The expanse of endless space and the relative lack of other humans in space is no comfort when the astronauts begin seeing strange lights. That's exactly what happened to astronaut Don Pettit in 2012, who described seeing flashing lights in space. He claimed to have seen blue flashes as he was dozing off at his sleep station, saying they were “like luminous dancing fairies”.
Danish astronaut Andreas Mogensen on board the ISS in 2015 captured an incredible light show on Earth that could explain the strange blue lights. The culprit, scientists believe, is a weather phenomenon that is obstructed from view on Earth but is visible from space. “I am very pleased with the result and that researchers will be able to investigate these intriguing thunderstorms in more detail soon,” Mogensen said.
The thunderstorms supposedly generated opposing charges in the atmosphere, which caused giant columns of brilliant blue electricity to discharge over seven miles above the clouds, into space. Ranging between 83 to 125 milliseconds, Mogensen needed a high-speed camera to capture images of the lightning columns, easily explaining why astronauts could barely catch a glimpse of the phenomenon. Even though the source of the “fairy lights” has been identified, scientists still can't explain it.
No comments:
Post a Comment