Red Lightning: 15 Mysterious Phenomena - How Many Have You Seen?

5. Gigantic Jets: Bridging Earth and Space

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Probably the most amazing and unusual kind of red lightning are giant jets. Up to 90 km separate these large electrical discharges from the top of thunderclouds all the way to the ionosphere. Rising to greater altitudes, gigantic jets—bright blue stems—transition to crimson, producing an amazing visual link between Earth and space. Originally found in 2001, giant jets are quite unusual and just few dozen incidents have been recorded globally. They are thought to happen when the electrical charge in a thundercloud gets so strong that it crosses the charge barrier at the top of the cloud, therefore providing a direct passage to the ionosphere. Scientists are quite interested in giant jets since they offer a special chance to investigate the electrical interaction between the upper and lower atmosphere. These occurrences could be very important in the global atmospheric electrical circuit since they single, huge discharge large amounts of charge between the troposphere and the ionosphere.