hundreds of kilometers above the surface.
And then we get to enjoy them, from right here, wherever you're reading these words. Everyone gets to be a winner.
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The Hill
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- The Hill
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